{"id":169359,"date":"2025-08-24T16:18:23","date_gmt":"2025-08-24T16:18:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/169359\/"},"modified":"2025-08-24T16:18:23","modified_gmt":"2025-08-24T16:18:23","slug":"former-nhl-player-would-take-maple-leafs-erik-karlsson-trade-idea-all-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/169359\/","title":{"rendered":"Former NHL Player Would Take Maple Leafs-Erik Karlsson Trade Idea ‘All Day’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> player Jay Rosehill would welcome a trade sending Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly and forward Nicholas Robertson to the Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a> in exchange for veteran Erik Karlsson.<\/p>\n

Discussing the mock deal on the “Leafs Morning Take” podcast<\/a>, Rosehill made it clear he believed Toronto would benefit massively from such a move.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI take that all day,\u201d Rosehill said. \u201cWe\u2019re gonna try and get rid of Nick Robertson in general. Doesn\u2019t fit anywhere, who\u2019s he gonna take the place of, who\u2019s beating him, who\u2019s he beating out for a roster spot? I just don\u2019t think he\u2019s gonna be here.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd Morgan Rielly is, you know, kind of stalled, makes $7.5 million, doesn\u2019t produce like he used to. Sometimes he has some dead stuff going on in the D-zone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aging Erik Karlsson Still Has Upside<\/p>\n

Karlsson, 35, is in the middle of an eight-year, $92 million deal<\/a> with the Penguins. His cap hit is $10 million per season, after the Sharks retained 13% of his original $11.5 million salary in the trade that sent him to Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n

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The veteran blueliner is coming off totaling 11 goals and 42 assists last season over 82 regular-season games.<\/p>\n

A three-time Norris Trophy winner as the league’s top defenseman, Karlsson could boost Toronto’s offense and its power play. Rosehill emphasized that, noting Karlsson’s upside without regard to his age.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo get the upside of Erik Karlsson, a guy that can (quarterback) your (power-play unit) and do everything that Karlsson has done in the past \u2014 a Norris Trophy winner, and everything he’s done, experiencewise, would be a great deal,” Rosehill said.<\/p>\n

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\"Defenseman<\/p>\n

Defenseman Erik Karlsson warms up with Sweden at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February 2025.David Kirouac-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Nicholas Robertson and Morgan Rielly as Trade Pieces<\/p>\n

Robertson signed a one-year, $1.825 million deal<\/a> in August, avoiding arbitration. Toronto has been reluctant to part with him because of his youth and offensive upside, but trade speculation has persisted throughout his career, including submitting a trade request last summer.<\/p>\n

The 23-year-old scored a career-high 15 goals last season in 69 games, with limited minutes and power-play exposure.<\/p>\n

Rielly, meanwhile, carries a $7.5 million cap hit<\/a> as part of an eight-year, $60 million contract<\/a>, but has faced scrutiny of late for his defensive lapses and declining production.<\/p>\n

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Because of the flaws in Rielly and Robertson’s profiles, Rosehill isn’t convinced about how feasible completing a two-for-one trade involving Karlsson is.<\/p>\n

“Again, I just don\u2019t see anyone going for that,” Rosehill said. “It\u2019s one of those pipe-dream deals to me, so I would take it for sure. But I just don\u2019t see it happening.”<\/p>\n

Related: Auston Matthews Sends Clear Message Ahead of Maple Leafs\u2019 2025-26 Season<\/a><\/p>\n

Related: Maple Leafs\u2019 Auston Matthews Reacts to Mitch Marner\u2019s Exit in First Public Comments<\/a><\/p>\n

This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports<\/a> on Aug 22, 2025, where it first appeared in the NHL<\/a> section. Add Athlon Sports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Toronto Maple Leafs player Jay Rosehill would welcome a trade sending Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly and forward…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169360,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5106],"tags":[642,5,24687,20,5172,885,4,29290,3101,100,66,31,5171],"class_list":{"0":"post-169359","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-maple-leafs","8":"tag-erik-karlsson","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-jay-rosehill","11":"tag-maple-leafs","12":"tag-mapleleafs","13":"tag-morgan-rielly","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-nic-robertson","16":"tag-nicholas-robertson","17":"tag-pittsburgh-penguins","18":"tag-toronto","19":"tag-toronto-maple-leafs","20":"tag-torontomapleleafs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115084650362677140","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}