Player Discussion Mitch Marner Part Infinity

[seventieslord]

I feel like Toronto almost needs to directly overpay for Florida’s Bennett and Ekblad just to change the delta between the two franchises. Like there’s additional value in damaging and disassembling their pieces as much as it is about getting better.

So Bennett is welcome again?

 

[hotpaws]

Kane can actually score goals and don’t shrink when the going gets tough in the playoffs.

Did the Sharks trade Marleau and Thornton when they didn’t have regular season and playoffs success, they didn’t. They continue to build around those two and maximized their skill set, and ended up with ONE cup appearance and Two WCF.

Did the Panthers continue to build on their President Trophy winning team when they see the players can’t do it in the playoffs. They didn’t, they traded away their 115pts leading scorer winger whom at that time was destined to play on LW with McD on Team Canada, plus a puck moving 1st pairing RD who can also play on the left side in his prime plus a 1st rounder for Tkuchuk. They ended up going to back to back Finals and winning One.

You should take a better look at Kane's offensive production before you go on about him like he's been some dominant offensive playoff producer every off season and the post i was responding to was knocking Marner's physicality as much as his production , if you want to compare the two players the edge would go to Kane for goal scoring but the rest would go to Mitch especially defensively . Also my main point was the Hawks surrounded Kane with many gritty/tough players , they didn't go out like Dubas did and try to out finesse every team to a cup .

The Sharks did have many many years of regular season success , they kept knocking on the door but couldn't win the cup and we're not talking about trading Marner we're talking about letting him walk for nothing which is an entirely different topic !

As far as the Panthers go , they didn't simply shop part of their core , they decided to gamble when Thachuk became available and deal them . Had Thachuk re-uped with the Flames that trade wouldn't have been available .

usually you get better value when another team gets stuck , simply saying we have to change the core and then letting a quality player walk thinking you'll use that money in free agency more effectively has a low chance of turning out well

 

[Stephen]

So Bennett is welcome again?

I don’t like him but we need him.

 

[Aashir]

I don’t like him but we need him.

do we @ 10?

fact of the matter is he is a 50 point player who through the ages of 25-28 missed 13 games a year on average.

Is a 30+ year old bennett going to hold up better? Is his style going to go unnoticed under the bright lights in toronto? Is his style going to be even more scrutinized since our team plays the opposite of him vs florida where he fits in with ogres like tkachuk, ekblad, rodrigues, marchand, and others?

Bennett is an amazing player, but unless someone can build a time machine to take the universe back to 2021 and slap the shit out of dubas and force a trade for a 2nd to calgary, then the bennett ship has passed IMO.

 

[Stephen]

do we @ 10?

fact of the matter is he is a 50 point player who through the ages of 25-28 missed 13 games a year on average.

Is a 30+ year old bennett going to hold up better? Is his style going to go unnoticed under the bright lights in toronto? Is his style going to be even more scrutinized since our team plays the opposite of him vs florida where he fits in with ogres like tkachuk, ekblad, rodrigues, marchand, and others?

Bennett is an amazing player, but unless someone can build a time machine to take the universe back to 2021 and slap the shit out of dubas and force a trade for a 2nd to calgary, then the bennett ship has passed IMO.

I haven’t assigned a dollar amount to him yet but definitely not comfortable with $10 million. There would be a premium there for downgrading Florida though.

 

[Gabriel426]

You should take a better look at Kane's offensive production before you go on about him like he's been some dominant offensive playoff producer every off season and the post i was responding to was knocking Marner's physicality as much as his production , if you want to compare the two players the edge would go to Kane for goal scoring but the rest would go to Mitch especially defensively . Also my main point was the Hawks surrounded Kane with many gritty/tough players , they didn't go out like Dubas did and try to out finesse every team to a cup .

The Sharks did have many many years of regular season success , they kept knocking on the door but couldn't win the cup and we're not talking about trading Marner we're talking about letting him walk for nothing which is an entirely different topic !

As far as the Panthers go , they didn't simply shop part of their core , they decided to gamble when Thachuk became available and deal them . Had Thachuk re-uped with the Flames that trade wouldn't have been available .

usually you get better value when another team gets stuck , simply saying we have to change the core and then letting a quality player walk thinking you'll use that money in free agency more effectively has a low chance of turning out well

Islanders went to back to back ECF after their Capt walked. Not saying ECF is some sort of accomplishment but it worked out for them.

MM and the rest of the core 5 had accomplished NOTHING in playoffs. Statistically and factually speaking 50% of playoffs teams every playoffs end up advancing to the 2nd round.

Change is scary, unknown and might even be worse but it might even be better.

How can you honestly say the current Leafs is close to winning the Cup and the team just need a few for gritty players? When the Core 5 had shown in the past 7 yrs that they just can’t do it, and they are actually playing scare instead of taking and leading the charge in Do or Die game.

As I mentioned either on here or in another thread. It needs a cultural reset from the top guys bc if they just can’t do it.

 

[TheGreenTBer]

I reckon we give it another month before they memory hole this last playoff showing and go back to clamouring how incredibly elite Marner is and how foolish the Leafs would be to not re-sign him, no matter what cost.


His whole style of playing 30 feet from the net lobbing floaters from the blueline has to the most anti-playoff style I've ever seen.

I don't know about this.

I get the impression that Treliving is not as big a fan of Marner as Shanahan was (as indicated by the nixed deadline trade) and couple that with the very real possibility that Mitch himself might be ready to move on, I still say it's 70/30 likely he's playing somewhere else.

Even if one is a fan of Marner, it's his alleged relationship with Matthews, and its potential effect both on the room and on the ice, that is a huge problem. I flat out hate the way Marner and Matthews play with each other and I believe Mitch is more dangerous and instinctual when Auston isn't on the ice. I'm trying to look at this as objectively as I can and I keep coming to the conclusion that one of these two need to move on...and Auston is under contract with a NMC so that leaves Mitch.

Just a terrible situation all around. We botched this horribly and literally every option is bad.

 

[Gabriel426]

I don't know about this.

I get the impression that Treliving is not as big a fan of Marner as Shanahan was (as indicated by the nixed deadline trade) and couple that with the very real possibility that Mitch himself might be ready to move on, I still say it's 70/30 likely he's playing somewhere else.

Even if one is a fan of Marner, it's his alleged relationship with Matthews, and its potential effect both on the room and on the ice, that is a huge problem. I flat out hate the way Marner and Matthews play with each other and I believe Mitch is more dangerous and instinctual when Auston isn't on the ice. I'm trying to look at this as objectively as I can and I keep coming to the conclusion that one of these two need to move on...and Auston is under contract with a NMC so that leaves Mitch.

Just a terrible situation all around.

I just find that both are just not as good as they think they are. I really don’t recall any duos that struggle this much in playoffs esp in Elmination games.
Often players of that caliber raises their games when the going gets though, when the spotlight at its brightest but they tend to shy away from that. I am not just talking about productions but they seem to lose 50/50 battles, faceoffs, all the little things….and I have not mentioned their competition, they often gets outplayed lesser players(not the Panther series) that would be on the 3rd line if they played for the Leafs.

 

[TheGreenTBer]

I just find that both are just not as good as they think they are. I really don’t recall any duos that struggle this much in playoffs esp in Elmination games.
Often players of that caliber raises their games when the going gets though, when the spotlight at its brightest but they tend to shy away from that. I am not just talking about productions but they seem to lose 50/50 battles, faceoffs, all the little things….and I have not mentioned their competition, they often gets outplayed lesser players(not the Panther series) that would be on the 3rd line if they played for the Leafs.

You're preaching to the choir, I want to move on from each and every one of these guys. But that's not realistic for a multitude of reasons we've rehashed countless times before. They may or may not be playoff underachievers individually on different teams. But, as a core group, they factually are and it's no longer a matter of opinion, and at this point our culture appears to be suffering.

I don't like Marner's reluctance to get physically involved. I don't like Matthews' attitude, health, complacency or decline in production. I don't like that Nylander either dominates or completely disappears. I don't like Tavares' massive drop in production and his lack of skating ability. I don't like that Rielly's defensive abilities are decreasing at the same time as his skating worsens, and those compounding factors lead to a very steep drop in player value. They pretty much all need to be gone within the next 3 years or less, and we need to turn the page for good. Maybe keep Nylander around for the rebuild if he wants to stay because we will need someone to play upfront while the next batch of kids marinate at lower levels? Then again, do we want them to learn from Nylander? Don't know.

 

[Gabriel426]

You're preaching to the choir, I want to move on from each and every one of these guys. But that's not realistic for a multitude of reasons we've rehashed countless times before. They may or may not be playoff underachievers individually on different teams. But, as a core group, they factually are and it's no longer a matter of opinion, and at this point our culture appears to be suffering.

I don't like Marner's reluctance to get physically involved. I don't like Matthews' attitude, health, complacency or decline in production. I don't like that Nylander either dominates or completely disappears. I don't like Tavares' massive drop in production and his lack of skating ability. I don't like that Rielly's defensive abilities are decreasing at the same time as his skating worsens, and those compounding factors lead to a very steep drop in player value. They all need to be gone within the next 3 years or less, and we need to turn the page for good.

Agree brother. Of the core 5, the only one I would like to remain is actually JT.
BUT these are the conditions.
1. 4mil caphit(can be 7mil real wage but on deferred deals)
2. No PP1 time and must accept his role as 3C or 3LW
3. Must understand his role as a support/depth player instead of a top player on the team.

 

[hockeywiz542]

 

[Menzinger]

Would be wild if he signed to a non playoffs.team and then didn't make it.

 

[Madap]

he hasn't been the worst of the core 4 so why is he getting singled out ?

Yes he has, pretty clearly. Maybe Tavares is not, but he’s not quite as comparable as Nylander or Matthews.

 

[Stephen]

Would be wild if he signed to a non playoffs.team and then didn't make it.

Marner kicking rocks to a low pressure, non playoff city where he can score a bunch of regular season points and make a fortune is probably the happiest ending for everybody. Marner runs away from his playoff demons once and for all without the pressure to grow, makes even more bank and we don't have to see him bring a cup back like we didn't give him 9x cracks at it.

Marner reportedly wanting to go to Florida is interesting though. Sets up a potential big swap of UFA's if we go big game hunting on their guys.

 

[TheGreenTBer]

Agree brother. Of the core 5, the only one I would like to remain is actually JT.
BUT these are the conditions.
1. 4mil caphit(can be 7mil real wage but on deferred deals)
2. No PP1 time and must accept his role as 3C or 3LW
3. Must understand his role as a support/depth player instead of a top player on the team.

Yeah I don't really care that much if Tavares returns for some reason. His play doesn't warrant it, but because of the low cost and the Marner/Matthews clique being the dressing room cancer in my opinion, retaining Marner would bother me much, much more even though he is a far superior player to Tavares.

I don't care about the regular season anymore except to keep us out of lottery range, so since I no longer think our window is open I'm mainly thinking about us just making the playoffs and not giving up high picks. I still think we can retool and squeeze into the playoffs while we gradually overturn the roster. Once Matthews' contract expires, along with JT's retirement and Rielly's likely eventual buyout, we'd have overhauled everything except for Nylander, who might request a trade at some point regardless, who knows.

I just think Marner is a bigger culture issue than Tavares is. Do I have all the information here? No, I can only go on the information I have and my potentially biased instincts. I try to call it as I see it, though I am highly emotional prone to vulgar outbursts.

 

[hotpaws]

Islanders went to back to back ECF after their Capt walked. Not saying ECF is some sort of accomplishment but it worked out for them.

MM and the rest of the core 5 had accomplished NOTHING in playoffs. Statistically and factually speaking 50% of playoffs teams every playoffs end up advancing to the 2nd round.

Change is scary, unknown and might even be worse but it might even be better.

How can you honestly say the current Leafs is close to winning the Cup and the team just need a few for gritty players? When the Core 5 had shown in the past 7 yrs that they just can’t do it, and they are actually playing scare instead of taking and leading the charge in Do or Die game.

As I mentioned either on here or in another thread. It needs a cultural reset from the top guys bc if they just can’t do it.

yup i've mentioned about 1 000 times the Islanders got a lot better when JT walked and that's because Johnny's a loser but letting Tavares walk i've been told would cause the world to end to so we have no choice but to re-sign him and then spin it as a discount

i have no problem with change , i'm just not going to scapegoat 1 player when there were many who didn't play well enough

i believe we are fairly close but that doesn't mean i want to keep running it back nor does it mean i want to trade everyone except Tavares , for me i'd like to see them replace our ghost of a second line C with a solid 2 way grinding C , he doesn't have to be a star , just a hard working 2 way player with a decent skill level , then use the rest of his cap hit to upgrade the depth

 

[TheGreenTBer]

Marner kicking rocks to a low pressure, non playoff city where he can score a bunch of regular season points and make a fortune is probably the happiest ending for everybody. Marner runs away from his playoff demons once and for all without the pressure to grow, makes even more bank and we don't have to see him bring a cup back like we didn't give him 9x cracks at it.

Marner reportedly wanting to go to Florida is interesting though. Sets up a potential big swap of UFA's if we go big game hunting on their guys.

If Marner signs in Florida I don't want to see a single person on this board defend him no matter how big a fan of his they are. That would make it clear to me that those posters are Marner first, Leafs second. Not acceptable.

That would pretty much be the apex of cowardice on Mitch's part and would completely validate absolutely everything the anti-Marner posters have been parroting for years. I don't expect it to happen. If he thinks he's hated now he wouldn't believe how persona non grata he'd be in the entire province if he does something like that.

 

[Stephen]

Yes he has, pretty clearly. Maybe Tavares is not, but he’s not quite as comparable as Nylander or Matthews.

Tavares and Matthews/Marner suck in different ways.

JT's kind of arm wrestling with Father Time to varying success. Is a bad skater and has unreliable hands that kind of quit on him for long stretches, but you can see the grind in him. A very stoic guy and not the greatest emotional leader.

Matthews and Marner. To borrow the Logan Roy line, they're not serious people.

 

[Stephen]

If Marner signs in Florida I don't want to see a single person on this board defend him no matter how big a fan of his they are. That would make it clear to me that those posters are Marner first, Leafs second. Not acceptable.

That would pretty much be the apex of cowardice on Mitch's part and would completely validate absolutely everything the anti-Marner posters have been parroting for years. I don't expect it to happen. If he thinks he's hated now he wouldn't believe how persona non grata he'd be in the entire province if he does something like that.

I don't see him being a good stylistic fit in Florida or Vegas.

 

[TheGreenTBer]

I don't see him being a good stylistic fit in Florida or Vegas.

Not at all.

Anaheim is a great fit. They're not close to the cap so a sign-and-trade for the 8th year is unlikely but it's a terrific fit for Mitch.

 

[Cleetus]

I know Jon Cooper in the past was quite Fond of Marners game also, but not sure how they would ever make that work cap wise

 

[Gabriel426]

yup i've mentioned about 1 000 times the Islanders got a lot better when JT walked and that's because Johnny's a loser but letting Tavares walk i've been told would cause the world to end to so we have no choice but to re-sign him and then spin it as a discount

i have no problem with change , i'm just not going to scapegoat 1 player when there were many who didn't play well enough

i believe we are fairly close but that doesn't mean i want to keep running it back nor does it mean i want to trade everyone except Tavares , for me i'd like to see them replace our ghost of a second line C with a solid 2 way grinding C , he doesn't have to be a star , just a hard working 2 way player with a decent skill level , then use the rest of his cap hit to upgrade the depth

That’s where you got it wrong at least from me.
I am not scapegoating MM, just that not signing is the easiest option.
Like I would trade AM, Willie and Reilly in hockey deals to bring in players.

To me even if McBain or Crouse or whoever come to the Leafs, if the Core 5 are still here, they will end up losing their edge and be more like the Core 5. That’s also something I am wary of with Knies.
The team needs a cultural reset and that’s why Bennett, Marchand, Marchessault, Ekblad and even Stone are very attractive as those guys will set a completely different cultures than Core 5 and if Leafs then bring in younger guys, hopefully they will become players who ain’t afraid to play in Game 7 and have confidence.

 

[Antropovsky]

Id be shocked it Zito had interest. He didnt like Huberdeau, why would he like Marner.

 

[Stephen]

I know Jon Cooper in the past was quite Fond of Marners game also, but not sure how they would ever make that work cap wise

Guess we could help them out and take the Hedman or Kucherov contract off them.

 

[Kiwi]

Agree brother. Of the core 5, the only one I would like to remain is actually JT.
BUT these are the conditions.
1. 4mil caphit(can be 7mil real wage but on deferred deals)
2. No PP1 time and must accept his role as 3C or 3LW
3. Must understand his role as a support/depth player instead of a top player on the team.

One thing I'm going to disagree with is no PP1 time, he's still an extremely good PP producer and it would be a waste not using him on the 1st unit

Fitting him under the cap wouldn't be easy for Vegas or Florida, I have doubts Florida would want him anyway

The teams he fits best are the up and coming teams with cap space, he seems to want good capped out teams

Should be interesting where he ends up