The Toronto Maple Leafs may not have much breathing room on the cap or the roster, but there’s still a path to adding a little more competition before camp opens. With rumours still floating about former second overall pick Patrik Laine and other depth free agents, the Leafs could be eyeing one more move - or even a professional try-out or two - to shake out the depth chart.
That’s where a few late-summer names come into play.
Carson Soucy is one option worth keeping on the radar. The Leafs’ blue line already looks crowded, with Emil Andrae added and Ben Danford potentially pushing for the third pairing, but Soucy brings a different kind of value.
The 32-year-old is coming off a difficult season split between the New York Rangers and New York Islanders, finishing with 12 points in 76 games. Offense has never been his calling card anyway - he has 99 points in 441 career regular season games - but he does offer defensive-zone reliability, a physical edge and a willingness to block shots.
That kind of profile could help the Maple Leafs in front of their goaltending. He wouldn’t need to be a 75-game, 20-minute-a-night fixture to matter.
Even as a rotating third-pairing option, he’d bring more competition to a spot that currently includes Andrae, Danford and Troy Stetcher. And if an injury hits on the blue line, he’d give the organization a real depth option.
A PTO before the season would make sense.
Eeli Tolvanen is a different kind of candidate, but one with a case of his own. The 27-year-old just put up 12 goals and 36 points in 78 games for the Seattle Kraken, and he’s already got one 20-goal season on his résumé along with 190 points in 423 career regular season games.
The underlying numbers suggest there may be more there, too. His shooting percentage last season sat at 8.5 percent, the second-lowest mark of his career, well below his 12 percent career average.
He also logged the most average ice time of his career, a little over 16 minutes a night, which could mean he was being used in situations that didn’t exactly play to his strengths. He may not be the first PTO name that jumps out for a team with a bunch of depth options already, but he could still supply useful scoring and push the rest of the group in camp.
Then there’s the familiar face: James van Riemsdyk. The 37-year-old is still producing in a bottom-six role, coming off 15 goals and 31 points in 72 games last season.
He’s slowed down some, but he still gives a team net-front presence, and that matters on a second power-play unit with John Tavares handling that job on the first group. Van Riemsdyk hasn’t finished with fewer than 11 goals in any of the last four seasons, and he’s still playing around 11 to 12 minutes per game.
He also knows the market, knows what to expect, and would arrive with built-in familiarity from his previous time with the Maple Leafs. Add in the fact that he shares an agent, Judd Moldaver, with Auston Matthews, and a PTO starts to look like a low-risk way for Toronto to see what’s left in the tank.
With the first 84-game season set to get underway soon, the Leafs have some decisions to make. Whether any of these three are in camp or land somewhere else before the puck drops on the 2026-27 season, they’re at least the kind of names Toronto could consider if it wants a little extra competition without much commitment.
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