From Buyout to Bargain; Craig Berube Identifies Leafs' Most Under Appreciated Player

When the Leafs handed him a 4-year deal worth $3.5M per season, there were questions if the Leafs had over-paid for Ekman-Larsson's services.

Sure, he had won a Stanley Cup just days prior, but did so playing on the third pair; and many believed he was on the decline.

Drafted by the Arizona Coyotes in 2009, OEL was eventually traded to the Vancouver Canucks in 2021 where he spent just two seasons with the club before he was bought out.

OEL could have rode off into the sunset and collected fairly sizeable checks after the buyout from the Canucks, and the Mammoth (due to trade retention) until the end of the 2030-2031 season, but he quickly found a home with the Panthers with the intention of reviving his career.

There, he successfully reinvented his game, adding more sandpaper and grit, helping Florida to their first Stanley Cup.

A three-point effort on Saturday against the Jets propelled OEL past Morgan Rielly for the lead in points by a defenceman with 31.

The offense is great, but it's his well-rounded game on both sides of the puck that had Craig Berube praising him Saturday night.

Ekman-Larsson finished Saturday's game plus-4, with a goal, two assists, 1 shot, 3 hits, and 2 blocks in a shade over 25 minutes in ice-time.

The Swedish blueliner continues to prove his former teams wrong, and is making Morgan Rielly and his minus-14 look more and more expendable - but that's a topic for another day.

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