Maple Leafs have found the next player on their roster they need to trade

With all the chatter about trading Morgan Rielly or prospects in a trade, the next player instead is a veteran who has fallen off quickly: Oliver Ekman-Larsson.

The Maple Leafs haven't had the greatest start to the season admittedly, and while there is still time to pull it together, things are a bit worrisome. The defense is still porous, they're taking too many penalties and relying on their PK to carry them, and goaltending has been okay, but still remains a question mark.

But you have to narrow it down and if you were to point to the biggest glaring issue it's undoubtedly the blue line. While Darren Raddysh has been solid, Jake McCabe doing his job, and Troy Stecher has thrived being a key part of the PK, others like Morgan Rielly haven't impressed - and Chris Tanev is out again.

Ekman-Larsson's time in Toronto may be coming to an end

The one player though who has had the worst start of all and arguably the steepest drop-off this year is Oliver Ekman-Larsson and it may be time for Toronto to think about moving on from him.

You have to give credit where credit is due, OEL has been fantastic over the past two seasons as not only an offensive catalyst, but someone whose elite stick-checking and defensive awareness has been an underrated asset.

2026-27 though? Yikes. He hasn't scored a point yet through 10 games, is a minus-3, has only six blocks, and has a ghastly 12 give-aways to only two takeaways.

He's fourth in defensive zone giveaways on the team, leads the team with 14 PIM already, and is responsible for a 0.05 Expected Goals/60 - worse than Bo Groulx, Brandon Duhaime, Teddy Blueger and Zack McEwen.

Whether it's an injury or something else holding him back, he looks a shell of what we saw. It took him four games to score his first points of the season last year - and he had a three-point night. He then rattled off points in 7 of his next 11 games, and was one of the lone bright spots to a rough season.

Can the team even move off of Ekman-Larsson?

Well considering last year there were rumours about him getting as much as a first-round pick at the trade deadline - it seems like he was a hot commodity. But not now. The team didn't sell high on their pieces like they should have and you can chalk it up to another Brad Treliving mistake.

Ekman-Larsson is signed through this season and 2027-28 at a cap hit of $3.5M. That's not terrible when he's giving you production but it's hard to justify when he's doing much of nothing now. He can still turn it around and may be dealing with injury issues after he left two games earlier this year - but has to quick.

If not, then the team is going to likely not be able to move off him unless they take on another bad contract, or somehow find a team willing to take him in a package to move off a player they don't want.

It's not so easy either as he also has a 16-team no-trade clause for some reason. It's still puzzling why he was given so much protection in his mid-30s with time not on his side and the team is paying for it now.

There's a chance that OEL can bring it together and put in a respectable season as there are still 74 games to go. But with Toronto's blue line getting older, and the early season results not what was anticipated - we could be looking at the end of his time with the Maple Leafs.

Maybe not now, but sometime this year.

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