Maple Leafs may have made a major blunder in Mitch Marner negotiations.

A costly mistake for the Leafs.

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HockeyFeed
Published 5 years ago
Maple Leafs may have made a major blunder in Mitch Marner negotiations.
Kostas Lymperopoulos/CSM/Zuma

The Toronto Maple Leafs may have made a major misstep when it comes to young forward Mitch Marner.

On Saturday night during the weekly "Headlines" segment on Hockey Night in Canada, Sportsnet's National Hockey League insider Nick Kypreos shared some details regarding the Maple Leafs attempts at negotiating with their young star forward. The discussion from Kypreos was sparked earlier this week by comments made by Darren Ferris, the agent currently representing Mitch Marner in his negotiations with the Maple Leafs. Ferris informed reporters last week that there would be absolutely no negotiations between himself or the Toronto Maple Leafs organization moving forward when it comes to Marner, and that he and his client were committed to getting this deal worked out only after the end of this current NHL season.

“Yes, 100 percent,’’ said Ferrisas per NHL insider Pierre LeBrun. “Mitch wants to concentrate on this season.’’

What was particularly interesting in the comments made by Kypreos on Saturday was the indication that the Maple Leafs could already have Marner under contract had they met his demands over the summer, and additionally it sounds like they could have had him at a price that will no longer be on the table. Kypreos stated that Marner and his camp had been seeking a contract that would have paid him a whopping $72 million dollars moving forward, and although that is a massive number it would have looked really good right now for the Leafs.

Kypreos did not state outright that the $72 million dollar demand from Marner and his camp would have been on a max deal, but he did imply as much. When you consider that even at 8 years the average annual value on such a deal would be at $9 million per season, it seems almost certain that this was the ask from Ferris and Marner at the time. Kypreos believes that the Leafs could still get Marner at that $9 million number but that they would have to do so on a much shorter term deal in order to get Marner to sign on the dotted line with him on pace to break 100 points this season.

Now it's easy to be critical of general manager Kyle Dubas with the benefit of hindsight, but you also have to remember that he had William Nylander's contract to worry about as well. The Maple Leafs could have given in to Marner's demands and no doubt would have gotten a better deal than they will now, but that could have also artificially inflated Nylander's contract demands in the process.

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