By talking about transactions you can pretend that things are decisive. Moving the star resets the room and changes the story. In Toronto, those ideas always feel particularly tempting when a season comes to a standstill.
Right now, that temptation has settled on Auston Matthews.
The argument for trading Matthews goes something like this
People usually put it this way: Matthews isn’t carrying the team, his numbers are low and maybe it’s time to shake things up. Trade it and suddenly you’ve done something, even if it doesn’t solve anything.
But it’s worth pausing long enough to ask a simple question: When you trade Matthews, what problem are you actually solving?
Let’s look at the context in which Matthews is playing
Start with the structure around him. For much of this season, Matthews has assembled a rotating cast of wingers: some young, some stopgap, some asked to play where they feel most comfortable. The chemistry has been volatile. Continuity has been rare. The implicit expectation was that Matthews would solve that himself. That’s not unusual in Toronto. But it is rarely acknowledged.
Trading him won’t magically stabilize these issues. It doesn’t create a top winger, clarify roles, or magically fix the system or cap. Those problems now belong to someone else. They remain, but now suddenly belong to someone else.
What does it mean that Matthews isn’t carrying the Maple Leafs?
Then there is the idea of “carrying” a team. It is used loosely, as if it were a personality trait and not a circumstance. But what does ‘carrying the team’ mean? Some stars carry teams because the roster is built to tilt that way. They are isolated, supported and given consistent partners. Others are asked to drag the instability uphill every night and still dominate. Matthews is increasingly asked for the latter.
Matthews isn’t perfect. He hasn’t provided a boost every game, and the Leafs could use more of him. But there is a line between criticism that is fair and criticism that is misdirected. Move him because the team is broken? That’s really an admission that the rest of the team or system is not in order.
How could trading Matthews make the Maple Leafs’ situation more stable?
There is also the question of portability. Matthews’ value is clear, but his situation is not easily transferrable. A team trading for him would do so with a plan: defined wingers, a clear role and an understanding of how he fits. Toronto’s frustration isn’t that Matthews isn’t talented. It is that the environment around him has become increasingly demanding and increasingly unstable.
A Matthews trade would feel like movement. It would dominate a news cycle. It can even provide temporary relief. But relief is not a solution.
Until the Maple Leafs are honest about what they’re asking their stars to absorb — and what they’re building around them — trading the captain won’t solve the problem people think it does. It just changes the subject. The real work is building around the players, not moving them.
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