Zach Phillips

He's 30 years old.

Your thoughts on this one?

I think it's fair market value.

You know, the big thing I was thinking about today, who's the last potential free agent who just maximized their value in one fell swoop the way that Darren Radish has in what six to seven months here.

Like I know he was a really sound defenseman going into last season, but you got to credit the guy for taking control of his own destiny and

really stepping up with Victor Hedman dinged up for a good majority of the season and he was outstanding like even when Hedman was in the mix for Tampa he was on PP2 and Radish was on PP1 so I think he fills a need for the Maple Leafs got a bomb of a shot skates well it's got a bit of a feistiness to his game too can move the puck he checks a lot of boxes and I think that's a reasonable price for what the market was going to pay this guy to begin with on July 1 and

I understand and comprehend it's a bit of a risk from the Maple Leafs perspective, but I think a risk they needed to make, specifically the fact that we think they're not rebuilding and looking to retool here on the fly.

It is.

I call it a nervous excitement.

And truthfully, Merrick, this is more about local products coming home to play and be members of the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Now, the strong outlier in disagreement with that is John Tavares comes home, the Oakville native.

And I think he's pretty much been as built since coming over from Long Island.

Yep.

There's just so many cases.

I hate the fact that I woke up today and the first person I thought about when I saw this news was David Clarkson.

I really, really wish I didn't go that direction.

But as you know, over at our platform at the Leafs Nation, we've been mulling over this idea of Darren Radish on paper making a lot of sense.

But there's risk, a risk element for sure.

And I think...

You know, you can't overstate that, but I think from this scenario, considering whether we're out two years away from Austin Matthews in UFA, having Nylander in his prime, John Tavares still a really good point producer.