Former Leafs Enforcer Ryan Reaves Reveals Why He Couldn't Play to His Strengths in 2024-25
Photo credit: John E. Sokolowski - Imagn Images
In his recent interview with the Leafs Morning Take Podcast, former Maple Leafs forward Ryan Reaves reveals the truth on why he only fought one time last year.
One of the main talking points last year revolving Toronto Maple Leafs enforcer Ryan Reaves was his lack of fighting majors, considering that was his bread and butter for why he was in the lineup.
It was a strange occurrence because in 2023-24, Reaves dropped the gloves 7 times, which included bouts with Nicolas Deslauriers, Arber Xhekaj, and Matt Rempe. He also fought 7 times in 2022-23 and on 3 separate occasions between 2019-20 and 2021-22, respectively.
In fact the 1 fighting major he received this past season was the lowest of his career as he never had less than 2 fights dating all the way back to the 2006-07 campaign.
However, in a recent interview with the Leafs Morning Take Podcast, he explains why that was and how it was almost out of his control.
"A lot of it was circumstance, beginning of the season we played New Jersey, second game of the season I got scratched right away. We played Columbus soon after that, Olivier had a broken hand, we played Philly twice and Deslauriers was hurt both those games and I was scratched for one of those games. Then we played Jersey, I played but MacDermid didn't play, MacDermid played and I didn't play. There's not a lot of heavies that are going to fight me, that's just kind of the circumstance of what I was dealt this year."
As Reaves mentions, there aren't too many heavyweights in the league anymore, let alone many who would want to drop the gloves with him. Add in the circumstances that he was either scratched or they were injured when their teams faced off, it starts to add up.
Reaves had a few instances where he tried to get some of them to drop the gloves but they wouldn't bite, including Montreal Canadiens defenseman Arber Xhekaj. Ironically, you can make the argument that Xhekaj's antics led to the Leafs furious comeback that night.
Now in San Jose, Reaves will try to make the opening night roster as a regular and look to accrue fighting majors whenever needed for a team filled with burgeoning prospects and young skilled players.
| POLL | ||
JUILLET 21 | 1905 ANSWERS Former Leafs Enforcer Ryan Reaves Reveals Why He Couldn't Play to His Strengths in 2024-25 How many fighting majors does Ryan Reaves get in 2025-26? | ||
| 1-3 | 1015 | 53.3 % |
| 4-6 | 582 | 30.6 % |
| 7-9 | 192 | 10.1 % |
| 10 or more | 116 | 6.1 % |
| List of polls | ||
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