Stephen
Moderator
- Feb 28, 2002
- 81,399
- 59,027
The Leafs have done just fine without Marner in the lineup whenever he's been injured. They will continue to do just fine without him altogether. Running this guy out of town should be priority number one to initiate change.
If that means booing him off the team the fans will do it.
I find Brendan Shanahan's reluctance to part with his golden generation to be little strange when he was the one who had the gumption to come in and rebuild this whole program up from scratch.
He could easily have reached into personal Detroit Red Wings lore and said "look, sometimes it takes a big move to get over the hump" and pointed out the Coffey/Primeau for Shanahan deal.
He could have diffused the high stakes feel of trading one of them by framing it as a hockey trade and toned down the team of destiny level belief he had in the core.
The whole Marner thing feels like small market NBA stuff when a team is so scared they're going to lose their star. Sometimes big moves are made. Life goes on.