Two Maple Leafs have been told they will be left unprotected.

The expansion draft for the Seattle Kraken is looming over the horizon and that means that there are about to be some very unhappy fans across the entire National Hockey League.

We are expecting that teams around the league will learn of every team's protected list at 10 am EST on Sunday morning, but some information regarding certain protected lists has already begun to go public. The latest comes in regards to the Toronto Maple Leafs who are facing some difficult decisions in this expansion draft when it comes to who to protect and perhaps more importantly who to expose.

On Sunday morning National Hockey League insider Elliotte Friedman reported that the Maple Leafs have elected to go with a 4-4-1 breakdown for their protected lists, that is to say they will be protecting 4 forwards, 4 defensemen, and one goaltender. More importantly though was the reveal from Friedman in regards to the identity of two players that would be left exposed by the Leafs.

According to the insider's sources, both forward Alexander Kerfoot and recently acquired forward Jared McCann have been informed that they will be exposed in this year's expansion draft. 

You may be left scratching your head at the thought of the Leafs exposing a player they just acquired in a trade, but no doubt the plan here all along was to retain one of either McCann or Kerfoot. The Leafs, like many pundits who have attempted to predict who the Kraken will select from each team, no doubt suspect that Kerfoot was high on the Kraken's list of priorities and have acquired McCann as some form of insurance for that scenario. If the Kraken do what many expect and select Kerfoot in the expansion draft, McCann will no doubt slot right into the role he previously occupied on the team. Should the Kraken opt to select McCann instead things will remain status quo for Kerfoot and the Maple Leafs.

Of course all of this remains subject to change if the Leafs throw a curveball and surprise everyone with their list of protected players, but that seems extremely unlikely at this point with the list expected to be approved just moments from now.