{"id":471788,"date":"2025-07-01T13:51:02","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:51:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=471788"},"modified":"2025-07-01T13:51:02","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:51:02","slug":"toronto-maple-leafs-sign-depth-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/07\/01\/toronto-maple-leafs-sign-depth-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto Maple Leafs Sign Depth Forward"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/06\/30\/maple-leafs-extend-forward\/\" target=\"_self\"> Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> have made a depth signing. <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.tsn.ca\/nhl\/toronto-maple-leafs-sign-michael-pezzetta-to-two-year-deal-1.2329737\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">News has emerged<\/a> that forward <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/p\/pezzemi01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-07-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Michael Pezzetta<\/a> has signed with the Leafs. This contract is for two years worth $1.575 million. The agreement has an average salary cap hit of $787,500 per season and runs through the end of the 2026-27 season.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">two-year deal for Pezzetta in Toronto, $775k Year 1, $800k Year 2 <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/zp8PA7tPy9\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/zp8PA7tPy9<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/PierreVLeBrun\/status\/1940093093719810447?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 1, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Michael Pezzetta has Signed for the Toronto Maple Leafs<\/h2>\n<p>Pezzetta has played only for the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/07\/01\/montreal-canadiens-trade-defenceman-to-st-louis-blues\/\" target=\"_self\">Montreal Canadiens<\/a> over his four-year NHL career. The Toronto native did not record a single point in 25 games last season with the rival Canadiens. He an averaged an ice time of around six minutes when he did crack the Montreal lineup. The 27-year-old had a Corsi for of 53.2 and a relative Corsi of 7.8.<\/p>\n<p>He has netted 15 goals and 23 assists for 38 points in 200 career NHL games. Montreal originally drafted him in the sixth round, 160th overall of the 2016 NHL Draft.<\/p>\n<p>The depth forward had a career-best seven goals and eight assists for 15 points in 63 games in the 2021-22 season. He played for the Sudbury Wolves and the Sarnia Sting of the Ontario Hockey League in his major junior career.<\/p>\n<h3>What It Means<\/h3>\n<p>It&#8217;s always nice to come home and Pezzetta gets to do that with this deal. This isn&#8217;t a flashy signing, but it&#8217;s decent enough for depth. Toronto now has 23 players on the pro roster and around $5 million in salary cap space.<\/p>\n<p>Pezzetta can likely be used as an extra forward and slot into the lineup if there are injury issues. He&#8217;s a big body at 6-feet, 1-inch tall and 219 pounds. The veteran forward is willing to do the little things for his team.<\/p>\n<p>Toronto <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/06\/30\/utah-mammoth-trade-maccelli-to-maple-leafs\/\" target=\"_self\">may not be done<\/a> making moves and does want to try and bolster the top-half of its lineup. However, this is a signing that will help help fill the depth chart.<\/p>\n<p><em>Main photo by: Dan Hamilton-Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Toronto Maple Leafs have made a depth signing. News has emerged that forward Michael Pezzetta has signed with the Leafs. This contract is for two years worth $1.575 million. The agreement has an average salary cap hit of $787,500 per season and runs through the end of the 2026-27 season. two-year deal for Pezzetta [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2352,"featured_media":453119,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_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":[18,4547,34,4548],"tags":[7735,662,5951],"class_list":["post-471788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leafs","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-michael-pezzetta","tag-nhl-free-agency","tag-toronto-maple-leafs-news"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471788","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\/2352"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471788"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":471791,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471788\/revisions\/471791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/453119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}