A look at Brad Treliving's work two years into his tenure as Maple Leafs GM

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Happy anniversary, Brad Treliving.

In the two years since the Maple Leafs hired Treliving to be the 18th general manager in franchise history, the 55-year-old has set the team on a new course, one that took greater shape when head coach Craig Berube was brought on board last spring.

In a perfect Treliving world, the Leafs will be a team that evolves into one of the top defensively responsible outfits in the National Hockey League, to the point that it becomes an annual Stanley Cup contender.
In the wake of another frustrating exit from the playoffs, this time culminating in a Game 7 loss to the Florida Panthers in the second round, the Leafs aren’t there yet.

“We fell short of where we wanted to be, and we fell short of where I thought we could be,” Treliving said on Thursday at his end-of-season availability. “There was a style of play I felt we needed to get to (in hiring Berube). It’s a style of play that I feel gives you the best chance to have success. We’re seeing it.

“You see it prevalent in our division. It’s a direct style, it’s a style that you have to be a heavy, forechecking team.”

The loss to Florida aside, the Leafs have taken strides in Treliving’s two years in the GM chair.

Let’s take a look at the past 24 months:

THE TRADES

Of the trades that Treliving has made, including a couple of draft deals that included only picks, one stands out above the rest.

We take you back to last June, when Treliving sent minor-league forward Max Ellis (who played this past season in Finland) and a seventh-round choice in 2026 to the Dallas Stars for the rights to free agent defenceman Chris Tanev.

Treliving has earned a reputation as a GM whose curiosity has him checking in on just about every player who may be available. Yet his pursuit of Tanev was unwavering. Treliving coveted a reunion with Tanev after working with him with the Calgary Flames. And after he was unable to trade for Tanev at the 2024 trade deadline, Treliving made it work a few months later.

Within days, Tanev put his signature on a six-year contract with an average annual value of $4.5 million and the Leafs officially had their defensive linchpin.

Tanev quickly established himself as being representative of just about everything Treliving wants in his defencemen. When Tanev isn’t blocking shots, he’s sharp in the D zone and rarely gets caught out of position. Moving the puck is done with ease.

Tanev will turn 36 in December, but there wasn’t one instance in his first season with the Leafs where his age was a detriment.

Treliving gave an indication of the longer, bigger defencemen he envisioned as being the poster boys of the Leafs blue line when he acquired Ilya Lyubushkin and Joel Edmundson at the ’24 deadline. Both moved on in free agency last summer, but Treliving had laid the groundwork for his vision.

included saying goodbye to 2017 first-round pick Timothy Liljegren. Failure to adjust to the physical nature now required by Leafs D-men led Liljegren to being traded to the San Jose Sharks last October. A couple of draft picks and depth defenceman Matt Benning, who spent the rest of the season with the Toronto Marlies, were fetched by Treliving in the trade.

At the deadline this past March, Treliving continued the theme in acquiring Brandon Carlo from the Boston Bruins.
Treliving on Thursday referred to centre depth and right-shot defencemen as being “the spine” of a winning team, and with Tanev and Carlo, the Leafs have a couple of integral pieces on the back end.

Considering the package that Treliving sent to the Bruins, Carlo has little choice but to go up a notch next season. We can agree that centre Fraser Minten has a bright future in the NHL, and he’s bound to become a thorn in the Leafs’ side in future Atlantic Division clashes. And a conditional first-round pick (top-five protected) in the 2026 draft puts more pressure on the shoulders of Carlo, who has two years remaining, to excel.

Of the trades that Treliving has made involving the acquisition of forwards, the one that takes precedence is the most recent, getting Scott Laughton from the Philadelphia Flyers in a package that included prospect Nikita Grebenkin and a conditional first-round pick in 2027 (top-10 protected). Though the Leafs also received a 2025 fourth-rounder and a 2027 sixth-rounder, it was a steep price to pay for Laughton, who didn’t make the kind of impact the Leafs desired. The Flyers retained 50% of Laughton’s salary, so he’s going to cost the Leafs just $1.5 million in 2025-26 before his contract ends. He has to find improvement in his overall game next season.

THE SIGNINGS

Whether he would acknowledge it in a public forum, every GM has signed players to contracts that he comes to regret.

A month after he was hired, Treliving retained centre David Kampf with a four-year contract and an AAV of $2.4 million. It was a mistake, certainly a lot of money for a fourth-line centre, even with a rise in the salary cap. Before two years expired, Kampf was a healthy scratch in the 2025 playoffs. There has been speculation that he might be bought out. If so, the Leafs will manage to find a way without him.

Of the four players signed on July 1 two years ago, winger Ryan Reaves and defenceman John Klingberg were the biggest and neither panned out. The latter played in just 14 games before a hip injury ended his season. Reaves got three years with an AAV of $1.35 million. He played in three games after January this past season and with one year left, he probably has played in his last game with the Leafs.

Forwards Tyler Bertuzzi and Max Domi were signed a day later. Bertuzzi mostly was a disappointment and the Leafs had little inclination to re-sign him before he landed in Chicago.

Domi? Well, we have another three years to learn if he can become a bigger factor. He got a four-year deal with a $3.75-million AAV last summer after recording 47 points in 80 games in 2023-24 on a one-year pact. This past season was not a good one for Domi, as he finished with 33 points in 74 games.

In the summer of 2023, Treliving’s biggest signing splash came toward the end of August when Auston Matthews signed a four-year extension with an AAV of $13.25 million.

That made Matthews the highest-paid NHL player for 2024-25, though he will fall to second next season when the extension of Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl, with an AAV of $14 million, kicks in.

Playoff-wise, when it matters most, the Leafs are waiting on their return. Named captain last August, Matthews has three years remaining.

Less than five months after Matthews signed an extension, Treliving locked up another core piece when William Nylander signed early in January 2024 for eight years and an AAV of $11.5 million. It’s a good contract and one that will be more team-friendly as the cap continues to rise. Nylander is coming off a career-high 45 goals. He’s capable of 50.

With July 1 last year came the additions of goalie Anthony Stolarz and defenceman Oliver Ekman-Larsson.

Little more needs to be said about what Stolarz did in the first year of his two-year deal. He will be the No. 1 goalie going into camp. Ekman-Larsson proved to be a steady veteran presence on the blue line.

Goalie Joseph Woll signed a three-year extension on July 1. In total, the Leafs will be paying their goalies, both better than capable, $6.1 million in 2025-26. That’s good management.

Forwards Steven Lorentz and Max Pacioretty each made an impact after attending camp on a professional tryout, though Pacioretty couldn’t stay healthy. Lorentz is bound for free agency, though it would be prudent for the Leafs to re-sign him.

Treliving during the season locked up defenceman Jake McCabe (five years, $4.513 million AAV), a year after retaining D-man Simon Benoit (three years, $1.35 million AAV). We wouldn’t argue with either contract.

THE HIRINGS

Upon firing Sheldon Keefe just more than a year ago, Treliving said the players needed a “new voice” behind the bench. They certainly got one in Berube.

The latter’s reputation as an NHL lifer — first as a player with more than 1,000 games on his resume, then as an assistant coach and finally as a head coach, guiding the St. Louis Blues to the Stanley Cup in 2019 — preceded him.

In his first season as Leafs coach, Berube demonstrated an ability to walk a fine line with his players. He’s not a taskmaster who browbeats them into submission. At the same time, he keeps it tight and there aren’t many days when his players wonder about their status.

It was clear that Berube had the respect of the room from the get-go and that carried through the season to 108 points and an Atlantic Division title. Convincing a talent-laden group to play a heavier, north-south game didn’t take much time. As Berube has said, when the top players bought in early, the group followed.

The whispers regarding Treliving’s interest in Berube started in the hours after Keefe was dismissed. The Leafs are in good hands with Berube.

With Berube came new coaches on the staff, including Lane Lambert as an associate and Marc Savard as an assistant. Gone were Guy Boucher, Manny Malhotra and Dean Chynoweth. Lambert will have to be replaced after he was hired on Thursday by the Seattle Kraken to be its head coach.

Less than two weeks after Treliving became GM in Toronto, he brought aboard Shane Doan as a special adviser.

With Brendan Shanahan out of the picture and not to be replaced, you would think that Doan, Mr. Arizona Coyote, will become more of a sounding board for Treliving.

The 2025 draft, meanwhile, will be the first with Toronto for Leafs director of amateur scouting Mark Leach. Treliving added Leach, who spent the previous 11 years in various scouting roles with the Dallas Stars, last July following the departure of Wes Clark to the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Leach will have six picks at his disposal — two in the fifth round and one in each of the second, third, sixth and seventh rounds.

“He puts value on every pick,” Treliving said. “I know everybody should, but whether it’s a pick in the fourth or a pick in the seventh, or whatever you’ve got, his feeling is there are players to be found in every round.”

WHAT’S NEXT?

We don’t want to oversell the summer of 2025, but it’s kind of big for Treliving, isn’t it?

If the team gets the DNA change that Treliving figures it needs, he’s going to have to properly use the money that otherwise would have gone to Mitch Marner (assuming, as many do, that Marner departs).

The DNA change apparently is unlikely to include John Tavares, as both sides want to maintain the working relationship.

We agree with what Treliving said about Matthew Knies on Thursday — the sooner he gets that deal done, the better.

The trade market could bear fruit as the free-agent pool at forward is not brimming with high-end talent. The challenge is that Treliving doesn’t have many trade chips. If teams ask for Knies or top prospect Easton Cowan, what’s the point?

One way or another, Treliving, who likes his goaltending and defence, will have to invest in veteran forwards who know what is required to win and also can make an impact on the scoresheet.

tkoshan@postmedia.com

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