At the end of the 2025 NHL Draft, General Manager Brad Treliving discussed the reports of a possible sign-and-trade or rights trade with Vegas involving Mitch Marner, the team’s 2025 draft class, and the UFA talent pool this summer.
How would you characterize Vegas’ interest in Mitch Marner? How optimistic are you that you can get a trade done before July 1?
Treliving: That was a good try. I am not going to comment.
As I said the other day, Tuesday is free agency, and we will continue to work away at things. Nothing to report on that front.
Is there a greater chance of trading Marner’s rights with a couple of days to go than there might have been a week ago?
Treliving: I don’t know if the chances are greater today than they were yesterday or if they are going to be better or worse tomorrow. I understand the interest, but certainly, we have nothing to report. I don’t want to get involved in speculation and how that runs. We will see how things unfold in the next few days.
Is it absolutely important that you get something for his rights?
Treliving: You’d always like to get something, right? That is not always the case. That is probably as far as I want to get into it. We’ll see how things go.
How do you feel about the group of players available this summer in free agency, and what you might be able to accomplish starting on Tuesday?
Treliving: We have a few days to see who gets signed. We will see what the list is at that point. But I think there are players at all sorts of different positions.
We have some internal business that we are focused on as well. We have some of our own free agents that we continue to work at.
There will be players available who can certainly help out at different positions. We will see where that gets to.
What do you think of the NHL doing away with the interview period with free agents? Do you have a preference?
Treliving: That’s been the case for a while. I think there was a benefit to it, for sure, but we have been under this program for a while now.
You mentioned that you kind of expected to trade down in the draft or trade into next year. None of it happened. What was that market like for you?
Treliving: It was active. I think you saw quite a bit of it. We had some opportunities with our second-round pick. We felt the gap we had to go down to was probably a little bit too far. The staff was passionate about the pick there.
There weren’t really any trade-up scenarios that manifested themselves. We looked to see if we could accumulate some more picks, but it never came to fruition.
Can you sum up the job you think your draft team did? The prospects are obviously three, four, or five years away from playing.
Treliving: We will reconvene in five years and see how successful the year was.
As [Mark Leach] said, you are looking for elements that can get somebody there. With the size factor, you can’t chase it; you are not just chasing it, but as our list fell into place and decisions were made, you are having comparable players. Ultimately, it is a passion for the player that is there. Along with the passion, there were some players who had some size.
Each of these guys has an element that we like. There is a lot of stuff that still needs to be worked on, like all young players. They’ll now get turned over to the development staff and get to work.
You judge these draft days with a calendar, not a stopwatch, but I am really happy with the work the staff did and the communication. That was probably the biggest difference in this setup: You are able to freely communicate in the room a little bit more than when you are jammed up at the table, where space is tight.
Did you like the decentralized setup, then? Would you rather go back to the old way?
Treliving: Centralized or decentralized — that is the question of the day, haha.
I love the draft. I think it is unique in our sport. I like the ability to talk face-to-face with other managers. You lose that bit.
Really, the pro of the decentralized draft is the calendar. We would all be trying to scramble for planes right now to travel back. You have work that needs to be done over the next couple of days. That is the biggest benefit of being at home and being in a room where you can freely communicate.
Those are the pluses, but certainly, you miss the togetherness and being able to talk with people.
That is really sitting on the fence, isn’t it? I’ll have to sleep on it and get back to you with my final vote on it.
When your staff talked to Will Belle, did his enthusiasm come through the same way it did with the media?
Treliving: Yeah, enthusiastic kid. We had a chance to spend some time. We brought a few of those kids up here after the combine. As Leachy said, it is a unique background. Pretty passionate guy. He’s an interesting guy to talk to. He has a lot of energy, and we liked the time we spent with him, for sure.
Did you end up talking to Rylan Fellinger? It is his prom today.
Treliving: Yeah, we did. You could hear the music going on in the background. I said, “What’s going on?” He said, “I’m at my prom.”
That is the best part of it: talking to the kids after the draft when they are excited. That is a fun part of it.
Maple Leafs’ 2025 Draft Selections
 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Round (Overall) | Player | Position | Ht/Wt | Country | Team/League | Profile |
| 2 (64*) | Tinus Luc Koblar | LHC | 6'3, 190 | Norway | Leksands IF (J20) | READ |
| 3 (86**) | Tyler Hopkins | LHC | 6'1, 183 | Canada | Kingston (OHL) | READ |
| 5 (137***) | Will Belle | RW | 6'4, 225 | USA | USNTDP | READ |
| 5 (153) | Harry Nansi | RHC/W | 6'3, 185 | Canada | Owen Sound (OHL) | READ |
| 6 (185) | Rylan Fellinger | RD | 6'4, 196 | Canada | Flint (OHL) | READ |
| 7 (217) | Matthew Hlacar | LW | 6'3, 201 | Canada | Kitchener (OHL) | READ |
**The Sharks acquired Timothy Liljegren from the Maple Leafs for Matt Benning, a 2026 6th round pick, and a conditional 2025 3rd round pick (via COL)
***The Penguins acquired Conor Timmins and Connor Dewar from the Maple Leafs for a 2025 5th round pick
