The Toronto Maple Leafs have dangled Matthew Knies in trade talks repeatedly over the years.

There was the time in 2022, when the Leafs reportedly discussed a deadline deal that would have sent Knies to the Chicago Blackhawks and brought Brandon Hagel (and Marc-Andre Fleury) back to Toronto. Three years later, there were talks to part with Knies in a bid for Mikko Rantanen, and just this past spring, the team seriously considered moving Knies if he could deliver them a monster haul from the likes of the Montreal Canadiens and Buffalo Sabres, among others.

So should the Leafs, under new management, actually do it this time — trade Knies, who recently landed at No. 12 on Chris Johnston’s early offseason trade board?

Let’s examine both sides of the debate.

The case for keeping him

Let’s start here: Knies won’t turn 24 until the middle of October and his contract doesn’t expire until 2031.

Hold onto him, and the Leafs have a core piece for the present and future — the long-term future. In other words, he has a place on a team that’s retooling or rebuilding.

Add Gavin McKenna, perhaps, to Knies and Easton Cowan and suddenly the Leafs have an intriguing batch of young and improving forwards to pair with Auston Matthews and William Nylander.

Knies has probably become a touch underrated now after last season when he, like just about every one of his teammates, struggled. But injuries were clearly a factor. Knies found a way to play in 79 games, but was never chugging at full speed thanks to a knee injury suffered early in the season.

Knies’ max skating speed was 35.9 kph, down from a high of 37.2 kph the previous season.

The Craig Berube-coached Leafs didn’t spend enough time in the offensive zone and neither did Knies, which meant far fewer scoring opportunities. Two seasons ago, Knies ranked fourth in the entire NHL with 100 high-danger shot attempts at five-on-five.

Last season that number plunged to 67.

Which helps explain, at least in part, why Knies went from one of the NHL’s top five-on-five goal scorers, with 22 goals, to a mere 10 last season — two less than Matias Maccelli.

Matthew Knies, left, struggled to score around the net last season. (John E. Sokolowski / Imagn Images)

Another part of that story, though, was worse luck.

Knies was probably overly fortunate during that ’24-25 season when he shot a blistering 26 percent on high-danger shots and unduly misfortunate last season in shooting only 15.5 percent, which was actually below league average.

Swapping Mitch Marner’s passing for some combination of Maccelli and Max Domi definitely didn’t help Knies’ goal-scoring prowess either.

Add a talented playmaker this summer — say, McKenna — to pair with Knies, and the quality of those scoring opportunities should tick back up (along with that luck).

It wasn’t all bad last season, either. Knies still scored 23 times and produced career bests with 43 assists and 66 points while playing a career high of almost 19 minutes per game, most frequently on a line with Maccelli and John Tavares.

That production feels like the absolute floor for the 23-year-old in the coming years.

With better health, coaching, and linemates, not to mention a power play that doesn’t stink for half a season, there’s plenty of reason to believe that much brighter days are ahead for the American winger.

Which would explain why so many teams (and good teams) have tried to pry him away from the Leafs.

What Knies is, at minimum, is something pretty unique, and valuable as a result: a toolsy top-six power winger who plays hard.

Players like that aren’t easy to find.

Two seasons ago, Knies scored 29 goals and crunched out 182 hits.

The only other NHL forwards in the last 10 seasons to meet those marks are Alex Ovechkin, J.T. Miller, Brady Tkachuk, Tom Wilson, and Andrei Svechnikov.

The other thing that bears mentioning is Knies’ playoff performance. Even in his literal first days in the NHL back in 2023, when he had barely played in the regular season, Knies looked at ease with the pace and intensity of playoff hockey.

His ceiling — how good he can actually become — still feels very much to be determined, which should make moving him now a scary proposition for new Leafs GM John Chayka.

It’s probably unlikely that Knies reaches his goal of becoming the next Rantanen. But even if he’s Rantanen Lite, or grows into a Matt Boldy-type of some kind, or a less mean version of Wilson (or Miller), the Leafs have a very valuable player on their hands.

I can’t help thinking of Chicago, in the midst of a full-on rebuild, deciding to cash in a not-fully-formed version of Hagel in that spring of 2022 for two prospects and two first-round picks.

The prospects didn’t work out and the picks are still maybes all these years later.

Hagel, meanwhile, morphed into an absolute star for the Tampa Bay Lightning, and he’s still only 27.

It’s not hard to envision Knies blowing up elsewhere if the Leafs were to move him now — and doing so on a contract (five more years and a cap hit of $7.75 million) that should become a bargain.

The case for trading him

It boils down to this: Knies is the best trade chip the Leafs have outside of the No. 1 pick.

It seems crazy to say, but Knies might even have more trade value than Matthews and Nylander given the no-movement clauses in their contracts, which would restrict trade returns, never mind their ages and price tags.

All those reasons for keeping Knies — his age, his upside, his contract — are also what make him a mighty attractive trade piece.

He could be the centrepiece that brings the Leafs back a top-notch defenceman or centre, solving at least one major offseason need.

The top two free agent defencemen, Darren Raddysh and Rasmus Andersson (assuming he doesn’t simply re-sign with the Vegas Golden Knights), would certainly be helpful additions to the Leafs’ blue line and allow the team, crucially, to hold onto Knies.

Deal the winger, though, and Chayka can aim higher.

Whether to move Knies or not will be one of John Chayka’s biggest offseason decisions. (Michael Chisholm / Getty Images)

The Nashville Predators don’t have a general manager at the moment, but when they get one, they’re having a meeting if the Leafs dangle Knies in exchange for former Norris Trophy winner Roman Josi, who has two years remaining on his contract at a cap hit of just over $9 million.

Now it would arguably be unwise to deal Knies, 23, for Josi, who just turned 36. So what about a much bigger, better, age-appropriate swing if it were at all possible: Norris Trophy nominee Zach Werenski?

If the Columbus Blue Jackets were concerned at all about Werenski’s willingness to stick around beyond the two years remaining on his contract, would they consider a deal with Knies as the headliner? (Or what about using the No. 1 overall pick instead in a deal for Werenski? Would the Leafs consider that, even if Werenski indicated a long-term desire to play in Toronto?)

What about using Knies to acquire a top-notch centre, for that matter?

Nico Hischier has only one year remaining on his deal with the New Jersey Devils and it’s uncertain whether new Devils GM Sunny Mehta will extend him this summer. Hischier would be a perfect long-term 2C for the Leafs — provided he signs an extension, of course, in such a trade.

If the Leafs don’t believe in Knies’ potential for whatever reason, if they think that last season is more or less what he can deliver production-wise, now might be the best time to move him when the sheen of major upside is still in the air.

All the more so after the team’s unlikely draft lottery win and the chance to simply replace Knies with another winger like McKenna, or even Ivar Stenberg, with the No. 1 overall pick.

The Leafs would probably still need to add another top-six winger in free agency in that case, though.

So, should they do it?

It depends.

If Knies can deliver an elite defenceman, like Werenski, then yes. Land a talent like that, draft McKenna (or another elite prospect), hire the right coach, and it’s not hard to envision this team contending again as soon as next season (and keeping Matthews happy in the process).

Dealing Knies, on the other hand, for a haul of futures (the kind of deal they discussed at this past deadline) is a little more fraught given those retooling intentions. The who and what in that kind of transaction obviously matters, but exchanging Knies, a sure thing with still untapped potential, for what could effectively be lottery tickets (à la Hagel) would be dicey at this point.

There’s a world in which those tickets go bust and Knies becomes a full-blown star.

So if they do trade Knies, the Leafs better be sure that what they’re getting back is worth the risk.

— Stats and research courtesy of Natural Stat Trick, Hockey Reference, NHL EDGE, Puck Pedia, and Stat Head