Former Leaf believes Mitch Marner is as good as gone
Is the writing on the wall?
HockeyFeed
After the Toronto Maple Leafs re-signed forward William Nylander to a hefty extension, they now face the harsh reality of having nearly half of their salary cap dedicated to just four players.
What exactly does the future hold for one key member of the "Core 4" in Mitch Marner? According to former Maple Leafs left wing and current podcaster Jay Rosehill, the writing could be on the wall for Marner's departure at some point.
"I see it and i can't help, when I think about Willy, I wanna sign Willy, I don't wanna let him go but every time I think about that contract, I think about Marner and what do we do with the Core-4, Marner's no-trades kicked in and it's like what are we gonna do?" Rosehill opined.
"Look at the team this year, are they gonna go the distance? Are they gonna win the Stanley Cup this year? It would be some kind of a miracle and maybe some major changes at the trade deadline.. as of right now I don't think having that many eggs in the basket of the core-4 is gonna work, it's not gonna work in the playoffs, you can have some pretty awesome regular seasons... but in my mind, I've said it before, we need to unload Marner and get as much as we possibly can for him."
Essentially, Marner is Rosehill's pick for the odd-man out at some point in the Leafs cap crunch - especially due to his opinion that the Leafs won't get it done in the playoffs with Marner.
"He's just my pick for that and he's the only guy - I mean Marner, Nylander, or Matthews, no one is going to take that Tavares contract - so for me it's Marner," he said. "You can't walk away from Matthews, you don't walk away from Willy, and that leaves the odd man out as Marner and my opinion is that you're not going to win in the playoffs with him, he doesn't have the gumption, he doesn't have the tenacity, he won't go to war with you for two straight months."
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