Toronto Maple Leafs' Kasperi Kapanen skates during the first period of the team's NHL hockey game against the Pittsburgh Penguins in Pittsburgh on Feb. 18, 2020.Gene J. Puskar/The Associated Press
Kasperi Kapanen woke up Tuesday as a member of the Toronto Maple Leafs. A short time later he was no longer with the club for whom he had played since 2015-16.
“You hear lots of rumours,” Kapanen said during an audio call with journalists during the afternoon. “For me, it has been that way for quite some time. I was doing my thing in the morning and people were saying that I might get traded, or that I had gotten traded, and I didn’t know what to believe.”
That’s when Toronto general manager Kyle Dubas called the 24-year-old winger and told him he was on the way back to Pittsburgh. The organization had originally drafted him in 2014 in the first round.
A handful of others were peripherally involved in the deal, but essentially he was swapped for the Penguins’ 2020 first-round draft pick (15th over all). The Maple Leafs otherwise would not have had one because Dubas traded theirs to Carolina last summer to shed Patrick Marleau’s US$6.25-million contract and free up some salary-cap space.
Some of that cash was used to sign Mitch Marner to a six-year, US$65-million agreement in September. As a part of Tuesday’s trade, Toronto will also get US$3.2-million back in salary-cap space in each of the next two years.
“We are excited about the first-round pick and we’re [happy with the others] as well,” Dubas said on an early-evening video call. “[Kasperi] is a good NHL player and we are happy for him. I don’t think he has reached his ceiling yet, and he has lots of room to grow and develop.
“This trade wasn’t about us being dissatisfied with him. This was just the deal we thought was the best fit for us.”
Kapanen came to Toronto in 2015 as part of the blockbuster trade that sent Phil Kessel to the Penguins.
“Kasperi is a good, young player that brings speed to our lineup and plays the way we want to play,” Jim Rutherford, the Penguins general manager, said in a statement. Rutherford drafted him in 2014. “We know him as a player and feel he can improve our top six.”
If that is the case, it would find him playing on a line with either Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin.
“If they think I can play in one of those spots, it’s a huge honour,” Kapanen said. “I’m excited to be back in Pittsburgh and excited for the opportunity.”
Kapanen was a baby when he moved from Finland to Connecticut, where his father, Sami, played for the Hartford Whalers. Thanks to his dad’s NHL career, he grew up a hockey brat. As a kid, he also lived in North Carolina for six years, then in the New Jersey suburbs for five after Sami Kapanen was traded to the Philadelphia Flyers.
He had a career-high 20 goals and 44 points in 78 regular-season games in 2018-19, and recorded 97 points in 227 games, including the playoffs, with Toronto.
His numbers fell a bit in the COVID-19-abbreviated season, to 13 goals and 23 assists in 69 games. He admits being disappointed with his own performance and that of the Maple Leafs this season. They were eliminated from the Return to Play qualifying tournament in five games by the Columbus Blue Jackets.
“This year, right off the hop, it wasn’t the start I wanted,” Kapanen said. “I thought I would get it back in the playoffs, but I feel both me and our team could have done a lot better. It is kind of a bad way to end with [the Maple Leafs], but I am thankful for the opportunity they gave me for five years.”
Along with the draft pick, the Maple Leafs also acquired forwards Evan Rodrigues and Filip Hallander and defenceman David Warsofsky. Toronto sent journeyman forward Pontus Aberg and defensive prospect Jesper Lindgren to Pittsburgh along with Kapanen.
A 27-year-old centre from Toronto, Rodrigues played in 199 games over five seasons for Buffalo and Pittsburgh with 27 goals and 72 points. He was not on the Penguins roster this postseason, which ended in a surprising four-game defeat by the Montreal Canadians in the qualifying round.
Kapanen said that he returns to Pittsburgh as a more well-rounded player.
“When I was drafted, I was one-dimensional,” he said. “I loved to play with the puck and to score goals. Everything else was kind of lacking in me.”
He was one of the Maple Leafs’ fastest players and had moxie, which was in short supply among the team’s forwards. He had three fights this season, including one with Rodrigues when the latter still played for Buffalo.
“I feel like I am an energy player and do everything I can to help the team,” Kapanen said. “I’m not going to be the biggest point-maker or scorer. That’s not my job. It’s to be part of the team and do anything possible to help it win night in and night out.”
Dubas said that this is probably only the first of Toronto’s moves in the off-season.
“This was a good start toward getting where we want to go,” he said.
The Maple Leafs have been eliminated in the first round of the postseason in each of the past four years, and pressure is building.
“When we don’t reach our expectation or potential, the blame should directly come to me,” Dubas said. “I don’t take any of the criticism personally. I know it is deserved, it’s fair and I expect it.”