Breaking: Gardiner reveals true nature of his back injury

It’s locker room clean out day today at Scotiabank Arena following the Toronto Maple Leafs’ disappointing Game 7 loss to the Boston Bruins on Tuesday evening.

Typically, locker room clean out day is a day reserved for final meetings between players and the media and it’s not unusual for players to reveal some ugly details of the ailments that they played through. In the case of the Leafs, forward Zach Hyman revealed that he played through a torn ACL during Game 3-7 of the series. 

Ouch… that hurts. 

Defenseman and pending unrestricted free agent Jake Gardiner was CLEARLY playing through an injury and today the blue liner confirmed that he may need back surgery during the offseason.

That’s a tough pill to swallow for Gardiner. Again, he’s a pending UFA and was likely looking to cash in this upcoming offseason. This could severely hamper his bargaining power.