The Toronto Maple Leafs’ transactions at the trade deadline are a clear indication that the team is in retool mode and out of playoff contention for the first time in ten seasons. With an unclear future for the team, trade chatter surrounding captain Auston Matthews has heated up.
The season is set to end on a rather disappointing note for the Team USA captain, who led his team to the gold medal at the recently concluded Milan-Cortina Olympic Games. He has two seasons left on his four-year, $53 million extension he had signed in the summer of 2023.
NHL insider Elliotte Friedman, on Sportsnet’s Saturday Headlines segment on Saturday, revealed that while Matthews wasn’t going to be traded at the deadline, the team is expected to discuss his future in the summer.
“I heard you guys in the first intermission talk about how Matthews looks and how much this is tough right now,” Friedman said. (1:15) “I just think—first of all, zero chance he’s getting dealt at the deadline—but I think at the end of the season, they’re going to sit down and have a conversation with him.
“It might actually not be right at the end of the year; they might wait a little bit to see how everything unfolds and what they decide to do and where they stand and where everything was going.”
The Leafs followed a different approach when they signed him to the new contract two and a half years ago. They got a deal in place a month before the 2023-24 regular season was set to start.
“The one thing that a couple of people reminded me of this week was he signed his current extension in August of 2023, but it was a year before he could even hit Unrestricted Free Agency,” Friedman added. “The Maple Leafs went down to meet with him in the summer, and the one thing he told them at that time was as long as it didn’t go off the rails, he was staying.”
The Leafs dealt Nicolas Roy and pending UFAs, Bobby McMann and Scott Laughton. There remain some key pieces around Matthews. William Nylander, Matthew Knies, John Tavares and Oliver Ekman-Larsson are all signed long-term. But Matthews’ own production has slowed down in the last two seasons. He has scored 130 points since the start of the 2024-25 season. In 2023-24 alone, he had 107 points
Elliotte Friedman believes Auston Matthews will be honest with Leafs about his future
The Maple Leafs are aware that they will be in line for a big trade haul if they were to move Auston Matthews to a club. Friedman believes that the Leafs captain would be aware of such a situation that could help Toronto’s probable rebuild.
“The one thing they feel very comfortable as an organization is that Matthews will not in any way put them in a bad spot,” Friedman said. “If there’s any reason to think that there’s anything negative going on here in terms of his future, he’s going to let them know. Right now, at this point in time, I don’t think he’s given them any indication that he’s unhappy or wants to go anywhere.”
Matthews’ trade might signal more moves from the Leafs. They could follow a similar path to the Vancouver Canucks. They traded their captain Quinn Hughes and have since made subsequent trades to pad up their picks for the upcoming years.
Edited by R. Nikhil Parshy
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