i listened to the first up interview and I really liked how Marner came off. I come from the “Mitch is no Auston and we can’t pay him that way” camp but the criticism here seems crazy. The guy is doing stuff for charity, and it puts him in the spotlight.
There were two big positives I took away from the interview I heard.
1. They wanted him to talk about all the guys that left, but he talked about how excited he was for the guys coming in, and why. (Snot)
2. About Reaves specifically, he said it would be good having a guy like that line up on their side “for once.”
To me that was huge. Our stars have had to deal with physical intimidation from far lesser players at least since Matt Martin was traded without anyone having their backs. We can debate until the cows come home if they should be Geordie Howe and handle it themselves, but Marners own language is that they missed this. That’s enough for me. Now let’s go see them play a bit bigger.