Leafs Top 50 Prospects

The Toronto Maple Leafs organization has drafted and developed a number of youngsters currently playing in the NHL (Auston Matthews, William Nylander, Morgan Rielly, Matthew Knies), but the club under former GM’s Kyle Dubas, Brad Treliving, and new GM John Chayka have had different ideas of what kind of prospects they wanted to populate the organization with.

As we’ve done on a yearly basis, we will be ranking the club’s top prospects over the upcoming weeks based on their progress in either the NCAA, CHL, Europe, ECHL, or AHL, and their potential to make the Leafs roster and make a contribution in the future.

Players are eligible for the list if they have not played more than 82 NHL games and are 25 years old or younger:

Leafs Prospect List

#50 – Blake Smith – D (Toronto – AHL)

The Leafs have adopted a philosophy under all of their recent GM’s signing undrafted CHL and NCAA free agents, mostly because the club has dealt a number of draft picks for rentals. Just as Dubas preferred small, skilled, speedy forwards, Treliving preferred size. Toronto went in that direction with Smith, who was teammates with Leafs 2025 draftee Rylan Fellinger of the OHL’s Flint Firebirds.

The 6’5”, 225 lb. blueliner has some excellent NHL bloodlines. His father is former Philadelphia Flyer Derrick Smith, his uncles are former Leaf Wayne Primeau and former Flyer Keith Primeau (both were teammates of Leafs former head coach Craig Berube in Philadelphia), and his first cousin is former Leaf Cayden Primeau.

The Oshawa, ON native played two seasons with his hometown Generals before being dealt to Flint in November 2022. After a pair of unspectacular seasons with the Firebirds and going undrafted, Smith blossomed as an overager, posting 32 points (10 goals, 22 assists), 54 penalty minutes, and a team-leading +15 in 64 regular-season games.

Smith is a classic late bloomer and was signed to a three-year, entry-level contract in April, 2025. He has size and strength, he plays with an edge, and according to scouting reports is a good skater for his size. After playing one game before the end of the 2024-25 season, the 21-year-old got regular work from Marlies head coach John Gruden, playing 62 games during the regular season, posting nine points (1 goal, 8 assists) and leading the club with 110 penalty minutes.

With the addition of Ben Danford for the playoffs, Smith played only one game during the Marlies Calder Cup run, but did score a goal against Laval in the deciding fifth game.