Major trade involving three teams: another young forward is finally traded along with Ryan O'Reilly and Noel Acciari
As we mentioned late last night, the Toronto Maple Leafs have concluded a major transaction with the St. Louis Blues and the Minnesota Wild.
The deal, as announced by the Toronto Maple Leafs themselves, goes as follows:
Ryan O'Reilly & Noel Acciari
St. Louis receives:
Mikhail Abramov and Adam Gaudette
The Leafs' 2023 first round pick
The Sens' 2023 3rd round pick
Leafs' 2024 2nd round pick
Minnesota receives:
Leafs 2025 4th round pick (and they retain 25% of O'Reilly's salary)"
So in summary:
St. Louis retains 50% of O'Reilly's salary and Minnesota retains another 25%.
O'Reilly ($7.5 million per year contract) will therefore have an impact of less than $1.9 million on the Leafs' payroll
This is what made the trade possible.
Anyway, speaking of the trade, it's rare that we see this, but in their official announcement, the Toronto Maple Leafs (and all the journalists) forgot one thing.
As Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman just reported, the Maple Leafs are finally getting another element in the trade:
Josh Pillar.
It wasn't in the official announcement, but Toronto does get the young winger from the Saskatoon Blades in the WHL.
Pillar, 21, is a big winger with 12 points in 13 games this season and was drafted in 2021 by the Minnesota Wild.
It's interesting because the Leafs paid a 4th round pick to the Wild so that they would retain some of Ryan O'Reilly's salary, but in exchange they also received a recent 4th round pick.
So the Wild's holdback will have been virtually free for Toronto.
In the end, the Maple Leafs got three players:
- Ryan O'Reilly, Noel Acciari and Josh Pillar.
It's not a big name, but it's rare to see a team add something that was missing from their official release, especially when it's a trade:
| POLL | ||
Who won the trade? | ||
| Toronto | 41 | 46.1 % |
| St-Louis | 48 | 53.9 % |
| List of polls | ||
