High ceiling, low floor. That’s what comes with skilled forward Ondrej Kase. When healthy, Kase’s talent is apparent. The 25-year-old winger has a 20-goal season on his resume and has scored at nearly a half-point per-game pace in his young career. The problem is that Kase has only played in 207 games through five NHL seasons, averaging just a half-season’s worth of games per year due to injury. The Boston Bruins learned the hard way that Kase cannot be relied upon, as he played in just nine regular season games total with the team after coming over from the Anaheim Ducks at the 2019 NHL Trade Deadline. This past year, he missed all but three games due to a head injury in the second game of the season and left his return game early, unable to handle getting checked.
Yet, the Bruins still nearly extended him a $2.6MM qualifying offer this summer. Bruins GM Don Sweeney had planned on retaining the dynamic, but fragile forward but changed course. The fact that Kase even remained in consideration for a new deal at that price point speaks to the upside that he brings if he can get healthy and stay healthy.
The Toronto Maple Leafs appear willing to take that chance. The team has announced a one-year, $1.25MM with Kase. While the term mitigates some risk of Kase being unable to return to form following a year missed almost entirely due to concussion symptoms, the Maple Leafs still had to commit over $1MM in order to sign Kase. That signing puts Toronto right up against the salary cap with their projected 23-man roster; so much so in fact that if Kase is on regular injured reserve, the Leafs will not have the room to even recall a minimum salary player to replace him. The trade-off of course is that a healthy Kase will be an excellent addition to their forward corps as a player who can skate with their stars and produce points. It is the ultimate boom-or-bust bargain for Toronto.
Thought after all the leaf signings they had enough for 3.5 million in contracts
Dubas’ one and only good move
Come on. Whole signing him is a good move, the deal should have been nothing more than a hair over league minimum, perhaps with bonuses for achieving a certain number of games played.
In a vacuum it’s hard to not like this deal. Young player who showed he could play before adversity slowed him. Signed cheap. Fills a need that needed to be signed cheap. All in all a pretty good signing given all of that.
BUT…in the context of what a soft team, specifically what a soft top 6 the Leafs put out there, they really needed to find a different skill set.
Yup Robertson sitting in the AHL with his entry level contract just doing nothing while they give a top 9 to this guy
This looks a lot more likely to bust than boom. He must have had a workout to show he is in the best shape of his life to garner enough trust for this.
Otherwise this is throwing a dart at the board blindfolded after a long night of drinking and having been spun around 20 times. Can the Leafs get it to hit? They don’t have much left in terms of darts to be thrown. Smells more of desperation but maybe redemption is coming. One can cling to hope.
They have to take shots like this since they’re already using half the cap towards 4 players.
“The Boston Bruins learned the hard way that Kase cannot be relied upon …”
Indeed. Happy to see him go to a divisional rival.
Good luck getting him to play
Love Kase’s game. Just have to know it’s good for about 25 appearances a season. Sadly, he’s another flameout who had potential to be a real star, but injuries will be his demise.
I really hope he works out in TOR (dude has amazing talent), but if they plan to rely on him, they’re mistaken.
Toronto hardly ever operates with a full 23 man roster.