The Toronto Maple Leafs should have cut ties with Nazem Kadri.

They have made some smart selections over the draft weekend last month in Sunrise, Florida. The rebuild is beginning and changes to the franchise are coming.

This week the team went out to re-sign centre Nazem Kadri to a one-year extension for $4.1 million.

Bringing Kadri back is not a smart move. He has a history of being sour with the coaching staff. If President Brendan Shanahan was serious about the culture needing change, Kadri should have been the one to go first.

During the 2009 NHL Entry Draft in Montreal, Canada a union was formed between the Toronto Maple Leafs and their seventh overall pick. That seventh pick selected was forward Nazem Kadri of the London Knights in the Ontario Hockey League.

There was such praise for the draft pick as he had come into the draft class with 258 points in four years as a player in the OHL.

He came to Toronto with a lot of success in the minor leagues as well as the international scene. He won a silver medal at the 2010 World Junior Championships.

Since his start in Toronto, he has played under former Leafs head coaches Ron Wilson, Randy Carlyle and Peter Horachek with varying levels of success. All three ex-coaches could not get Kadri going to the same level of success he had in his youth.

He just recently completed a two year contract worth an annual salary of $2.9 million.

Kadri is 24 years old. Last season he had 18 goals and 21 assists over 71 games with the Maple Leafs over their ‘dreadful’ season.

Kadri comes into the fold and will now work under new Leafs’ head coach Mike Babcock. This will be Kadri’s fourth head coach. The team had preached for a long time about ‘culture change’. Kadri doesn’t fall in the fresh blood category that Shanahan and Babcock are looking for.

Kadri will not make or break the immediate future of the team’s direction. He has had brief splashes of great plays and shown flashes of brilliance that warranted being selected seventh overall. However, he has also had long doghouse battles with the team’s various head coaches during his NHL career.

Bringing him back to Toronto next season is not a big blunder for the team. However, if culture and levels of success are to be improved, Kadri has to go at the trade deadline next season.