Assessing the Boston Bruins-Toronto Maple Leafs Transactions of Post-Lockout Era

Phil Kessel and Tyler Seguin are bound to be the prime media magnets once more when the Boston Bruins visit the Toronto Maple Leafs this Saturday. That somewhat trite eventuality couldn’t be helped even if the two of them were not their respective teams’s leading point-getters.

So why fight it? Heck, why not consider the noticeable number of uniform swaps players have made between Boston and Toronto in recent years?

Since the conclusion of the 2004-05 lockout, the Bruins and Leafs have lost one player apiece to each other via free agency. More recently, the two Original Six, Northeast Division cohabitants have made three trades, all of which still bear a certain degree of relevance today.

Here now is a capsule of each of the five said transactions.

Summer 2005: Free Agent Brian Leetch

Leetch’s time in Toronto and Boston did not even combine for a full regular season’s worth of games played. Acquired by the Leafs at the 2004 trading deadline, he posted a point-per-game log of 2-13-15 in the homestretch, then took part in Toronto’s most recent playoff run, leading the team with eight assists in 13 games.

On the other end of the subsequent lockout, at which point he was 37 years of age, the Boston College alum returned to the Hub and spent his final season with the Bruins. Seeing action in 61 games, he placed fourth on a non-playoff squad with 27 assists but was second only to Shawn McEachern for the team’s worst rating with minus-10.

Ultimately, Leetch was a nonfactor in both cities. The pre-lockout Leafs routinely fizzled in the second round as they did once more in 2004, and Leetch’s unspectacular swan song coincided with the approach of Boston’s front office overhaul.

Summer 2006: Free agent Hal Gill

Reeling off the note on the Bruins and the comprehensive personnel moves in the summer of 2006, new general manager Peter Chiarelli brought in the peerlessly towering Zdeno Chara from their previous workplace in Ottawa.

Contrary to popular myth, Chara’s arrival did not usher Gill out of Boston because of a rule against having more than one player exceeding a 6'6" stature. That said, similar assets meant similar cap hits, so the Bruins let the New England native seek a new employer after nine years and eight seasons in Boston.

Gill’s Toronto tenure wouldn’t last, although he did make an impression in his only full season as a Maple Leaf, appearing in all 82 games and leading the team with a plus-11 rating in 2006-07. By the next trading deadline, he was exported from the go-nowhere Buds to Stanley Cup-hungry Pittsburgh Penguins.

Given Toronto’s goals-against median in each of the three full years following Gill’s departure―a league-worst 3.49 in 2008-09, 3.21 in 2009-10 and 2.99 last year―it is worth pondering what difference he could have made had the Leafs retained him. (As a side note, he left before either of his fellow Providence College alums, Ron Wilson and Brian Burke, could come to town.)

June 24, 2006: Andrew Raycroft for Tuukka Rask

This draft day deal was a steal if there ever was one.

After garnering the Calder Trophy as a Bruin in 2003-04, Raycroft crumbled in 2005-06 after seeing minimal action during the lockout. Joining Gill in Toronto, he earned the Leafs’s starting job for one year only to lose it to Vesa Toskala in 2007-08.

Since seeing action in 72 games during that first year with the Leafs, Raycroft has played no more than 31 games in a single season. Between stints in Colorado, Vancouver and Dallas, he has been a perennial second-stringer.

Conversely, upon gaining his rights, the Bruins phased Rask into the system after one more year in his native Finland and two spent primarily in Providence. (He also won his NHL debut in, of all places, Toronto on Nov. 20, 2007.)

In his first full NHL campaign in 2009-10, Rask led the league in both goals-against average and save percentage. Last year, despite moving back behind Tim Thomas in the Boston goaltending hierarchy, he still placed No. 22 among NHL regulars with a .918 save percentage.

September 18, 2009: Phil Kessel for Three Draft Picks (Seguin, Knight, Hamilton)

Naturally, the jury is still out on this trade. But if all goes according to plan, it should give neither franchise much to complain about.

In the immediate run, the Bruins dealt Kessel out of necessity, for his inconsistency and attitude were just too bothersome. When his impact went to waste as part of another cellar-dwelling season for the Leafs, that waste made for fruitful fertilizer in Boston’s compensation package. Toronto’s would-be No. 2 pick had Seguin donning black and gold and ultimately pitching in to a Stanley Cup title run in 2011.

Seguin’s point-per-game pace in the early going of 2011-12 has New England fans salivating over the long run. And they haven’t even seen Jared Knight or Dougie Hamilton in The Show yet, but likely will within the next one or two years.

At the same time, the playoff-starved Leafs are off to an irreproachable start at 9-3-1. The same can be said for Kessel, who as of Friday morning is the only player in the league to have reached 10 goals and is also tops in the points (21) and plus-minus (plus-10) category.

Assuming Kessel and at least one or two of Boston’s rising stars stay in the system and stay on track, there ought to be at least one Cup lined up for each of them within the next two decades.

February 18, 2011: Joe Colborne for Tomas Kaberle

How soon until the Air Canada Centre masses introduce a “Thank you, Tomas!” chant?

None other than Tomas Kaberle, a 12-year member of the Leafs, finished second behind Kessel for the team lead with 49 points in 2009-10. He had another prolific playmaking campaign in the works when he was reeled in by Boston in exchange for a former first-round draft choice.

Kaberle flustered the Bruins faithful through last year’s homestretch and playoff run, even though he mustered 11 assists and five power-play points in the postseason en route to the Cup. With no real harm done, Boston opted to let him hit the free-agent market and drift down to Carolina.

Meanwhile, Colborne made his NHL debut in last year’s regular-season finale and has since continued to foster his game with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies. As it happens, just as Kessel is topping the NHL scoring chart, Colborne leads the development league with an 8-8-16 scoring log.

If he can translate that scoring touch to an impact in The Show, then Colborne’s transfer likely will not hurt the Bruins so much as help the Maple Leafs.