Its certainly possible with no picks and an expansion they are a bit weaker but the impact is less than the loss of Hyman. The result of adding rentals for a playoff push and then losing them is something most clubs that see themselves as contenders do. Boston has been a frequent renter for the last 10 years with no Cups but they still ice a strong team every year. I think it puts more pressure to do some successful roster manipulation outside of the big 4 to mitigate the lost picks. We'll see what roster starts the season.
Boston gave up a 2nd rounder for Taylor Hall at the TD and then re-signed him for $6.0 mil X 4 years. So that is not going to help our Leafs once we rejoin the Atlantic. I don't see us adding anyone at the level of Hall and we will be still trying to offset the loss of Hyman never mind all the lost draft picks. IMO
Hall put up 16 games 8- 6-14 points in the reg season and 3-2-5 points in the playoffs for a 2nd round pick and that was the only pick they were missing (for which now they have Hall) from this draft selecting in all the other rounds and 2 X 7th.
While Leafs used 1st + 2 X 4ths on Foligno alone and letting him walk and after Rittich and Hutton etc are left with Matthew Knies, Ty Voit, & Vyacheslav Peksa.
Our Leafs didn't make up ground in the draft nor are we likely to add a Hall like player via free agency and as long as that perfection line makes only $19.5 mil combined Boston will also be in advantage cap wise yearly. So I'm not optimistic how we close ground as it appears we're actually losing it.
