Reviewing a Really Interesting Toronto Maple Leafs Trade One Year Later.
The Toronto Maple Leafs made a surprising move one year ago when they traded Rasmus Sandin to the Washington Capitals at last year’s trade deadline.
The Toronto Maple Leafs were forced to make a decision on Sandin, who had just turned 23 (which doesn’t sound old, but it’s five years after he was drafted) because he was at the point in his career where he was about to change from a prospect to just another player who hadn’t quite established himself.
With the acquisition of Jake McCabe, the Leafs had too many left-side defenders and no real place to play Sandin. They had just picked up Erik Gustuffson and Luke Schenn to play the right side, but already had Rielly, McCabe and Giordano on the left.
Sitting Sandin in the playoffs would destroy his value, but he was just 23 and had excellent statistics so the Leafs were able to get a late first round pick for him.
At it’s core the trade was almost an automatic win for the Leafs, since they had drafted Sandin with a late first round pick in 2018, got to use him for 140 games, then traded him for practically the same pick they use don him.
But we all no trades have much more context than that, so let’s see how things have worked out a year later. (all stats naturalstattrick.com).
The Toronto Maple Leafs Trade of Rasmus Sandin
This is a hard trade to evaluate. I was a huge Sandin fan and I immediately panned the trade when it happened. A year later though, and I think it was a good move.
