2006-07 Toronto Maple Leafs Mats Sundin Jersey

It was on this day in 1994 that the Toronto Maple Leafs traded Wendel Clark, Sylvain Lefebvre, Landon Wilson and a first round draft pick to the Quebec Nordiques for Mats Sundin, Garth Butcher, Todd Warriner and a first round draft pick.

Sundin would go onto become the Leafs captain after Doug Gilmour left the Maple Leafs during the 1996-97 season. Sundin thus became the first European to be named captain of the Maple Leafs. He would also lead the Maple Leafs in scoring for eight consecutive seasons and for 12 out of his 13 seasons with the Leafs, finishing second to Alexander Mogilny in the remaining one.

In 2002-03, he became the first Swedish born player to reach 1,000 points in the NHL and currently leads all Swedish players in goals (564), assists (785) and points (1,349), as well as the Maple Leafs in all-time goals (420) and points (987).

Today's featured jersey is a 2006-07 Toronto Maple Leafs Mats Sundin jersey. If you compare this jersey to the Maple Leafs Sundin jersey featured earlier here at Third String Goalie, you can see the evolution over the lifetime of this basic jersey style.

While they both have the twin white stripes around the arms and waist and matching Maple Leafs crest, the current one has replaced the retro maple leaf secondary logo on the shoulders with the modern "TML" logo on the shoulders and the numbers have evolved from the classic one color white to the again more modern three color numbers, white trimmed in blue and outlined in silver, the first time the Maple Leafs have ever used any other color except blue and white for their basic jersey set.

This jersey also features the Teammates for Kids patch, worn by Mats Sundin and the Maple Leafs on January 6th, 2007. As part of the program, each player on every team would play one game with the patch on their jerseys, which would then be auctioned off for chairity to raise money for the Garth Brooks Teammates for Kids Foundation. This would result in over 600 game worn jerseys entering the market in a single go.

Here is Sundin showing off some of the skills that would make him so popular in Toronto.