Pending UFA Marner unsure if he'll be back with Leafs
Published
Toronto Maple Leafs players and coach Craig Berube held their end-of-season media availabilities on Tuesday at the Ford Performance Centre.
Mitch Marner is not ready to talk about his future.
"It's so fresh," the pending unrestricted free agent said during the team's end-of-season media availability. "It's tough to really think about anything right now, about going forward and future-wise. I was hoping to be playing a hockey game tonight, and that's not the outcome. I haven't thought about anything. Next coming weeks, I'll sit down with my wife, and we'll start talking and trying to figure out what the next steps are."
Marner grew up a Leafs fan in Toronto and has said playing for his hometown team "meant everything." But there's also a sense the 28-year-old winger, who declined to engage in negotiations during the season, may be ready for a fresh start after nine years and only two playoff series wins in Toronto.
Marner was asked point blank if he wants to be a Leaf next season.
"Always loved my time here," he said. "I loved being here. Like I said to you guys the other night, I've been so grateful. I haven't processed anything yet. It's still so fresh. It's just so fresh."
Like in the immediate aftermath of the Game 7 defeat, Marner answered in the past tense when talking about his time in Toronto.
Despite emerging as a 100-point player and Selke Trophy nominee, Marner has taken a lot of heat over the years for his role in Toronto's playoff losses.
Marner opened his media session on Tuesday by thanking a reporter for deleting a social media post, which elicited a fan response that crossed the line.
Marner, who became a first-time father during the playoffs, was asked what it's been like for his family to experience some of the lows during his tenure in Toronto.
"I'm sure it's tough on them," he said. "You got to not focus on that. That's, I think, what my wife and I have done such a good job of the last couple of years is just not focusing on that. You can't focus on that. You know there's so much love and appreciation for yourself and from the fans out there and just because you don't hear it, you know it's still out there. You know you got the love of a lot of people."
Fans littered the ice with jerseys and other debris late in the Game 7 blowout loss to the Florida Panthers on Sunday. Some fans inside Scotiabank Arena booed Marner when he touched the puck late in the game.
"Sometimes the noise you hear is not the one that you want, but that's how it goes," he said. "And, yeah, I'm sure my family's taking it hard, especially being in the crowd for a couple [games]."
Marner described the fan response in Game 7 as "heartbreaking" in his post-game scrum.
"But, you know, that's how this game of hockey goes," he said on Tuesday. "And the passion the city brings is something that you appreciate and love about it."
---
John Tavares is also a pending unrestricted free agent. Unlike Marner, the 34-year-old centre has repeatedly expressed a desire to sign an extension. And he was encouraged by the discussions he had with general manager Brad Treliving and coach Craig Berube on Tuesday.
"I've had positive conversations with Tree and Chief today and very optimistic that it can work out where I'm back," Tavares said. "But haven't put too much thought into it as obviously it's only been just a number of hours since things have ended."
Tavares served as team captain for five of his seven years in Toronto. During that time he's welcomed three children into the world and started a charitable foundation.
How will he balance family needs with the other factors involved in a negotiation?
"Everything plays into it," Tavares acknowledged. "But, you know, you want to make something work, you do everything you can to try to find what works on both sides and what's fair for myself and my family and for the team and the club."
---
Auston Matthews acknowledged that the injury he sustained during training camp remained an issue throughout the entire season.
"It was tough, definitely," the 27-year-old centre said." Physically, you know, it was a very tough season."
Matthews tried to play through the injury at the start of the season, but eventually missed nine games and travelled to Germany to get treatment. He then missed six more games later in the season.
Matthews finished with a career low 33 goals in 67 regular season games. He scored three goals in 13 playoff games.
"There was good stretches," he said. "There was stretches that weren't so good. It was just kind of a bit of a rollercoaster, unfortunately, throughout the whole season, throughout playoffs, just on a day-to-day basis."
Matthews missed a practice and a morning skate during the playoff run. He said the issue will not require surgery.
"I'm confident with some time off and just going through my own process, and stuff like that and treatment and everything, I'm really confident I'll be back 100 per cent next season, and there's nothing really to worry about," he said.
Matthews declined to reveal any specifics regarding the nature of the injury.
---
Restricted free agent Matthew Knies is eager to get a new deal done with the Leafs.
"I want to be here," the 22-year-old winger said. "I want to play here. That's all that really matters to me."
Knies made it clear that he's not interested in going down the offer sheet route.
"I want to be here," the Arizona native reiterated when asked about that possibility. "I want to play here. That's all that matters to me."
Knies is coming off a breakout season, which saw him score 29 goals in 78 regular season games and then pot five more goals over 13 playoff games.
Knies isn't sure if he'd prefer a long-term deal or something shorter.
"We ended like two days ago," he said. "I haven't really thought about any of that."
Knies sustained an injury in Game 6 against the Panthers, which limited his impact at the end of the series.
"Not really going to disclose what it was but almost prevented me to play the way I wanted to play," he said.
Knies, who played almost the entire season on the top line with Matthews and Marner, expects the injury to heal on its own during the summer.
---
Anthony Stolarz confirmed he sustained a concussion in Game 1 of the series against Florida . He got hurt when Panthers centre Sam Bennett bumped into his head while driving the net.
"I don't think there was any malicious intent on his part," the Leafs goalie said. "It was just one of those things where he just caught me in a bad spot."
Stolarz remained in the game initially before vomiting at the bench and heading to the hospital for further evaluation. He said the shot that he took to the mask from Sam Reinhart earlier game had no role in the injury.
Stolarz and Bennett are friends having won a Stanley Cup together last season.
"He obviously felt pretty bad," Stolarz said. "It's a very fast game and, you know, s--t's going to happen. I told him basically, 'Good luck,' and, you know, 'I'm doing a lot better now, doing fine.'"
Stolarz dressed as the back-up goalie in Game 7, but never returned to game action. He described the injury absence in the playoffs as being "extremely frustrating."
---
Max Pacioretty produced six points in the series against the Panthers, which was tied for the team lead with William Nylander.
But the 36-year-old winger, who is a pending unrestricted free agent, is not sure if he will play again next season.
"This year was very difficult for me being away from my family," the father of five said. "So, I'm really excited to just get home and be with them and talk to them about what's next in life. But in terms of playing, that's difficult to answer right now."
Pacioretty's family remained in Michigan during the season.
---
After the series ended, Panthers winger Brad Marchand and coach Paul Maurice defended the Leafs and suggested the scrutiny they face in Toronto makes it more challenging to win.
"When you see the pressure that Toronto faces … you see the fans, they just beat the pressure into this team,” Marchand said from the podium after improving to 5-0 in series against the Leafs. "It’s got to be tough on those guys to walk to the rink every day and not feel that."
But Leafs players and Berube refused to use the market pressure as an excuse on Tuesday.
"There's always pressure, and we put the most pressure on ourselves," said Marner. "I mean, we hold ourselves to such a high accountability."
"There's pressure everywhere," Berube said. "I don't care where you're playing. If you're playing in that Game 7 and you're in Columbus, there's pressure to win."
But the way the Leafs lost Game 5 and Game 7 on home ice – identical 6-1 scores – provoked questions about the team's ability to silence outside noise. After the Game 7 loss, Berube suggested that the issue for his team was "between the ears."
"You may not have your A-game, but what you have to rely on is your structure," the coach expanded on Tuesday. "And when I look at these games and I look at the situation that arrived and hurt us in these games, we lost our structure. And that's very important that we take this away and that we come back next year: Structure is very important. And if you don't lose your structure, you can get through these games without having your A-game."
Berube added that the team makes sure the players have resources available to deal with the mental side of the game.
"There's pressure anywhere you play," said goalie Joseph Woll, who allowed five goals in the Game 7 loss. "And the thing about pressure is it comes from a good place. It comes from us having fans that care. It comes from us having media that cares, from players that care. And, you know, I've had a unique experience of only playing for this team, so I can't really speak for experience of playing for a different team, but I know that there's nowhere I'd rather play. I'm happy how much people care and it really makes you have to focus that much harder and really be in the moment that much more when you have that pressure."
---
No representative from the Leafs management group addressed reporters on Tuesday.