Draisaitl got 15.9%, and while he's a very good player, especially on the PP, Marner is a better player at 5v5 and and the PK. I don't think Marner is going to get 15.9%, but he will likely justifiably get in the 14-15% range. Many good teams would pay him that.
Yes, we should have pushed harder to sign Marner last offseason if it was possible, instead of playing these stupid games with one of the best players this franchise has ever had.
Yes it has. It just hasn't got us a cup yet. People need to learn the difference.
Nobody needs to go. That's an emotional reaction. Measuring "progress" strictly by round wins is shortsighted. Matthews, Marner, and Nylander all outperformed their contracts by a similar amount, and players don't get extra money now because they were worse when they signed a fair contract last time. That's still looking backwards anyway. This should be about what helps us the most going forward, and that's keeping Marner. And if we did have to get rid of somebody (we don't), that's keeping Marner over Nylander.
That won't necessarily make the depth scoring better and more consistent than what we've had though. It will just make it more expensive. Mid tier UFAs is where money gets thrown away. And even if you did make the depth better, it's still unlikely that the team overall is better, because you're losing a massively impactful piece of the team in the process.
But hey, if we had 3-5m for depth players, we could sign brand new tier of depth that we've never before experienced... Like Mikheyev! Oh wait we already had him... Like Bunting! Oh wait we already had him... Like O'Rielly! Oh wait we already had him... Like Kerfoot! Oh wait we already had him... Like Foligno! Oh wait we already had him... Like Engvall! Oh wait we already had him... Like Domi! Oh wait we already had him... Like Bertuzzi! Oh wait we already had him... Like Laughton! Oh wait we already had him... Etc.
And not only have we already had that calibre of depth, the rising cap is going to give us opportunities to sign these kinds of players in UFA without getting rid of one of our best players.
We have 8 forwards on 2m+ contracts. Of the 14 forwards that Florida used in the playoffs, 8 were on 2m+ contracts.