Nick Ritchie discussion - clears waivers

[Zonk]

If the Leafs wanted to keep him they wouldn't have placed him on waivers and would have cleared cap another way , if another team wanted him they would have claimed him .

no one is giving up an asset now that he's cleared to have him play in the minors as a potential call up in case of injuries/covid at his cap hit

it was a bust signing and most of our fan base have accepted that outside of a few who for some reason need to try to spin it that Ritchie still has value

I am not sure if your post is serious, or if you are just trying to be provocative.

Using the logic in your post, the Leafs did not want to keep any of Brooks, Amadio or Ritchie, because all of them were placed on waivers. IMO they wanted to keep all three, but had to expose them because of cap and roster restraints. There are other players that they want to keep more, but they would keep or have kept all of the three that were waived if it had been possible.

 

[hotpaws]

I am not sure if your post is serious, or if you are just trying to be provocative.

Using the logic in your post, the Leafs did not want to keep any of Brooks, Amadio or Ritchie, because all of them were placed on waivers. IMO they wanted to keep all three, but had to expose them because of cap and roster restraints. There are other players that they want to keep more, but they would keep or have kept all of the three that were waived if it had been possible.

of course it's a serious post , why wouldn't it be ? what f***ing team in the league wants to bury a player making 2,5m when it'll still cost them 1.3m in cap space to have them playing in the minors and sure maybe the team would have preferred Brooks/Amadio to clear to use as call up in case of injuries/covid but that's because there salaries are fully off our cap

 

[PhiladelphiaKessel]

I’m glad he’s sticking around, not willing to give up on him just yet.

 

[Amadeus]

I’m glad he’s sticking around, not willing to give up on him just yet.

The dude is the definition of underwhelming. He's got all the tools but he plays too passive. Don Cherry was wrong.

 

[LeafalCrusader]

He's okay to keep as a 13th forward we can yo-yo up and down between the Leafs-Marlies-Taxi sqaud whatever the rest of the year but with Campbell needing a big raise and other guys to re-sign that 2.5 million will need to be unloaded somehow in the offseason IMO.

 

[The Shrike]

He's okay to keep as a 13th forward we can yo-yo up and down between the Leafs-Marlies-Taxi sqaud whatever the rest of the year but with Campbell needing a big raise and other guys to re-sign that 2.5 million will need to be unloaded somehow in the offseason IMO.

If they can't trade him in the offseason there's always the buyout route. The cap hit from that would be $300,000 next season, and $1,100,000 the following season.

 

[ACC1224]

If they can't trade him in the offseason there's always the buyout route. The cap hit from that would be $300,000 next season, and $1,100,000 the following season.

Wouldn’t it make more sense just to keep him on the Marlies?

 

[Mess]

The fact that NO team, even in an uncertain Covid world messing with rosters regularly, wanted to claim Ritchie for Free, speaks to both his contract and his currently level of play.

I didn't think Leafs would get out of this situation so easily and you can now see why Boston didn't even give him a qualifying offer as RFA and chose to walk away even when he was only making $1.5 mil.

Hopefully it sent a wake-up call to Ritchie and we see a new level of compete when he is dressed.

 

[Mess]

Wouldn’t it make more sense just to keep him on the Marlies?

Just when after 7 years we're finally getting out from under the Kessel cap retention of $1.25 mil, when now might be eating similar dead cap space with Ritchie in the minors.

I bet the Leafs were wishing that someone would claim Ritchie and with the Kessel retention coming off the books the Leafs could use both those cap recovery options towards re-signing Jack Campbell perhaps. Ritchie's $2.5 mil would've gone a long way towards addressing that upcoming cap crunch situation of finding future cap space.

Leafs have very little cap space next year to play with, and with Jack Campbell a pending UFA, I just hope that this Nick Ritchie situation doesn't mean Petr Marzek at $3.8 mil is our stating goalie as both those contracts are currently dead weight and ideally could be magically converted into re-signing Campbell.

So in the big picture for the Leafs, I see the Nick Ritchie situation as a bigger long-term problem then just his poor play this year, where demotion to the AHL and burying the contract in part doesn't solve Leafs bigger cap hell problems going forward.

 

[WTFMAN99]

I don't think he's difficult to move in the off-season, even if the Leafs were to take back something in the 1-1.5M range.

What's frustrating with Ritchie is that if he's not producing, he can be a presence in other ways...makes hits...fight...create chaos...he's basically chosen to do nothing this year and that is why he got waived, clearly we had 12 guys ahead of him. I think he could be an important guy in a playoff run where the game is different but he needs to want it.

 

[Golden_Jet]

I don't think he's difficult to move in the off-season, even if the Leafs were to take back something in the 1-1.5M range.

What's frustrating with Ritchie is that if he's not producing, he can be a presence in other ways...makes hits...fight...create chaos...he's basically chosen to do nothing this year and that is why he got waived, clearly we had 12 guys ahead of him. I think he could be an important guy in a playoff run where the game is different but he needs to want it.

It would be cheaper to buy him out in the off season, than taking on 1.1 million plus in salary though.

 

[WTFMAN99]

It would be cheaper to buy him out in the off season, than taking on 1.1 million plus in salary though.

I was looking at a guy like Anders Bjork - 1.6M cap hit

Bury him, it's a 475k cap hit on the books next year which is 175k more than the buy out of year 1 for Ritchie at 300k but the following year Ritchie comes with a 1.1M cap hit in dead space...alternatively, if we worked it up to buy out Bjork, it's a 100k cap hit in year 1 and 300k in year 2.

If you can keep it to 1-1.5M (ideally 1.25M or less) coming back to us, we can manage it. It's a very early discussion, Ritchie may come back into the line up very motivated the rest of the way and someone may take him off our hands willingly.

 

[zeke]

Thank god we have a GM that doesn't care about the kind of inane criticism he's getting in this thread, and didn't put saving face ahead of the good of the team.

Waive Engvall and keep Ritchie and he avoids all this criticism.

 

[robertmac43]

I think a lot of people in here are giving Ritchie too much credit for what they think he can do. Some saying it's a choice that Ritchie isn't hitting more or asserting himself more in general...

It's not a choice the guy can barely keep up at the best of times.

 

[TheShape]

The extra year given was maddening. It would be interesting to see what other clubs were offering Ritchie in the off-season.

Frustrating just as we're relieving ourselves of Kessel's cap hit we're adding more dead cap space for another year. 31 teams just passed on this guy for free, it's not going to be easy to unload the player.

 

[ACC1224]

Thank god we have a GM that doesn't care about the kind of inane criticism he's getting in this thread, and didn't put saving face ahead of the good of the team.

Waive Engvall and keep Ritchie and he avoids all this criticism.

What GM have the Leafs had that cared about the opinion of people here?
If he waived Engvall and not Ritchie he wouldn’t be criticized? Makes no sense.

 

[zeke]

What GM have the Leafs had that cared about the opinion of people here?
If he waived Engvall and not Ritchie he wouldn’t be criticized? Makes no sense.

Yep, so many GMs would care too much about saving face rather than waiving a guy they just signed.

And all these criticisms about dead capspace wouldn't have existed if he had just waived Engvall instead.

 

[keonsbitterness]

What GM have the Leafs had that cared about the opinion of people here?
If he waived Engvall and not Ritchie he wouldn’t be criticized? Makes no sense.

When one has an unusually deep attachment to our current GM, it makes perfect sense.

 

[ACC1224]

When one has an unusually deep attachment to our current GM, it makes perfect sense.

This place is so weird.

 

[horner]

He's okay to keep as a 13th forward we can yo-yo up and down between the Leafs-Marlies-Taxi sqaud whatever the rest of the year but with Campbell needing a big raise and other guys to re-sign that 2.5 million will need to be unloaded somehow in the offseason IMO.

He will be traded in the off-season
Or
Waived and sent to the minors.
Hopefully this was a wake up call for him being put on waivers and not one team picked him up.

 

[zeke]

When one has an unusually deep attachment to our current GM, it makes perfect sense.

I'm pretty sure you have accused our handsome young GM of playing favorites to make his own signings look as good as possible, no?

Or was that someone else?

 

[keonsbitterness]

I'm pretty sure you have accused our handsome young GM of playing favorites to make his own signings look as good as possible, no?

Or was that someone else?

Definitely someone(s) else.

 

[Magic Man]

The one thing I have to wonder in the Engvall/Ritchie debate. If you had waived Engvall with the season he has had so far and the amount of money he makes, like Amadio and Brooks before him, he would have been claimed. With the season Ritchie has had and the amount of money he makes, with the extra year of term, he stood a better chance of getting through waivers. Now, they don't lose a forward in the midst of pandemic which has just forced Marner and Engvall into protocol.

They were supposed to lose Engvall at the start of the year to waivers, but Mikheyev went down. So, this way they get to keep the group of 13 forwards they came in with at least for now. Ritchie may need waivers again at some point though and he might be more attractive around the deadline. Which could still work out because the Leafs will be looking to add then and moving his cap hit would be a way to fit someone in.

 

[zeke]

Definitely someone(s) else.

Lots and lots of someone else(s)!

 

[Mess]

I'm pretty sure you have accused our handsome young GM of playing favorites to make his own signings look as good as possible, no?

Or was that someone else?

Pretty hard to avoid when they're ALL his own signings.

The only player on the Leafs roster that Dubas didn't sign to their current contract is Morgan Rielly, and his new deal is already in place for next year.

Some people even believe waiving Engvall (whom he signed) is different than waiving Ritchie (whom he signed), which would lead to less criticism of a signing mistake. Only difference is the Ritchie mistake is 2 X as costly then Engvall when it comes to cap hit but the same GM applies to both however.

When a $2.5 mil player under performs a $1.25 mil it just makes the mistake more glaring and obvious, harder to sweep under the rug, and also much harder to fix.