Please, Toronto media, no more lame references to his last name!

...it's not a type of food poisoning; and no, it's not funny to insinuate that it is.

The Leafs signed Tony Salmelainen to a two-way contract late last week. The two-way status of his contract means he'll begin the year with the Marlies. And likely finish the season there too. Barring the trade of a top 12 forward, Salmelainen will only see time in the NHL as an injury replacement. Even then, he may not be the first call-up, as others, including Jeremy Williams are NHL-ready.

Personally, I believe that adding talent to the wings is something that the Leafs could benefit from. Please don't confuse that statement with the typical Leafs Nation point-of-view, wherein trading for a superstar winger such as Ilya Kovalchuk or Dany Heatley is not only possible, but realistic. Rather, it says here that there are options (Salmelainen or not) on the Marlies that could add skill to the team. The Leafs are often criticized - rightly so - for having a glut of 3rd and 4th line talent, most of which naturally belongs at the centre position. Would it not make sense to drop a mediocre talent from the team in order to make room for some skill at its natural wing position?

Salmelainen, while clearly not the abovementioned Kovalchuk or Heatley, still has upside. In 2006, he was the MVP in Finland. His year with Chicago and Montreal was his first full season in the NHL. His 6G 11A totals impress no-one, but are promising when broken down by time on the ice.

His average icetime over the entire season was under 10 minutes. Not a lot. The following chart (whipped up by yours truly using mad Excel skillz, yo) shows his performance broken down by time on ice:


Compare his goals per game when playing over 14 minutes to notable players:
Joe Sakic (0.44); Sidney Crosby (0.46); Jaromir Jagr (0.37); Eric Staal (0.37).

Or, his points per game compared to notables: Zach Parise (0.76); Markus Naslund (0.73); Scott Gomez (0.83); Mark Recchi (0.83)

Obviously, putting up these numbers over an entire season or more is far different than over 12 games, and this analysis is about as unscientific as one can get, but the numbers show that when given icetime, Salmelainen can perform fairly well at the NHL level.