Valteri Filppula was almost a Maple Leaf.
Filppula, who is usually Tampa’s third line centre, bears a passing similarity to Leo Komarov. And not just becuase they’re Finnish. Filppula never shoots the puck and scores very few goals. He does, however, like to pass, and he’s good at it.
But a playmaking depth centre is not someone you need to pay $5 million in cap hit for for this year and next. If a deal was in the offing, it seems like the plan was to take him as a salary dump with some kind of sweetener, or at least a deep discount on Brian Boyle.