Easton Cowan has changed how the Toronto Maple Leafs see him, according to Elliotte Friedman, and John Chayka now has a decision to weigh.
It's early Thursday, and the Leafs sit at 7-5-2 through 14 games. Cowan, the 21-year-old winger out of Mount Brydges, has been a big part of how they got there.
Friedman laid out the shift on the FAN Hockey Show on October 21. The story keeps circling back to Chayka's blue line search and who might go out in a deal.
Cowan has 13 points in 14 games this season. Six of them are goals, one came shorthanded, and two were game winners.
| Easton Cowan by the numbers | |||||
| GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | 14 | 6 | 7 | 13 | +2 |
| Career | 80 | 17 | 25 | 42 | -3 |
The other half of Friedman's comment matters more. He said that at the end of last season, if the Leafs felt Cowan could have fetched something valuable, they would've moved on from him.
That's a blunt look at where the winger stood. Last spring he was a tradable piece, and now he's a player the organization sees differently.
Friedman's read, passed along by NHL Rumour Report, is that Cowan "completely changed how the organization sees him."
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Wednesday night in Seattle wasn't his best. Cowan was held off the scoresheet, went minus-1, took 2 penalty minutes and landed 2 shots in 11:36 of ice time.
Chayka's blue line search puts Cowan's value to the test
Chayka has already left the door open to a Cowan trade. Toronto has also been framing him as the real deal while it hunts for help on defence.
Those two messages don't sit easily together. Teams that say a player is untouchable usually get asked the price anyway.
The contract is part of the appeal. Cowan is on an entry-level deal with a $900,000 cap hit through 2027-28, and he's an RFA at expiry.
A cheap winger scoring at this clip is exactly what rival general managers ask about first. That's also why moving him for a defenceman would be a mistake. It's like selling a winning lottery ticket because the payout looks small.
Chayka's top-pair defenceman search isn't going away, and the Leafs head to Vancouver on Saturday. Does Cowan's play keep him off the market, or just raise his price?
Should the Maple Leafs keep Easton Cowan even if it costs them a top-pair defenceman?
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