Nick Kypreos’ latest defense of Mitch Marner badly misses the mark

This week, Nick Kypreos penned a Toronto Star column encouraging Maple Leafs fans not to vilify Mitch Marner if he walks away this summer as a UFA. In the piece, he also argues that the Maple Leafs haven’t given Marner any reason to trust the organization’s loyalty. 

Kypreos specifically cites the recent examples of Mikko Rantanen and Brad Marchand:

Kypreos: The NHL used to be a place where loyalty reigned supreme.

But with the likes of Brad Marchand and Mikko Rantanen changing teams this trade season, it reminded us loyalty has become a relic of the NHL’s past. When free agency rolls around July 1, we’ll see if there’s any left between Mitch Marner and the Maple Leafs.

We are in an era where teams are comfortable cutting longtime captains loose. An era where homegrown stars and Stanley Cup champions can be traded over relatively small salary disputes. And an era where players will, more often than not, prioritize their own career trajectories and bank accounts over the good of the team.

In my day, Mario Lemieux, Steve Yzerman, Nicklas Lidström and Joe Sakic were the gold standard of players who bled the colours of one team throughout their careers. That two-way loyalty between a player and his team seems rare these days.

… Marner has said for years that he loves playing for the Leafs. Nine seasons into his NHL career, that hometown loyalty may no longer be enough. And why should it be?

In a not-so-slick misdirection, Kypreos essentially argues: “NHL teams aren’t always loyal to their players when they want too much money for management’s tastes (Avalanche/Lightning) or are shifting into rebuild mode (Bruins). Therefore, Marner shouldn’t be loyal to the Leafs!”

Conflating the four situations mentioned in the article — Rantanen, Marner, Marchand, Stamkos — creates a gross mischaracterization of the particulars of the Marner/Leafs situation. It flattens crucial context and nuance.

The Leafs, by all accounts, would love to sign Marner to a contract that, based on everything we’ve seen from them in their negotiations with Matthews and Nylander (and the past settlement with Marner), will not include a nickel-and-dime approach to the negotiation. By Kypreos’ admission in the article, Marner refuses to negotiate in-season.

Inverting the recent example of Marchand to show why Marner shouldn’t be villainized if he doesn’t sign to stay in Toronto – after also refusing to negotiate a deal or waive his NMC at the deadline while expressing his desire to play in Toronto – is particularly deceiving. Mid-season, Marchand called a face-to-face meeting with Bruins management in hopes of bridging the gap between the sides, expressing that he was ready to work with the organization in good faith. If Marner did the same with Treliving tomorrow, we’d probably report a signed and sealed contract extension by the next day.

Kypreos also attempts to construct a “The Leafs aren’t loyal to Marner” narrative to justify the Marner camp’s approach, but unsurprisingly, he is forced to reach for evidence — to the point where he takes a random Treliving quote out of context.

Kypreos links to an article by Kevin McGran that includes a quote from Shanahan about “everything being on the table” after last season’s playoff exit as well as a quote from Treliving. The specific Treliving quote referenced by McGran — and also Kypreos, who names Treliving specifically — was about the team’s top-heavy roster/cap construction. Marner’s name is never mentioned:

For the past several years, the team has had four high-priced players who take up about 50% of the salary cap space. Winning teams don’t seem to be structured that way. Does that philosophy need to change?

Treliving: As we said, the short answer is that we have to look at everything. We don’t have to revisit the history of when those contracts were done. We ran into a pandemic. A lot of things happened.

Again, I have to expand the view. I have a 12-month view of this thing. We have really good players, but it hasn’t worked, right? It hasn’t worked to date. Again, you were not going to come out here and make emotional decisions or decisions so that we can have another press conference where we can say, “Look at what we have done!” That makes no sense, but you have to analyze why it hasn’t worked.

Certainly, you can have a viewpoint and say, “We have invested in four players for X% of the salary cap, and if we spread it all around, you are going to have more depth and those types of things.” We are where we are. This is the situation we are in. Those are really good players. We have to dig into why we are ending up with the same result year after year and adjust accordingly.

The question leading to Shanahan’s answer about “everything being on the table” did include a reference to Marner and Tavares’s No-Movement Clauses at one point. Here is the whole exchange:

When you say everything is on the table this summer, is it safe to say it includes asking Mitch Marner and John Tavares if they would be willing to waive their NMCs? If so, what is your sense of how receptive they would be to that?

Shanahan: It is important to state that even since the season ended, everything is on the table. We will discuss everything. I don’t think it serves the Maple Leafs in any fashion to discuss those things prematurely or discuss those individuals prematurely.

Our focus right now is on finding a new head coach. Certainly, that new head coach will have an important voice as part of our decisions moving forward. I am simply saying that whatever questions you guys ask us, generally speaking, they are things we are going to have to consider after what we have seen.

Brad and Keith are relatively new here, but I am not. I have seen some of these things over the years. Again, I do believe there is a time for preaching patience. I do believe there is a time when you have to examine some of the patterns that persist. Everything will be on the table.

I don’t think it serves the Toronto Maple Leafs well to get into any specifics today.

Is Kypreos’ argument, then, that Shanahan was supposed to explicitly single out Marner here — as if to say he will perhaps consider big changes, but they absolutely cannot include Marner leaving? In the process, was Shanahan meant to ignore the inclusion of Tavares in the question? Tavares, by the way, was still the captain of the team at the time and just last week publicly restated how badly he wishes to stay once the Leafs get around to talking business with him, despite this apparent public show of disloyalty by Shanahan.

It also would’ve been inappropriate for Shanahan to make any declarations about specific players at that juncture, a few days after the series loss to Boston. At a minimum, he had to acknowledge at least that everything was under review and change needed to be considered after seven straight early playoff exits. Shanahan’s statements clearly weren’t about Marner or any one player on the team specifically. Not many of us in the market really believed a core player would move when push came to shove, but it would’ve been tough to justify ruling big changes out entirely on that day in May 2024. It was not the time or place for the Leafs’ President to address specific players and their futures.

In terms of action — perhaps to their detriment in the end (TBD) — we also have little indication that the Leafs pursued moving Marner last summer with any degree of seriousness. Just as we heard about the Rantanen trade possibility very quickly, we quite likely would’ve heard about it if the Leafs were in any way seriously building a market or drumming up a bidding war amongst a variety of teams last summer while intending to present some options to Marner.

Further to the point about fan perception, refusing to waive the NMC does change the picture when taken in combination with the refusal to sign or negotiate as of yet. Again, the Marner camp has the contractual right to refuse a trade; it probably came as no surprise to Treliving that Marner did turn it down, given Marner has a baby on the way, plays in his hometown, and is committed to seeing the season through with his teammates in Toronto.

Fans are also within their rights to judge Marner for how he and his camp handle this. For now, we’ll ignore the history of contractual disputes, an important piece of the story and a pretty ugly one in this case (offer sheet threats, negotiating through the media). What fan would like it if a star player on their favourite team is refusing to negotiate a contract with a management group eager to hand him a massive contract, refuses to accept a trade to another team, and claims he wants to be in their city only to walk away from the team at the end of the day?

The only scenario where a fan base might stomach this with any sort of grace is if Marner was celebrating a Cup win with the Leafs on his way out. The larger point: If hockey fans at the center of the hockey universe weren’t loyal and passionate enough to their team to vilify a player in such a scenario where the player expresses a desire to stay, refuses to negotiate a contract in season, refuses a trade, and then leaves their (contending) team anyway, we likely wouldn’t even have a league that allows Marner to make $100+ million to play a kids’ game.

The natural next question is whether Treliving should’ve presented the trade possibility to Marner, then, if Marner was likely to turn it down. The answer is absolutely.

Treliving wouldn’t be doing his job — at a fireable-offense level — if he was sitting there not negotiating with Marner’s camp as he edges towards UFA and also ignoring the Rantanen trade possibility so as to not to ruffle any feathers. It would be managerial malpractice, and Treliving did the right thing by performing his due diligence.

The issue became that it could now leak because more than just the Leafs and Marner were involved. Carolina is clearly aware, and probably Dallas and other teams pursuing Rantanen would’ve been aware. In some way or another, it leaked, and it led to a media firestorm that Treliving was forced to come out and address. Marner himself, his head coach, and other teammates were forced to comment on it in the media at a time of the season when the play on the ice really should be the sole focus.

Thanks to the unique Rantanen situation, this possibility fell into the Leafs’ lap. They had a player of comparable value who would’ve come to Toronto (and seemingly signed long-term) on the table at the trade deadline before Marner’s approaching UFA eligibility. As Marner’s camp takes the approach of slow-playing it until free agency (or closer to it), Treliving would’ve been remiss not to thoroughly investigate his options.

It could’ve bailed the Leafs out of a major headache and, depending on how it plays out from here, a potentially era-destroying situation if they’re not careful in managing it. Teams almost always lose trades when moving out players of Marner’s calibre, especially for teams in the Leafs’ position (trying to chase a Cup). Yet, Carolina presented a path toward not necessarily losing a hockey trade. This would’ve been a superstar-for-superstar blockbuster that would’ve allowed the Leafs to retain a top-five, prime-aged winger on their team long-term – one who happens to have some fantastic playoff production (and a Cup ring) on his resume. I won’t compare the two players’ games and relative value, but from an asset management perspective, Treliving simply had to find out if Marner was at all open to it.

For the record, similar to Anthony’s view, I think there is enough here — the Leafs’ very strong desire to keep him, and Marner’s preference to stay, under the right conditions — to suggest this ultimately is worked out eventually, and Marner stays put. However, the closer it edges toward July 1, and depending on what transpires in the playoffs, there remains a real possibility that the negotiations could derail.

There is an undeniable pattern of behaviour here from the Marner camp. Recall Kyle Dubas’ quote in February 2019, ahead of the contentious second-contract negotiation the following summer: “We’re respecting their wishes… When they’re ready to sit down, we’ll talk. He’s going to be a Toronto Maple Leaf for a long time, regardless of how we have to come to that.”

It is also a familiar sight to see these strange pro-Marner pieces or segments pop up in the media in an almost PR-like fashion when these contractual disputes flare up.

Despite this distraction last weekend and what has to be a highly frustrating saga for a GM to navigate, Treliving, similar to Dubas, has voiced complete alignment and 1,000% endorsement of Mitch Marner, the person and the player. There is very little ground to stand on regarding the argument for a lack of organizational loyalty shown by the Leafs to Marner. It requires one quote taken entirely out of context to even pretend otherwise.

Kypreos is right that loyalty proved to be a one-way street in the case of Rantanen/Colorado and Marchand/Boston. It could change in Toronto, but it’s (thus far) proven a one-way street for the Leafs/Marner; only it’s not the Leafs refusing to play ball.