Why letting Mitch Marner walk to free agency is the right decision

Overall, it’s a pretty bad stat line all around. However, I think the worst producer of the group is Marner. Zero goals in 21 games is shambolic. I can understand the argument that “assists are worth as much as goals”, but seven assists in 21 games is not elite offence, something that Marner was paid to do during his time in Toronto.

It’s clear that the Core Four can’t produce when it counts, and granted, it’s not all on Marner. But to pay Marner his rumoured $13M-$14M AAV for the next seven-eight years after we have seen this show time and time again is asinine.

Where does this leave the Maple Leafs?

The Maple Leafs need new blood

The common criticism of walking Marner to free agency is that there are no players to replace him or it’s “bad asset management”. This is true. There are no 100-point wingers in their prime that can help make your team make the playoffs with relative ease year after year. And yes, it is painful to lose a superstar for “nothing”.

But that’s not the point. The writing has been on the wall for several years, arguably since the 3–1 series collapse against the Montreal Canadiens in 2020–21. However, people would be quick to use goaltending, bad defence, lack of depth scoring, or some other excuse to explain the back-breaking losses away.

This season General Manager Brad Treliving revamped the defence to the best it has been in literal decades. The goaltending duo of Joseph Woll and Anthony Stolarz was top in the league this year. The Maple Leafs also received depth scoring this postseason, notably from Max Pacioretty.

There was no excuse this year. It’s the core leadership group of this team that is the problem and always has been. New on-ice leadership has to be brought in, and the top six has to be changed.

We have seen what this group of superstars can do over the last nine years. Unfortunately, they have not even brought the team halfway to a Stanley Cup. As a consequence of being so top-forward heavy with trade protection, there is not enough money to go around to fill in holes or the ability to make seismic changes to the roster.

Fortunately, Brad Treliving has several options. He could sign players in free agency, such as Nikolaj Ehlers or Brad Marchand. Treliving could trade for players such as Jonathan Marchessault or Robert Thomas. Or some combination thereof. Treliving could of course sign one-year stop gaps, given the available free agent pool doesn’t seem that appealing this year and try again next year. 

The point is that there are several options for the cap space that would have otherwise gone to Marner.

It’s nothing personal, it’s just business

Whether you hate or like Mitch Marner, I think the amount of hate he has received over the years has been a lot. I think how his previous contract negotiations played out left a bitter taste in the mouths of many Maple Leafs fans. But the bigger point in all of this is that the current situation is the Maple Leafs’ own doing.

The Maple Leafs had several opportunities to move off of one or two core pieces before this year. The perfect opportunity in my mind would have been after the 2020–21 Montreal debacle. The next point in time surely should have been after the 2022–23 second-round exit. In fact, Kyle Dubas, the General Manager at the time hinted that it was time to trade one of the core players.

However, we can be fairly confident that it was Shanahan who kept this core group together. He allegedly called the Maple Leafs’ superstars after Dubas’ contract was not renewed saying they would not be moved.

Whether it should have been Auston Matthews or William Nylander moved instead of Marner, once Nylander signed his franchise-record $11.5M AAV x 8-year contract last year, Marner was the odd one out. Had Marner put the team on his back, as Mikko Rantanen did for the Dallas Stars against the Colorado Avalanche, an argument could be made to re-sign him. However, Marner did not have a superstar-worthy performance this past postseason.

The team has gone through three General Managers, three coaches, swapped out dozens of assistant coaches and the bottom six, and now the defence. After nine years of postseason mediocrity, it’s time for the Maple Leafs to move on in a new direction. One that does not involve Marner. It’s nothing personal, it’s just business.