Got a seventh? The Leafs have a deal for you

Hearing TOR has notified teams the rights to Ilya Mikheyev are available if a team wishes to "jumpstart the process."

In a somewhat unusual move, the Leafs are trying to help other teams sign Ilya Mikheyev now, instead of waiting until free agency opens on July 13. There’s no clever scheme here to allow someone to sign the nearly 28-year-old Mikheyev to an eight-year deal. But the thinking seems to be to allow a team to negotiate ahead of the frenzy. A cynical person might assume that the deal would be a trade for rights after a contract was already agreed upon so the acquiring team was buying a sure thing.