The Leafs shouldn’t consider trading Brandon Carlo, at least not right now: Alberga’s Take

Unless he’s included in a deal that makes the team undeniably better, it wouldn’t be a wise decision for the Toronto Maple Leafs to part with Brandon Carlo.

For some reason, it feels like people are in a hurry to deal the 28-year-old blue liner, and honestly, it’s a bit bewildering. To be fair, it’s probably because the Leafs don’t have many good assets to deal right now, so by process of elimination, Carlo’s name continues to come up. And, make no mistake about it, teams like him, but for me at least, he would be a very difficult guy to pry.

For starters, that discounted $3.485 million cap hit for the next two seasons is a thing of beauty. As time progresses, getting Carlo at that price tag will indirectly allow the Leafs to allocate important dollars elsewhere. That was a shrewd piece of business, it really was.

Barring severe regression, the Leafs should have no problem extracting incredible value from Carlo’s contract moving forward. On top of all that, steady, consistent, and mobile right-handed shooting defenders are hard to find. Afterall, a player of Carlo’s ilk has been on Toronto’s wish list for the better part of the past decade. Now that they have one, many fans want him gone before he’s barely even settled in.

Then, there’s Morgan Rielly. If you deal Carlo, you’re back to square one. For the umpteenth season in a row, the Leafs would be playing musical chairs in a scramble to find a suitable partner for the longest tenured Leaf. The sample size is relatively small, but in the brief time they spent together post trade deadline, the Rielly/Carlo pairing showed some promise. With Rielly not currently open to moving on from the only NHL team he’s ever known, it’s imperative that Toronto finds a way to get him back to the player that he was a few years ago. Personally, I think Carlo’s fully capable of helping with that, and ultimately, there’s no doubt that it played a factor in Brad Treliving’s decision to acquire him from Boston this past spring. They need time to grow together. Honestly, I wouldn’t be shocked to see Rielly have a bounce-back season of sorts, Carlo’s a perfect partner for him.

In the grand scheme of things, as a general manager, you’re always looking to better your roster. If that comes at the expense of dealing someone like Carlo, you obviously have to look into it. That said, now’s not the time to make a move like that. The best course of action is to start the year and see what materializes on the trade front as the season progresses. For example, maybe Calgary makes someone like Nazem Kadri available. At that point, it’s fair that someone like Carlo could enter the equation. But, for the time being, they shouldn’t be rushing to deal him.