It's highly unlikely also because Marner is unlikely to sign here, not just because Willy won't waive, which is just getting to Lloyd Christmas levels of chance. Rielly I see as a far more likely scenario for waiving.
2025 Offseason Thread: Spring Cleaning
- Thread starter herman
- Start date
I think that is pretty dubious.
Aside from Marner leading the Leafs in playoff scoring since he came into the league, among Leafs with 50 playoff games played in the last 100+ years, Marner's .90 playoff ppg is 4th highest and arguably 3rd if scoring eras are taken into account (I suspect he would pass Sittler to be behind only Gilmour & Sundin. Leafs greats Roberts, Keon, Mahovlich, Apps, Clark, Kennedy - they all handily take a back seat to Mitch in playoff ppg. What a playoff bum, eh?
Three of the core four are in the top 6 in Leafs history for playoff ppg. Kind of severely dents the old media wives tale that they aren't any good in the playoffs, right? Supporting cast is the bigger issue. Always has been.
Among NHL forwards since Marner came into the league, Marner's playoff ppg of .90 is 16th in the whole NHL (50 GP).
Again, no Leafs forward is as good.
Here are the NHL "Gods" who couldn't put up a better playoff ppg than Marner during that time:
Aleksander Barkov
Ryan O'Reilly
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins
Matthew Tkachuk
Auston Matthews
William Nylander
Kyle Connor
Alex Ovechkin
Steven Stamkos
Patrice Bergeron
Artemi Panarin
Filip Forsberg
Carter Verhaeghe
Sam Bennett
Chris Kreider
Zach Hyman
Max Pacioretty
Brock Nelson
J.T. Miller
Ondrej Palat
William Karlsson
Sam Reinhart
Taylor Hall
John Tavares
Jamie Benn
Evander Kane
Tyler Seguin
Pierre-Luc Dubois
Tom Wilson
Anton Lundell
Brayden Schenn
Tyler Toffoli
Alex Tuch
Corey Perry
How come those bums can't dust Marner's ppg in the playoffs? Only 15 forwards in the NHL could muster a better ppg over 50GP in the playoffs. His +/- is in the upper 30%. He's blocking shots, killing penalties and playing a 200 ft game. Somehow, that isn't good enough? Absurd.
I'm curious if they'll actually replace Lambert or just expand the roles of the current assistants. Marc Savard could take over handling the forwards along with PP while Mike Van Ryn does the defence and penalty killing. Sacco seems like he'd be a solid candidate if they look to make an addition.
This is obviously all speculation right now but I'm bringing it up because his history behind Boston's bench is kind of crazy compared to Leafs assistants. He's been an assistant coach there for 12 seasons, promoted to intern head coach this past season. The Leafs meanwhile seem to change an assistant coach virtually every season almost. They ran the same bench for the first 3 seasons of the Matthews era (Babcock with Smith and Hiller) but since then there's been some sort of coaching staff change in each of the past 6 seasons. The Leafs try to attract the best and brightest assistants but the downside of that is it often leads to the position being a stepping stone for their careers and we can never really develop any consistency there.
24/25: Lost Lambert to a head coaching position
23/24: Boucher, Malhotra, and Chynoweth weren't retained
22/23: Lost Carbery to a head coaching position
21/22: Lost Paul MacLean and changed goalie coaches, certainly the least rocky year
20/21: Lost Dave Hakstol to a head coaching position (decent chance he wasn't returning anyway IIRC)
19/20: Lost Paul McFarland to a OHL head coach position
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mr grieves
Active member
For the Leafs to contend, with what they’re being paid under a hard cap, those 4 probably need to be the top 4 in Leafs playoff history, and they definitely need to be a lot better than 15-20 in the league! Their contract values put them in the top 5 or so, right up there with MacKinnon, McDavid, Rantanen, and Draisaitl -- if their production isn't up there too, that's a big problem! The shortcomings of the supporting cast aren’t just some separate factor unrelated to what the team pays those guys.
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dappleganger
Well-known member
You mean former Leafs draft pick and player Joe Sacco? Let's do it!
Around May 5, 2024, after the playoff loss:
Athletic: Mitch Marner wants to remain with the Maple Leafs: ‘That’s the goal’
Right after the playoff loss, he states he wants to remain with the Leafs and will start thinking about a contract extension "now"
Treliving fires Keefe May 9th
Treliving hires Berube on May 17th.
Treliving then turned his attention to hiring associate coaches.
Marc Savard is hired May 27th or so, etc
So there is not a lot of time to haggle with Marner in May
Around June 4th, Treliving said. “Mitch controls a lot of this whole thing. If there’s a way to make our team better, we’re going to do it. But we’re certainly not going to make a trade just so we can pound our chest and say, ‘Look, we’re different.'”
By June 4th, Marner's GM is kicking around trading Marner in the media less than a month after the playoff exit and within only a few days of any possible meaningful discussions because of the coach hires.
So Marner's contract negotiations went terminally sour shortly after the coaches were hired? I don't believe that.
I find this claim that "the Leafs made every effort to re-sign Marner and were just rebuked." very hard to believe before the trade talk started before June 4th, 2024. That trade talk equates to the Leafs GM publicly saying "In our view, you Mitch, are not an essential part of our plans to win a Cup." That would have a serious chilling effect on negotiations. It was not a slip up. Treliving kept bringing it up over the summer.
That drives the player to listen to his agent because his GM is publicly ambivalent on whether Marner plays another year in Toronto or not and has told the whole league Marner is available as far as the Leafs GM is concerned.
GM Treliving did this to himself and his team. Marner put up his 102 pts and 9 years of top notch stats. He can play for any team in the league he wants and be paid handsomely to do so. His GM turned on him in public. There is very little Treliving can do about that now - damage is done. The best way for Marner to punch Treliving in the nose for his behavior is to leave for nothing. The Leafs GM is clearly not innocent here.
GhostofPotvin29
Active member
I don’t read anything in that quote that says the GM is “kicking around trading Marner”, it’s about as generic a quote from a GM as you can get.
Prior to this playoffs, I posted the below, I don't have the spreadsheet anymore:
I exported 16/17 to Current, Playoff Points Per Game, Top 100 (at least 20 games played). I then added 23/24 cap hit column. I then divided the cap hit by playoff-point-per-game to get a value score. Sorted by worst value:
1. Tavares
2. Matthews
5. Nylander
13. Marner
33. Rielly
Others inside the top 13: Jones, Pettersson, Panarin, Benn, Kopitar, Laine, E. Karlsson, Hertl, J. Gaudreau
In summary, of the top 100 players in points per playoff game since 16/17 the Leafs' cost per point has been very high.
Guru Tugginmypuddah
Well-known member
I think last year, Treliving floated the idea of trading Marner to upper management and was told no. His further negotiations with Marner were probably rebuked by offering, I am guessing somewhere between $12-13 million. I think Marner's agent strongly advised him to not sign for that, and to look for AT LEAST what AM34 was getting, probably more than AM34 on an eight year deal. I think the Leafs have a hard cap on nobody making more than AM34, and I don't think that sits well with Marner's camp.
This all comes down to money. I think the Leafs were ready to sign him last summer, at a number less than AM34. Marner's camp didn't like it, and here we are.
This all comes down to money. I think the Leafs were ready to sign him last summer, at a number less than AM34. Marner's camp didn't like it, and here we are.
dappleganger
Well-known member
There was definitely some pressure from management last offseason to make Marner feel uncomfortable.
Heck, I was feeling uncomfortable and I'm only a fan.
It's so entertaining watching and reading the pearl clutching on different levels. At this point I could care less if they completely blew up the team or not. Again, I do think it was insane not to recoup something for one of the big three, but I also just can't believe the number of people who seem to want to run it back yet again (as highly unlikely an outcome as that is). Are we afraid of taking a step back, like not winning a round like we haven't in the last 7 of 9 years? Are we afraid of not having enough assets going forward? Because that ship has long, long sailed unless this front office decides to start playing hardball even with NMC holders.
Personally, I'm quite excited to see what they do with the Marner money off the books. If they use that money wisely, and get a little (or maybe a lot) lucky, the team could wind up being much more suited to the playoff-style that Berube wants. As the article (and you) noted - get some players who are faster and better forecheckers and figure out that bottom six. They've got a tough defense, good goaltending, and some high-end offensive talent remaining.
Of course, it could all go wrong, maybe Matthews never gets back to (or near) his previous level, maybe Tanev turns into Brodie, whatever...but I'm looking forward to seeing what happens in the post-Marner world.
Give JT the money he wants over longer term:
https://www.dailyfaceoff.com/news/y...-lightning-potential-salary-cap-circumvention
https://www.dailyfaceoff.com/news/y...-lightning-potential-salary-cap-circumvention
GhostofPotvin29
Active member
bustaheims
Well-known member
If you add game 4 to that, the numbers aren't great, either, quite frankly - 3 goals, 24 points in 37 games. He does most of his production in the first 3 games of the series - and in the first round, those are generally the loosest, highest scoring games of the playoffs).
Also, really, he piled up points in 4 of the series he's played. Boston in 2018 (9 points in 7 games), the two against Tampa (8 in 7 and 11 in 6, respectively), and this year against Ottawa (8 in 6). The rest of his playoff performances have been exactly what people are complaining about - in those 7 series, he's put up 27 points in 44 games.
Kaberle15
Well-known member
Still, if they manage to trade him would be better than losing it for nothing...
Carolina and New Jersey should be all over him.