In a trade that makes sense for everyone, and gives a young player a chance at a pro career, the Leafs have traded the rights to prospect Fedor Gordeev to the Minnesota Wild for a conditional pick.

An hour later, the Maple Leafs made the move official via their Twitter account. The seventh-round pick is not for the upcoming draft, but instead for 2020, and indeed conditional. The Wild had two picks in the 2020 seventh round (theirs and Winnipeg’s from a Matt Hendricks trade). Toronto will get Minnesota’s and will have four seventh-round picks in 2020: their own, Minnesota’s, San Jose’s from the Eric Fehr trade, and Edmonton’s from the Nolan Vesey trade.

The condition on the Vesey pick is still unknown. If anyone has an information on that, it would be a great help!

The Leafs are stacked on defence in the AHL, and would struggle to give Gordeev any ice time. This way, he gets a chance with another organization and won’t have to go back into the draft. The only other option for him would have been an AHL contract, and he would have ended up on the Growlers.

Gordeev is Russian, but from Toronto. He is just 20, and is a left-shooting defender who is listed at 6’6”.  He just finished playing in the Memorial Cup for the Guelph Storm, where he scored one goal. His ability to be a translator for Russian-speaking players is a very useful secondary skill.

He split his OHL season between Flint and Guelph, and scored about the same on both teams. He had a good playoffs for Guelph with two goals and one assist.

Good luck in Minnesota, Fedor. We’ll try to put that seventh-round pick to good use.

Maple Leafs Prospects