NHL Trade Deadline: For the Maple Leafs, Sometimes the Best Move Is Not to Play

Today at 3:00 P.M. eastern standard time, the NHL mid-season trading period closed, not with a bang as some expected, but with a whimper. There were no big-name trades, no blockbusters and only seven total transactions that mostly consisted of minor league player swaps.

The Toronto Maple Leafs were only involved in one minor trade with the Rangers that sent John Mitchell to New York for a seventh round draft pick in 2012. 

The Leafs ended the trading period as neither buyers nor sellers. From where I am sitting, that make the Leafs winners and Brian Burke a genius. 

Like the game of global thermo-nuclear war, sometimes in the trade game, the best move is simply not to play.

Look at what the Leafs didn't do.

The Leafs did not lose any of the first round picks they recently acquired nor did they lose either of their two newest prospect in Jake Gardiner or Joe Colborne. Also saved was the synergy of Toronto’s best line, as “Mac in the U.S.S.R” will be allowed continue their scoring ways. 

Sure, the Leafs didn't pick up a puck-moving defenseman to replace Tomas Kaberle, but that translates into Carl Gunnarsson and Brett Lebda getting more ice-time to improve their respective games—and that can’t be a bad thing.

The Leafs still don’t have Brad Richards, but they also didn't give up the farm to get him. That too can’t be a bad thing.

No the Leafs came out smelling like roses by showing patience and waiting on the sidelines at the trade deadline.

In fact most general managers were unusually inactive this year. Perhaps it’s due to Burke starting a new trend of making moves earlier in the trading period that fished out all of the trades and left no one scrambling at the deadline. Perhaps there just weren't any good trades out there to be had or the prices were too high.

In any case, this year’s trade deadline spectacular was completely anticlimactic and a total bust. 

Now the Leafs can take the hand that is their picks, prospects and players and parlay them through hard work, practice and conditioning into a far better hand for the summer when the trading game picks up again.