We got our first trade of the NHL offseason Tuesday as the Toronto Maple Leafs traded 27-year-old goaltender Joseph Woll and defenseman Simon Benoit to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for goalie Sam Ersson, defenseman Emil Andrae and a third-round pick. Both players that the Leafs acquired are pending restricted free agents.

The Leafs gained a mid-round pick and freed up a little bit of cap space in the move but Woll is still pretty young and while he battled injuries this season, he still had an above-average save percentage and in each of the prior two seasons, he put up some really solid numbers.

The reality for Toronto is that with Anthony Stolarz signed long-term and Dennis Hildeby no longer being waiver-exempt, the Leafs were going to have to expose one of their three goalies to the waiver wire next fall, so this move gives them some flexibility for the summer and cleans up an issue that they would have had to deal with anyway next season.

Why couldn’t they get more for a relatively young goalie, signed to a pretty good contract?

Well, that’s the reality of the goaltending market. There are a lot of goalies out there and not a lot of jobs.

Even after this Toronto move, there are still........

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