{"id":132795,"date":"2022-10-13T18:00:46","date_gmt":"2022-10-13T22:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=132795"},"modified":"2022-10-13T18:00:46","modified_gmt":"2022-10-13T22:00:46","slug":"maple-leafs-sign-fraser-minten-to-entry-level-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2022\/10\/13\/maple-leafs-sign-fraser-minten-to-entry-level-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto Maple Leafs Sign Top Prospect to Entry-Level Contract"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/leafs\/\" target=\"_self\">Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> have signed Fraser Minten to a three-year entry-level contract. Minten was the team&#8217;s first pick in the 2022 draft. The center was drafted 38th overall, following a draft-day trade between Toronto and the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/blackhawks\/\" target=\"_self\">Chicago Blackhawks<\/a>.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\ud83d\udd8a We\u2019ve signed forward Fraser Minten to a three-year, entry-level contract.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Toronto Maple Leafs (@MapleLeafs) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MapleLeafs\/status\/1580649584023539713?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">October 13, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Fraser Minten Signs Contract<\/h2>\n<p>The 18-year-old, hailing from Vancouver, British Columbia will spend the 2022-23 season as an alternate captain of the Kamloops Blazers. With 55 points in 67 OHL games in 2021-22, Minten will look to reach the point-per-game plateau in this campaign. He will be playing closely alongside 2022 WHL MVP Logan Stankoven.<\/p>\n<p>At 6&#8217;2&#8243; and 196 pounds, Minten is an intriguing piece of a young forward group that&#8217;s coming up in Toronto. Alongside Nick Robertson and Matthew Knies, the Leafs may have a line of the future. Minten was not the highest-ceiling prospect available to the Leafs, however, his responsible defensive game and his instinct to play into the slot make his NHL game somewhat projectable.<\/p>\n<h3>Draft-Day Trade<\/h3>\n<p>The pick used to acquire <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2022\/07\/01\/fraser-minten-scouting-report-2022-nhl-draft\/\" target=\"_self\">Fraser Minten<\/a> was acquired by the Leafs on draft day in a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2022\/07\/07\/petr-mrazek-traded-to-chicago\/\" target=\"_self\">trade<\/a> with the Chicago Blackhawks. Toronto traded the 25th overall pick and inconsistent goaltender <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/m\/mrazepe01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Petr Mrazek<\/a> for the 38th overall pick. This allowed the Leafs not only to still get a strong draft slot, but also the cap flexibility to make needed upgrades at the goaltending position.<\/p>\n<h3>Contract Details<\/h3>\n<p>Minten&#8217;s entry-level contract has a three-year term, and is set to expire after the 2024-25 season. However, Minten&#8217;s contract will slide as he is already in the CHL for the season. Thus, unless another entry-level slide occurs, Minten will expire as an RFA after the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n<h3>What This Means<\/h3>\n<p>Minten may not be the most exciting prospect from the 2022 NHL draft, but it shows the direction the Toronto Maple Leafs are taking. They have all the star-power they need, and are trying to build a strong bottom-six in hopes of a cup-run. Responsible defensive players on entry-level deals such as Minten are <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2022\/08\/02\/toronto-maple-leafs-need-prospects-to-step-up\/\" target=\"_self\">perfect complements<\/a> in a flat-cap NHL, and he should serve the Leafs well.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Draft prospect Fraser Minten believes his hockey IQ will go a long way to helping Leafs in future: <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/YF6g9s56iW\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/YF6g9s56iW<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/TSNHockey?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#TSNHockey<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Cn7OBv3AHK\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/Cn7OBv3AHK<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 TSN Hockey (@TSNHockey) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TSNHockey\/status\/1545442888754118656?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 8, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Toronto Maple Leafs have signed Fraser Minten to a three-year entry-level contract. Minten was the team&#8217;s first pick in the 2022 draft. The center was drafted 38th overall, following a draft-day trade between Toronto and the Chicago Blackhawks. \ud83d\udd8a We\u2019ve signed forward Fraser Minten to a three-year, entry-level contract. &mdash; Toronto Maple Leafs (@MapleLeafs) [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4259,"featured_media":132797,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18,4547,4548,3462,309],"tags":[5853,7347,619,72,5951],"class_list":["post-132795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leafs","category-hockey","category-nhl","category-nhl-prospects","category-nhl-top-prospects","tag-2022-nhl-draft","tag-fraser-minten","tag-petr-mrazek","tag-toronto-maple-leafs","tag-toronto-maple-leafs-news"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4259"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}