The Toronto Maple Leafs have signed restricted free agent Matthew Knies to a six-year, $46.5 million extension, which carries a $7.75 million common annual worth (AAV).
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This comes simply days earlier than 2025 free company opens on July 1, which permits Maple Leafs basic supervisor Brad Treliving to show his consideration to different areas of want for the workforce.
Knies’ Extension Is the Excellent Value
There was some hesitation that the Maple Leafs can be overpaying for Knies due to how they’d dealt with the earlier members of the core. Nonetheless, Treliving has proven with this deal that he was in a position to get Knies signed for the right worth. Final season, he had a profession yr with 29 targets and 29 assists for 58 factors in 78 video games. Within the playoffs, regardless of being injured within the collection in opposition to the Florida Panthers, he had 5 targets and 7 assists for 12 factors in 13 video games.
Knies, 20, was drafted within the second spherical of the 2021 NHL Draft and is coming off his entry-level contract that carried an AAV of $925,000, which is able to now enhance considerably. The Maple Leafs now have a projected $13.7 million in wage cap house. Nonetheless, with the wage cap going up over the subsequent handful of seasons and the potential departure of Mitch Marner, they’ve more room to maintain Knies at this discount of a deal.