NHL Power Rankings and Predictions

The Toronto Maple Leafs are going to be a poor team this year, but they should be better than last season. This will be the first season when most of the Leafs’ prospects will start getting significant playing time. Their kids are really good, but that tends to lead to a bad record. In the end though, it will be worth it.

Auston Matthews leads an impressive group of forwards. One of their biggest issues is a surplus at center, which could keep William Nylander or Matthews from being a center this season. That clearly contradicts Toronto’s long-term goals. Toronto could solve this issue by trading Tyler Bozak, but they’ll likely gamble on him starting strong and building up his trade value.

Their defense will be inexperienced, but it certainly has potential. Morgan Reilly is a very good defenseman, but is he great? He’ll have to make that turn in 2016-17. Jake Gardiner is quite solid, but he’ll likely be asked to do too much on a team that lacks depth. Martin Maricin is an analytics darling. However, the Leafs need to get him more playing time to determine if he’s a part of their long-term plan. He has been successful in a third pairing role and deserves a long look. Again, that’s likely counterproductive to winning now.

The Maple Leafs won’t win much in the 2016-17 NHL season. But things are definitely looking up.