Cap casualty Timothy Liljegren has been traded to the San Jose Sharks.
The former 17th overall pick from 2017 has been traded seven and a half years later for a conditional third-round pick in 2025 (either Edmonton or Colorado’s pick), a sixth-round pick in 2026, and veteran bottom-pairing depth option Matt Benning.
Benning, a 30-year-old right shot with nearly 500 NHL games of experience spanning Edmonton, Nashville, and San Jose, is coming off of major hip surgery that ended his 2023-24 campaign last January. He’s averaged a career-low 13:02 TOI through seven games with the Sharks this season.
While Liljegren has proven himself to be a bona fide NHL defenseman over nearly 200 games in the league — a competent defender and puck mover — he struggled to establish a standout trait he could hang his hat on in Toronto. He never distinguished himself on either side of special teams, and he struggled to fully earn the trust of either Sheldon Keefe — or, for the past month and a half, Craig Berube — as either a shutdown defenseman or an offensive difference-maker. At playoff time, his role declined, often drastically, and he was a healthy scratch for at least one game in the last three postseasons.
The Leafs‘ once-barren right side also became much more crowded over the last six months. Jake McCabe has established himself as capable on his offside, summer signing Oliver Ekman-Larsson also has experience on the right, Conor Timmins quickly earned the confidence of Craig Berube, and right-shot Chris Tanev was added at the top of the depth chart over the offseason, to go along with new RD depth options Philippe Myers and (eventually, assuming he’s healthy enough) Jani Hakanpaa. If the Leafs hold onto him, Benning could now join this mix on the right, bringing ample NHL experience (including on the penalty kill), but with the caveat that he has played a very marginal role on a terrible team and has not been the same player after undergoing hip surgery, albeit it’s tough to evaluate any defenseman on a team in the Sharks’ position.
All of the above factors being as they may, the trade doesn’t necessarily shine as optimal asset management by the Leafs. Liljegren had arguably built up enough clout with his body of work over the past three seasons, including notable stretches handling top-four minutes at times of injury during the regular season, to earn a decent run of games to start this season, even if Berube had reservations about the player based on training camp and preseason.
After playing nearly 20 minutes a night last season with 23 points in 55 games and strong underlying numbers, Liljegren was signed to a two-year, $3 million AAV contract ahead of arbitration — clearly the numbers and contract of a capable NHL regular, and it’s cap space the team chose to allot to Liljegren and not other assets over the offseason. Camp and preseason only mean so much, and Liljegren was never given a proper look under the new head coach in real game action, playing all of 13 minutes. He was then dealt for relatively little, given the value of a young-ish right-handed defenseman who can handle 18-19 minutes competently and produce 25-30 points.
Conor Timmins has provided reasonable bottom-pairing minutes while playing 15:31 so far (including 2:14 on the PK), but he has a lot left to prove in terms of his durability and reliability defensively over an 82-game season. Liljegren, who is a year Timmins’ junior, has a much longer track record of excelling in a bottom-pairing role with some ability to competently elevate higher in the lineup on a spot-duty basis. Hakanpaa’s health status and the state of his game if/when he plays make him a question mark, to say the least. In addition to the long-term consideration for an older blue line when giving up on Liljegren, who is 25 and only just now approaching the 200-game mark — there is likely some room to grow still, knowing the average development curve at the position — he might’ve come in handy this year.
However, Connor Dewar, Calle Jarnkrok, and Hakanpaa are all on LTIR, expected to play a role this season, and eligible to return from LTIR as early as tomorrow; something had to give, and the writing was on the wall for weeks now. Liljegren played one game vs. LA (barely playing in it) and was not even used on a rotational basis as fresh legs in tired back-to-back situations. Berube flat-out did not like the player, and Liljegren earned far too much to play a fringe role on a capped-out team.
The Leafs grabbed a couple of draft picks — a 2025 conditional third and a 2026 sixth — and they definitely could benefit from the draft capital, whether it’s used at the podium or as trade ammunition. The Leafs previously owned just one pick in the first four rounds of the 2025 draft. Whether his best hockey is behind him remains to be seen, but Benning provides a veteran RHD depth option who is signed beyond the season at $1.25 million, which is just fractionally above the buriable amount (by $100k) if/when he is waived off the NHL roster. That means the Leafs can free up nearly the full $3 million of Liljegren’s deal, assuming Benning is waived (or the full amount if he’s flipped in a separate deal). It’s still not enough to activate all of their LTIR players without another trade or waiver move, but it gets them much closer.
