The Maple Leafs' needs are clear. How many will Kyle Dubas be able to address?
The Leafs’ needs are clear. How many of them will Kyle Dubas be able to address ahead of Monday's NHL trade deadline.
Travis Dermott’s limitations were exposed with the Maple Leafs
Zoom out and Travis Dermott, the 34th overall pick in the 2015 draft, developed into a solid NHL player.
Dermott played in 251 regular-season games for the Leafs, plus 22 more games in the playoffs. That’s not nothing.
The nitpicking over his game over four-plus years with the Leafs was partly a result of the market — obviously. But it was also what was bound to happen with any player on any contending team. Dermott was judged, sometimes harshly, in the context of his ability to be important for a squad with championship goals. He was never a bad player, just not the player the Leafs ultimately hoped he could become.
With Dermott, it was always about the upside — and whether he would get there in the end. Whether the apparent tools (the skating, the size, the puck-moving) would all come together and make a competent top-four defenceman.
The Leafs needed that, wanted that for him.
It just never happened. He was missing that one ingredient to put him over the top. (I’d argue it was processing speed.) Eventually, the Leafs stopped even trying him in the top four following an early stint on the top pair with Rielly this season. The coaching staff didn’t trust him. He was passed over for playing time by Sandin, Liljegren, and Lyubushkin.
On a different team, with lesser expectations and more opportunity, maybe he can still become what the Leafs envisioned. Or maybe this is who he is in the NHL: A third pairing defenceman.
