Well in order to move Liles to the AHL the Leafs were required to put him on NHL waivers.
Liles cleared waivers which means 29 other NHL teams including the Leafs don't want JML on their NHL teams even if they could have acquired him for free.
That speaks volumes to both the contract and the player in question here.
So are 30 NHL GM's wrong and\or what makes Leaf fans believe his is a solution for Leafs defense for improvement?
Since the Leafs are saving $920k by demoting LiLes then why no use that cap savings on trying out Percy or Granberg for that cap hit savings portion?
Nobody's claiming Liles is a great option, merely an option.
It is not as if Fraser or Ranger are better at this point. Even if they would get claimed off waivers, it would be because of their salaries, and not necessarily because they are any better than Liles. Mark Fraser, need I remind everyone, is a career #7/AHL guy. He played well in stretches last year but struggled as the season went on and right into the playoffs.
We have something like $3 million of Liles' salary, on our cap today. We have the money to take that extra $900,000 cap hit with both Bolland and Lupul out with injury. Again, what do we have to lose?
If he comes up, plays well, then we've got a serviceable defenseman who we can hopefully move at the deadline or draft, freeing up cap space next year. If he stinks, then he gets send back down. Moving him anywhere while he's playing in the AHL is going to be tough, if not impossible.