After a busy first day of free agency, it’s been quiet in Leafs Nation —almost too quiet.
Other than announcing a few depth signings on Tuesday, the Leafs haven’t made any major adds since Monday afternoon when brought in Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Anthony Stolarz.
We kicked off the show by talking about that a bit. Then, we touched on the remaining crop of free agents still out there. Vladimir Tarasenko is super intriguing. Of course, the 32-year-old is coming a Cup with Florida. Additionally, he won a Stanley Cup under Craig Berube in 2019, too. Some other names still available: Jack Roslovic, Tyler Johnson, James van Riemsdyk, Daniel Sprong, and Justin Schultz.
Presented by Greta Bar YYZ, we touched on the weirdness surrounding the Jani Hakanpaa situation. On Monday, all the insiders said the 6’7” defender was inking a two-year deal with Toronto. That said, that signing still hasn’t been made official. Furthermore, Steve Simmons of the Toronto Sun revealed over the past few days that Hakanpaa has a bad knee, and according to his sources, he may never play again. We’ll see what happens, but this is turning into a bizarre saga. Simmons added that the Leafs told him that their doctors had cleared Hakanpaa to be signed.
After that, we went over some of the key dates on Toronto’s 2024-25 schedule. Indisputably, the headliner will be Sheldon Keefe’s return to Scotiabank Arena on January 16th. The Leafs will kick off their season on October 9th in Montreal. Meantime, the one and only Brian Burke stopped by the show once again. We got his thoughts on Day 1 of free agency, the Mitch Marner situation, the crease, and if the Leafs should strip John Tavares of the captaincy.
Earlier this week, Sportsnet’s Nick Kypreos speculated that the Leafs could be mulling over a captaincy change. For what it’s worth, Rosey and I were strongly against it. With JT one year away from UFA, there’s no need to do it now —especially with Craig Berube now at the helm.
Anthony Stewart will be my co-host for Thursday’s show. Join us at 11 AM ET as we’ll be broadcasting LIVE from the Black Hockey Summit at the Scotiabank Pond in Toronto. Furthermore, a few current NHLers are expected to drop by the set.
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