Maple Leafs News & Rumours: Drouin, O’Brien, Bobrovsky & August Questions

The interesting part is how the team could potentially fit him into the lineup. Toronto has some flexibility among its top nine, with Auston Matthews, Matthew Knies, William Nylander, John Tavares, Gavin McKenna, Jack Roslovic, Nick Paul and Easton Cowan giving the coaching staff plenty of combinations to work with.

Drouin isn’t coming in to replace any of those players, and nobody should expect him to suddenly become a top-line star. But he could provide another experienced puck distributor and some inexpensive offensive insurance. Injuries always happen. Having another player who can step into a middle-six role without completely changing the way a line operates isn’t a bad thing.

There is also a pretty obvious reason to be cautious. Drouin’s injury history is part of the reason he could be available for a PTO in the first place. His game has also tended to work better when he has talented players around him. When he has been asked to create everything himself, things haven’t gone nearly as well.

That’s not entirely different from what Toronto has seen with Max Domi. Drouin would essentially be another option for that kind of role. He’s certainly not the best offensive forward still available, but if he’s willing to come to camp on a PTO and compete for the final contract spot, the Maple Leafs could do worse than giving him a chance to show what he has left.

Andy O’Brien Has a Very Different Take on Sergei Bobrovsky’s Age

The other interesting question in Toronto is sitting in the crease. Sergei Bobrovsky is 37, and there is no way around the fact that the Maple Leafs are taking a fairly significant gamble on an older goaltender. But new Maple Leafs sport performance head Andy O’Brien doesn’t seem particularly concerned about the number beside Bobrovsky’s name.

In an appearance on TSN 1050’s First Up, O’Brien praised Bobrovsky’s training habits and suggested that his biological age is actually younger than his chronological age. That’s a strong endorsement of how the veteran takes care of himself.

The timing of those comments is interesting because Bobrovsky is coming off a tough regular season in Florida. He finished with a 27-23-1 record, a .877 save percentage and a 3.07 goals-against average. Those are obviously not the numbers Toronto is paying $7 million a year to get.

But there is a reason Bobrovsky was one of the most coveted goaltenders available, and the organization is betting that last season was not a good representation of what he still has left. Toronto also knows what Bobrovsky can do in the postseason. He has been one of the premier goaltenders of his generation, and he will reunite with Anthony Stolarz after the two shared the Panthers’ crease during their Stanley Cup run.

That makes O’Brien’s comments more than just an interesting sound bite. Toronto has one of the oldest rosters in the NHL. The team is now investing heavily in trying to improve the way its players prepare, recover and maintain their bodies, and Bobrovsky appears to be exactly the kind of athlete O’Brien believes can benefit from that approach.

John Chayka gave Bobrovsky a three-year contract worth $7 million annually, so the Maple Leafs are obviously betting that the bad numbers from last season don’t tell the whole story. Now they have a performance staff that believes his body isn’t showing the kind of wear and tear you might normally expect from a 37-year-old goaltender. That’s still something Bobrovsky will have to prove on the ice, but it gives Toronto another reason to believe the gamble might work.

The August Questions Are Getting Smaller

Neither of these stories is likely to dominate the headlines once training camp begins. Drouin would be a PTO candidate, not a major acquisition, and Bobrovsky will ultimately be judged by what happens when the puck drops rather than by what O’Brien thinks about his biological age.

Still, these are the kinds of decisions that can become important over an 84-game season. A player who provides a little more depth can matter when injuries hit, and a goaltender who maintains his level late in the season can make a huge difference.

That’s really where the Maple Leafs are now. Maybe neither story turns out to matter much. But in August, these are the questions worth asking. Toronto needs to make sure the pieces it already has — and perhaps one or two inexpensive additions — give the team enough options when the real test begins.