The Toronto Maple Leafs announced the recalls of three skaters Sunday morning, calling up forwards Nicholas Robertson and Wayne Simmonds, as well as defenseman Victor Mete. These moves come after starting netminder Matt Murray was placed on long-term injured reserve Saturday, a move that gave a cap-strapped Maple Leafs team some more breathing room under the salary cap.
Toronto had been operating with a roster holding the bare-minimum eighteen skaters and two goalies. With Sunday's move, the team is utilizing all 23 of its allocated roster spots thanks to the additional room Murray’s LTIR placement provided.
Robertson and Simmonds are likely to start off as Toronto’s 13th and 14th forwards. In those roles, Robertson would likely fill in for any absences on the Maple Leafs’ scoring lines, while Simmonds would fill in for any absences in the team’s bottom six.
We covered earlier this month how the Maple Leafs were shopping Simmonds, a 1019-game veteran, but perhaps now that Simmonds has a place on Toronto’s NHL roster there won’t be the same sort of push to find a deal for him.
As for Mete, he was called up to in all likelihood serve as the team’s seventh defenseman. That’s a role that the 24-year-old should be able to handle capably, as he has had a place in NHL lineups since making his debut with the Montreal Canadiens in 2017-18.
The Maple Leafs are 2-1-0 and widely expected to be among the league’s best teams, although there has been concern about how well the team’s depth would hold up against the rigors of the NHL regular season. Now, we will see the organization’s depth face its first real test as these three players assume their roles as spare skaters in Toronto.
More must-reads: