News: Mitch Marner Contract Mega-Thread (mod warning post 990)

[FrankMTL]

I don't know if it's his doing or not, but Dubas seems to be having a rough time with these negotiations recently.

 

[HTFN]

I think Ferris did a smart thing here. Let's not forget Dubas gave a sound bite earlier in the day. I said this yesterday, everytime Dubas opens his mouth, he is giving more ammo to agents.



What Ferris did was let Dubas know not so subtly if he wants to back up the statement above. He has to ante up. It may be he sees weakness in Dubas with the Nylander and Matthews deals, and he is just upping the pressure. Marner bet on himself this year, this won't affect him on the ice. He's 6-8 pts clear in the lead on the Leafs for scoring. He's doing what he has to, for Ferris to show him the money. But Dubas brought this on himself to some extent by making negotiation mistakes by continually making promises. This is why GM's are better to not say anything than to keep giving sound bites where agents can turn against them. Ferris did this cleverly yesterday.

Pretty much. He basically blew Customer (Fan) Service 101: Only set expectations you can meet. By swearing to do anything other than simply "Explore options" at this time he's just cutting ground out from under his own feet, and it gets worse with every deal they sign.

 

[Kamiccolo]

Your fandom is 100% in the way of you seeing this clearly.

"You should take less than you're worth so we can hoard all our nice things" is greed. "You should just buck up and take one for the team, kid" is, well, maybe not bullying in a severe sense but then again, neither is "Matthews didn't take a pay cut and we're over here getting hardball offers, that won't cut it and we've been patient". Swinging your **** around on the FA market while boasting about how easy it's going to be to keep all your talent is certainly greed, if not a little of both.

You said it yourself, you have to pay your stars. If you think contract negotiations are a hugfest that's on you.

Nah sorry. It's greed to say that 10M isn't enough, I want 11. Sorry no one will change my mind. They want to max out their earnings, fine, that is their right. But in the mean time they are f***ing with a fan base that hasn't had a championship in almost a lifetime and I hope they all realize the shit storm this city will bring down on them if they fail to live up to these deals.

I say trade them all for the right price IMO

 

[Strait2thecup]

Dubas is not a good gm

 

[A1LeafNation]

Marner will be a better player than Matthews IMO. Leafs would be smart to lock him up long term. 8 years at 12 million per year should do it.

Matthews is a premier center and a premier goal scorer when it's all said and done.

 

[hamzarocks]

Dubas is not a good gm

Made a good trade but haven't liked his contracts yet. Still doesnt have too long of a resume. Remains to be seen but he is probably avg at best

 

[Kamiccolo]

I don't know if it's his doing or not, but Dubas seems to be having a rough time with these negotiations recently.

I think Dubas is a great people manager, seems to be a great talent evaluater (his drafting and trades) but he sucks at contract negotiations

 

[HTFN]

Good post, but it’s important to consider the difference between Toronto and everywhere else. There’s no escaping it in Toronto for not only the exposure, but the volume of media.

Marner’s gonna have a loooong morning today.

Undeniable, but like anybody having a bad day at work, he'll just have to remind himself that he's fielding the extra crap for an extra payoff. I fail to properly account for Toronto media almost every time, but I would still hope there will come a pretty understandable "now it's time to shut the **** up and stop asking" point, either from Marner, his camp, or just the coaching staff if this keeps on too close to playoff time. There are bigger fish for those guys to fry come March than to answer these questions for the 80th time, so for now just weather the storm because from his perspective, it's worth it.

 

[TheGroceryStick]

I don't know if it's his doing or not, but Dubas seems to be having a rough time with these negotiations recently.

Yup.
I think it started with the Tavares signing and subsequent Shanahan/Dubas statement of "Guys will need to take discounts"
, "we are prepared to sign our big 3 stars"

Well, whatever. Do the right thing management.

Trade Nylander...put pressure on Marleau to accept a trade. Make a public statement that we are forced to structure our team differently and need to trade alot of guys we wanted around.

 

[Nizdizzle]

 

[Skinnyjimmy08]

Ofcourse they will lowball him at first.. Not like they will instantly just hand him the Matthews deal that he deserves... The fact that his agent is making this public is concerning to see.. There wont be no discount thats for damn sure. I know fans all said that marner and matthews seem like guys that will take less and bla bla bla but its not happening. Matthews bent over Dubas and now its Marners turn

 

[GodEmperor]

By this argument Matthews is worth nowhere near 11.5 per annum.

Matthews is a center
Matthews scored 40 in his first year
Matthews paced for 50 last year
Matthews has a better ppg pace this year too

Maybe Mitch might have an argument if he did something definitively better than Auston, apart from health, he doesn't have anything on him, certainly not position.

Matthews got paid basically a bit more than Eichel and a good chunk less than McDavid (proportional to the cap) which is right where he is at.

Mitch's low end value is 9.5 and highest at 10.5, certainly not equal to Matthews unless he wants to learn how to play C.

 

[David Suzuki]

His big day gets marred by Ferris' comments

Is he 10 years old? Pretty sure he doesn't care. Also if you think Marner didn't condone these comments you're out to lunch!

 

[janesy12]

I think Dubas is a great people manager, seems to be a great talent evaluater (his drafting and trades) but he sucks at contract negotiations

Dubas is not a good gm

Do people honestly think it's only Dubas making these decisions?
Like it's just him and the agent sitting in a boardroom with a calculator and the Salary Cap Handbook?

Dubas takes his advice from a room full of lawyers, accountants, statisticians that know all this stuff inside out.

 

[PatriceBergeronFan]

I don't see the issue with taking umbrage on Marner's side if the GM is pressuring him into taking less while giving teammates more.

 

[PatriceBergeronFan]

Nah sorry. It's greed to say that 10M isn't enough, I want 11. Sorry no one will change my mind. They want to max out their earnings, fine, that is their right. But in the mean time they are ****ing with a fan base that hasn't had a championship in almost a lifetime and I hope they all realize the **** storm this city will bring down on them if they fail to live up to these deals.

I say trade them all for the right price IMO

The players owe you nothing.

 

[leaffaninvancouver]

Do people honestly think it's only Dubas making these decisions?
Like it's just him and the agent sitting in a boardroom with a calculator and the Salary Cap Handbook?

Dubas takes his advice from a room full of lawyers, accountants, statisticians that know all this stuff inside out.

People are remarkably stupid. I’m sure they think it is just an agent and Dubas locked in a room.

 

[JasonRoseEh]

How does anything I said convey any bias against the Leafs?

The second paragraph was a general statement, not necessarily directed towards you, but it's nonsense that Marner is feeling any heat at all.

 

[GoldiFox]

Leafs just paid Nylander and Matthews at the top end of their RFA values. Good luck getting Marner to take anything but the top of what he's worth ($11+ million). Any team in the league should be happy to pay up for Marner, good problem to have.

 

[Stuzchuk]

my guess for Marner, 5yrs @ 8.5-9.0M (Draisaitl's Money, with less term)

 

[Tuggy]

Marner's agent about to come on TSN1050. You can listen from tsn.ca.

 

[JasonRoseEh]

Matthews is a center
Matthews scored 40 in his first year
Matthews paced for 50 last year
Matthews has a better ppg pace this year too

Maybe Mitch might have an argument if he did something definitively better than Auston, apart from health, he doesn't have anything on him, certainly not position.

Matthews got paid basically a bit more than Eichel and a good chunk less than McDavid (proportional to the cap) which is right where he is at.

Mitch's low end value is 9.5 and highest at 10.5, certainly not equal to Matthews unless he wants to learn how to play C.

And Marner is the teams best player THIS year and getting better. He does something definitely better than AM, he makes every line he's on work. Look what happens when he's not on a line.

Ultimately it doesn't matter because Marner and his agent believe he's worth equal to Matthews and they're not going to budge much at all. Personally? I love that this is happening to the Leafs.

 

[waitin425]

Toronto has all the power. Marner is either an asset to them signed or a wasted asset sitting at home. Like Nylander he can wait and wait and not play and that can go on for years. No one wants that to happen but if the Leafs truly want to play ball they can set a price and that’s that.

With all of that being said, I feel that based on comparables on his own team (I don’t care about Kuch, etc) Marner has a strong case to argue that he is worth slightly less than Matthews. I’m thinking in the neighbourhood of 10.5.

Interestingly I believe that Kap is also going to be in the same boat. The kid looks amazing every game. His talent and ability are similar to Nylander and Nylander has done nothing to help the team by stinking it up this year. bobs projection of Kap signing for 2.5 is grossly low. The guy deserves at least 4.5 probably closer to 5.

Finally Johnsson. That kid also deserves a raise in the ball park of 2.5. I bet he gets bridged.

At the end of the day in order to make all this work, the Leafs should trade Nylander, after his big pay this summer, for a strong right handed d with a better term. Nylander for Pesce makes too much sense. Gives the Leafs ~3 million to play with and a much stronger d core

 

[Kamiccolo]

The players owe you nothing.

Imagine if Bergeron, Pasta, Marchand, etc all asked to be the highest paid guys in the league and your lack of depth wasn't just poor drafting and development but salary cap restrained. You'd change your tune.

And this is coming for everyone. People laughing at Leaf fans right now but when your RFA's are up, you'll feel the same way.

 

[GBLeaf]

Wonder if anyone fancies offer sheeting him now, seeing as he allegedly wants 11m+ ?