Insider Names 2 Maple Leafs Trade Candidates To Get Cap Compliant Before Season

The Toronto Maple Leafs are currently sitting over $1 million above the set salary cap limit of $88 million. They will need to shed that $1 million+ to get cap-compliant before the start of the season in less than two weeks.

Insider Darren Dreger, on TSN 1050 Radio Friday morning, has proposed two players that the team should be looking at to consider trading in order to meet that need.

To comply with the cap, who are we looking at? I'm looking at guys like (Calle) Jarnkrok, maybe David Kampf. They're decent players (but) there's a reliability concern for me when I look at Jarnkrok.

Jarnkrok has two years remaining at a $2.1 million cap hit, but as Dreger alluded to, he missed a lot of time last season, playing in just 52 games, and he's currently out with a lower-body injury as camp rolls on.

In addition, Jarnkrok has just five goals in 93 playoff games in his career and just three points in 18 games with the Leafs.

As for Kampf, Dreger says he's "a safe, 4th line center, he gives you everything he has." And while eliminating his $2.4 million cap hit with three years to run would certainly make them cap compliant, Dreger admits that "Berube, he might love" having the certainty of Kampf for the 4th line. He's been a steady performer for Toronto, and has missed just two games total over the last three seasons.

But the bottom line is, Dreger would like to see everyone forget about the rumors of Nick Robertson being the odd man out for cap purposes. He's having a very good camp and has so much potential to unlock.