We’re drawing closer to a seismic shift in the NHL with it becoming increasingly apparent that Connor McDavid’s time in Edmonton is coming to a close. There’s a fever pitch to trade rumors as McDavid enters the offseason with one year left on his contract and no Stanley Cup to show for it.
Sure, there’s an outside chance the organization can make a pitch for him to stay — but with McDavid in his prime it’s a hard sell. After back-to-back losing years in the Stanley Cup Final the Oilers have a top-heavy roster with depth, defense, and goaltending issues which will take time to fix, and it’s unclear if McDavid is willing to wait much longer. As painful as it is, when the organization separates the logical from the emotional the best move is to likely try and deal McDavid now, rather than get squeezed as the contract is set to expire and be forced to settle for less.
Every single GM will make a call to Edmonton if McDavid is available, even if they know they don’t have a chance of landing him. To not at least make a cursory effort is managerial malfeasance. That said there are realistically only a small handful of team with a shot of making a deal: The Leafs, Panthers, Rangers, Stars, and Kings run the spectrum of east and west teams that could conceivably make a deal — and inside this there’s only one truly correct landing spot for McDavid, and one which would be so abhorrent it’s enough to make me throw up in my mouth.
Connor McDavid belongs in Toronto
As much as we all like to goof on the Leafs’ failure, the NHL is a better place when they’re contenders. It’s much like the Cowboys in the NFL, the Lakers in the NBA, or the Yankees in MLB. The sport is simply better for having the icon of the league contending.
Like Edmonton, the Maple Leafs have struggled to break through, but not for want of trying. Some are choosing to look at this knife-edge moment for Toronto as a reason why McDavid won’t go to the Leafs, but that’s a nonsensical take considering everything we know about star athletes.
As it stands Toronto is smack in the middle of a talent shift. The team only has 17 players under contract for the 2025-26 season, and over $25M in cap space if we assume Mitch Marner is gone (and we should). They would have even more if a deal with Edmonton is reached, which would have to include William Nylander as a starting point.
Essentially what we’d end up with is a Toronto team with a nucleus of McDavid and Auston Matthews, and around $20M in cap space to play with after inking McDavid to a long term extension. That’s arguably similar to Oilers’ combination of McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, but the extra cap space would allow McDavid to operate in an advisory role to help hand pick the players he wants to play with, something which has been extremely appealing to star players in other sports.
Of course, there’s also the feel-good factor of McDavid returning to his hometown in Toronto. There would be something magical about the best hockey player since Wayne Gretzky staying in Canada to try and bring the cup to Toronto which has alluded them for so long. It would be the equivalent of LeBron James managing to win in Cleveland. It would also cement McDavid’s legacy as a player who still forged his own path, won because of his greatness, not someone who needed to ride the coattails of another organization to get a cup.
Which is why …
Connor McDavid to the Panthers would be nauseating
If McDavid to the Leafs would put him in LeBron James status, then being traded to the Florida Panthers makes him the Kevin Durant of the NHL. Don’t get me wrong, Durant is an unquestionably brilliant player, but his two championships with the Warriors will always be viewed as him taking the easy way out, rather than actually earning it.
Make no mistake: If McDavid went to the Panthers they would three-peat. Heck, they might even four or five peat. A trade to Florida would likely include Alexsander Barkov and then some, but it’s a small price to pay when you end up with Connor McDavid, Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Reinhart, and the ludicrous depth Florida already offers.
Sure, on some level it’s all about winning and McDavid wants to win — but is this the way to do it? It would render the Stanley Cup a hollow victory, not one earned by lifting a team up to greatness. It would be McDavid’s own admission that he can’t lead a team to win it all, regardless of where it is — but instead need to be a cog in a machine. An incremental upgrade. Just as Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green didn’t need Durant to win, so too the Panthers don’t need McDavid to hoist the cup.
There are myriad reasons why this would make sense for both the Oilers and Panthers. Naturally Florida gets the best player in the NHL, so that’s a no-brainer — but for Edmonton, Barkov would be the kind of culture builder who can fill McDavid’s leadership vacuum and keep Edmonton competitive, especially if he comes with more players from the Panthers are sweeteners in a deal.
For literally everyone else it would be hell. It would transform the NHL into a one-conference sport where we’re all just waiting to see who would play Florida in the Stanley Cup Finals every year, and because of the massive salary cap advantage the Panthers already have due to their sales tax loophole they could keep running it back forever.
That would be hell.
