The Leafs Nation: Elliotte Friedman on the Leafs Morning Take on the Toronto Maple Leafs and what area they may be looking at adding at the trade deadline.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Nick Alberga: “Alright Elliotte, lets get into the conversation. Obviously the trade deadline March 3rd. Looking forward to Sunrise next weekend as well. I’m sure you’ll be there. So the trade conversation, is there a certain player that comes to mind right away that you think would be a perfect fit for the Toronto Maple Leafs right now?
Friedman: “Well I’m one of those people who wonders if they should be looking more at forward than defense. I am. But I think what the question is, not what we think, it’s what do they think.
And I think since Muzzin’s been out, there default as been, we have to get a defenseman that plays like Muzzin does.
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Now I think at times cause the way their D has played this year, that they have, I don’t know if ‘wavered’ is the right answer, but I do think internally they have thought, ‘are we good enough here to go start focusing on something else?’
And the number one thing I think they said internally is, ‘we have time.’ Cause they probably won’t be able to do much until right before the deadline. So we better, but we better be sure.
I think the way their D has played has given them some rethinking on this. I just think at the end of the day, look, there’s the regular season and there’s the playoffs. They are two different leagues.
And people blame the referees. I get it. But the bottom line is, I’m one of those people who believe that players change more than the officials do. That you can not play 28 games in the playoffs. Sorry, you can not play 82 games in the regular season like you play 28 games in the playoffs. It’s just not possible. I think it’s a rougher, meaner, nastier game and I think that they. Like put it this way, any defenseman who could be available, I think they’ve called on them.
I think they’ve called the team and said, ‘What are you thinking? What are you looking at? What’s it going to cost us? What are we going to need to do? And I think they’ve collected all that information.
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Any forward who’s been available, I think they’ve done that to some degree too. But I think the biggest question is going to be, what do they think they need, cause I do think it was a Muzzin type the moment he went down. But at the very least I think that they’ve reconsidered or taken a look at does this mean the way the D has played this year.”