Failed trade by the Maple Leafs gets exposed!

Last month, the Buffalo Sabres traded young pending RFA forward JJ Peterka to the Utah Mammoth in exchange for Michael Kesselring and Josh Doan. Peterka was looking for a change of scenery and wasn’t willing to re-sign with the Sabres. He immediately inked a five year deal worth $7.7 million with Utah upon completion of the trade.

It was then relieved how other offers had made it to the desk of Sabres general manager Kevyn Adams, including one from the Minnesota Wild involving Marco Rossi, an offer from the St. Louis Blues that involved Jordan Kyrou and an offer from the New York Islanders that involved their former defenseman Noah Dobson.

“There were so many interesting offers on the table, I’m surprised Buffalo went with this one; Wild offered Rossi plus, Blues put Kyrou on table, a team offered two 1sts plus; Isles’ Dobson was in the conversation,” had reported Frank Seravalli.

But the Toronto Maple Leafs were in the mix as well. Seravalli also revealed that the Maple Leafs also try to jump into the Peterka sweepstakes, but ended up losing him to the Mammoth.

Peterka was in line for a significant new deal after he had 27 goals and led all restricted free agents with 68 points in 77 games this season. He was coming off of his three-year, entry-level contract that carried a cap hit of $855,833.

Not sure the Maple Leafs could have offered him as much, or if they had, if the fanbase in Toronto would have been thrilled about it. While this is technically a failed trade from the Leafs and general manager Brad Treliving, I guess we will try find out how much of a fail it was once the 2025-26 season gets underway and we see how Peterka is doing in Utah.