# 5 – June 22, 2007: Toronto trades their 1st and 2nd round picks in the 2007 Draft (Lars Eller & Aaron Palushaj) and a 4th round pick in 2009 to San Jose for goaltender Vesa Toskala and winger Mark Bell.

The 2006-07 Maple Leafs missed the playoffs by a single point after the New York Islanders won a shootout victory over New Jersey on the last day of the regular season. One of the primary reasons for their elimination was the subpar goaltending they received from the tandem of Andrew Raycroft and J.S. Aubin. Raycroft played 72 games but had a save percentage under .900 and was frequently pulled due to ineffective play down the stretch.
Leafs GM John Ferguson made the decision after the season was over that he had to needed to repair his goaltending situation if his team was to have a chance to make the playoffs. At the NHL draft on June 22, Toronto traded a package of draft picks to the San Jose Sharks, including their first-round pick in either 2007 or 2008, their 2007 second-round pick and a fourth-round pick in 2009 to acquire goaltender Vesa Toskala and winger Mark Bell.

The 30 year old Finn had been with the Sharks since 2001 and had split time with Evgeni Nabokov the three previous seasons. Toskala had a great year in 2005-06 with a 26-10-1 record and 2.35 GAA and was one year away from becoming an unrestricted free agent. There had been a number of teams that expressed interest, but Toronto was able to make the deal because of their willingness to take on Bell, a two-time former 20 goal scorer in Chicago who had struggled in his one season with San Jose.

Sharks GM Doug Wilson chose to exercise the option to take Toronto's first-round pick in '07 and used it along with their second-round pick to trade with St. Louis to move up into the top 10 of the first round to select center Logan Couture. Toronto's pick was used by the Blues to select forward Lars Eller, who was traded to Montréal last season in the deal for goaltender Jaroslav Halak.

Toskala immediately following the trade signed a two-year contract extension with the Leafs and in his first season with the Blue and White had a decent, yet inconsistent season, going 33-25-6 with a 2.74 GAA in 66 games. His performance dropped precipitously in 2008-09, as a chronic hip problem limited him to 53 games and had to be repaired surgically at the end of the season. When he played, he often displayed a penchant for giving up soft goals at the worst possible times.

In the summer of 2009, GM Brian Burke brought in Swedish import Jonas "The Monster" Gustavsson to compete for the starting job and Toskala responded to the challenge by posting the worst numbers of his professional career. In 26 games, his 3.66 GAA and .874 save percentage were amongst the worst in the league. In January 2010, Toronto traded him along with forward Jason Blake to Anaheim for Jean-Sebastien Giguere.

Bell did not have any better luck in Toronto, after the trade he was suspended by the NHL for 15 games due to a DUI conviction that occurred while playing in San Jose. When he returned to the lineup, he was unable to regain his scoring touch, netting only 4 goals in 35 games. His most memorable moment as a Leaf was a blind side hit on Ottawa’s Daniel Alfredsson. At the beginning of the 2008-09 season, he was sent down to AHL and later in the year was claimed on recall waivers by the N.Y. Rangers.

After playing two years in Switzerland, Bell returned to North America by signing a one year deal with the Anaheim Ducks and is currently with their AHL affiliate.

The miscalculations by Ferguson in hindsight are so baffling that it's a wonder how he was ever hired as an NHL GM. When he was hired in Toronto, his stated goal was to rebuild the aging club with players acquired through the draft, but he proceeded to trade draft picks with reckless abandon. There is no guarantee that Toronto would've made the same deal that San Jose did to move up to draft Couture, but there is no arguing the point that Vesa Toskala was not the right fit in Toronto and that the trade made for him was one of the worst moves in the organization's history.

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