Old Marner's Almanac 2025

The premise here is pretty straightforward. Every team in the NHL wants a Mitch Marner. Anyone who wouldn’t is either lying or an idiot. Similarly, there’s a reason Mitch Marner would sign with any team in the NHL. Where does this all end? Will it be over by July 2nd, or are we spending all Summer waiting with bated breath for a decision from someone who might be the most coveted free agent in the Cap Era?

I don’t know, and you sure don’t either. But I do know how your team is signing Mitch Marner as a free agent this Summer.

The ever-useful CapWages.com (a descendent of CapFriendly and all former iterations, with a special shoutout to CapGeek) and its GM Mode was used to generate 32 NHL rosters with Mitch Marner included that are legal for Opening Night 2025-26. I’ve accounted for the main pieces in RFA/UFA land, but please don’t yell at me if your favorite third-pair defender is not on the roster. They’ll make room for him, probably by shipping off your favorite second-pair defender along with a draft pick to a rebuilding team if your GM is Steve Yzerman.

Some teams easily have the room needed to offer Marner his likely contract (in the $12M-$14M AAV range), while others are obviously appealing to Marner and his camp. What you might not realize though, is that every team can make the room, and should make the room; while no one really knows what Marner is thinking, given his experience with the hometown Leafs. Does he want to make a lavish salary playing in a stress-free environment? Does he want to parachute in as the hero to push a contender over the edge? Does he want to move to a warmer climate where he can golf on non-gamedays? Does the good Canadian boy want to stay home and bring Olympic Gold and a Cup back to his home country in 2026? The possibilities here are endless.

For convenience, I’ve grouped the league into four different categories. At the end of this exercise I’ll give my official Moods Moves prediction of where Marner lands. But for now, every team is considered an option, and I’ve made it happen. I made Marner’s contract an 8-year deal in every case, assuming that Toronto will be open to a sign-and-trade to recoup some assets.

Up first, we have the only team in its own category, as well as the only team Mitchy has ever known:

The Toronto Maple Leafs, we now know, were the closest team to knocking off the back-to-back Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers, were one of two teams to win multiple postseason games against the Cats and the only team to force a Game 7. Had Toronto been able to access the Air Canada Centre in Games 5 or 7, they might just be parading down Lake Shore Boulevard themselves this week, given how easy the Panthers made the path look.

There has never been a more obvious time to Run It Back than this, as the Leafs have a legitimate claim to make that they were no worse than the second or third-best team in the NHL with a clearly-injured Auston Matthews, who battled a myriad of injuries all season and didn’t look himself at any point in the year. Can they afford to, is the question, given the unrest in the fanbase and the unmitigated disaster that Game 7 turned into against the Cats:

• Starting with Knies (bridge deal) and Tavares (signing 1-year deals to chase his elusive Cup for the hometown team), they each could cost ~$6M.

• Nick Robertson and Pontus Holmberg get light deals, Ryan Reaves gets bought out, and you bring back the entire defense corps and goaltending tandem that performed remarkably well this year.

• You’ve run it back successfully. If you need more money to throw at Knies or Tavares, you could move out Woll to a rebuilding team (I’m thinking San Jose, specifically, which I’m sure will not be unique to this roster) for a mid-round pick and sign a true backup behind Stolarz, which nets you a shade over $2.5M in AAV to hand out where you see fit.

But Mitch Marner doesn’t want the pressure of the Canadian market, so he’ll go to a place where he can be The Guy, but one that is desperate enough for his talent that they’ll let him do his thing, be it put up 100 points and Selke-level defense year-in and year-out, or disappear entirely in the postseason (or both. the answer so far has been both).

These teams also get bonus points in my book because they tend to have enough cap space to easily give Marner the ~$14M AAV he’s looking for. Very easy work. Let’s see how these teams fare:

The Chicago Blackhawks are the most obvious team of this bunch: up-and-coming superstar, a storied tradition of winning, and loads of help coming down through the pipeline. If you’re looking for the most Panarin-esque arc possible, where within two years Marner is back in the conference finals post-free agency signing with a non-playoff team, Chicago is as close as you’re gonna get:

• Kaiser and Soderblom are the only names of note that need a deal. Big whoop. This team leaves $18M of cap space, with Marner’s $15M AAV already accounted for. Plenty of room to pay Bedard and whoever from this crop of rookie talent breaks out in a big way in a year or two.

• As an added bonus, I hear Marner had a pretty good run on a line centered by a #1 Overall Pick superstar and Tyler Bertuzzi. Run It Back?

The Utah Hockey Club (Mammoth is a stupid fucking team name, fight me… at least the logo/color scheme is good) deserves consideration as the #1 option in the Chicago tier, as well, with talent that is more NHL-proven and a likelier path to immediate success. I rank Chicago above them simply because I’m not sure Utah has the same ceiling in its range of outcomes with Logan Cooley as the likely 1C of the future and a relatively weak blueline prospect pipeline:

• McBain gets a $2.9M deal for 2 years, which might even be heavy but I think they really like the player. The same can’t be said for Matias Maccelli, but that contract is already in place, believe it or not. Same with every other deal shown here.

• $3.7M in space isn’t much, but consider that Nick Schmaltz expires in a year’s time, as does Alex Kerfoot and Maccelli, and that is already ~$16M to use on Hayton and Cooley’s extensions, not considering the cap hike that is likely to be added on. Getting Dylan Guenther signed for $7M x 8 years is a good piece of business, if adding superstars in free agency is your aim!

The Columbus Blue Jackets were close enough to home for the beloved Johnny Gaudreau to sign there.. and Gaudreau grew up a 7-hour drive from Columbus. Marner’s hometown of Markham? That’s a 6:45 drive.

If the money works, Mitch sure would look good on Adam Fantilli’s wing… while the good fortune that only seemed to befall Columbus in 2024-25 once the worst possible thing imaginable happened to the franchise and the people who are a part of it could turn into Marner being the final piece of a legitimate contender. That’s not where I thought this exercise was headed.

• Fabbro is likely to fetch a nice free agency deal, so let’s get him paid to ensure the top pair of Werenski and Fabbro isn’t going anywhere, while Provorov likely walks (even though CBJ does have the room to offer him a top-of-market salary). $6Mx4 works for me.

• Tarasov is an RFA, as is Jordan Harris, so small-ish deals make sense for both.

• The final piece here is Dmitri Voronkov, who fits in so nicely with Monahan and Marchenko, especially now that they are the second line in what is all of a sudden an incredibly dynamic top six. You could convince me that something in the $7M-$8M range is the right number for the 6’5” 50-point player who doesn’t turn 25 until the preseason, but I’ve settled on $6.75M on a mid-term deal for now.

• Adding Marner still leaves CBJ with ~$10M in cap space. Easy does it.

The San Jose Sharks are about as far away from the Toronto Maple Leafs as it gets, in every sense. I hear Mitch has some San Jose connections, who might even know a thing or two about Marner’s current inability to sniff a championship…

• $25M in cap space with Marner in place is about as easy as it gets. I gave money to Georgiev and signed Kostin on the cheap. Who cares.

• Tyler Toffoli basically did this last summer, so we know the pitch can work, and who can blame someone for taking millions of dollars to go live in California? Shut up, tax nerds, accountants exist…

• With Michael Misa likely to be a day-one contributor as well, it’s not hard to picture a world in which Marner leads a team of budding superstars to success. Then again, Marner leading a team to success might actually be hard to picture…

Let’s round out this section with a few more teams that missed the playoffs in 2024-25.

The Anaheim Ducks are looking to make a splash. Marner is one big fish to catch:

• It feels like it has been 6 years since Kreider was traded to the Ducks. It has been a week? Whatever you say. Welcome to the bottom six, Chris.

• Leo and Mitchy feeding Cutter is too much to pass up. I might need to go lie down, my blood flow has been, uh… altered.

• I gave Leason a short-term deal and Lundestrom a longer-term one, hence the difference in AAV for perfectly fine bottom-six players.

• Lukas Dostal has earned every penny of the $7Mx7 deal I have him signing here… is it weird that he hasn’t signed this deal yet? I was taken aback to see him on the list of RFAs, I must say.

• The Ducks spending $14M on Marner could hinder the pending extensions of Cutter, Leo, and LaCombe (I’m assuming Zellweger and Mintyukov come in on cheap-ish bridge deals), but with Gudas, Trouba, and Zegras off the books next year, they don’t even need to move Gibson in the next year to create the necessary cap room (but seriously guys, are we trading Gibby or not?).

I hear rumblings out of the Philadelphia Flyers camp that Matvei Michkov needs a center to play with. I can’t give him that in this exercise, but a slightly-used Mitch Marner will help an awful lot! Pretty cool initials, too. I hear MMs that are located in Philadelphia are hockey geniuses.

• Pelletier probably gets a mini-extension, while my guess is Cam York gets traded for a modest return this offseason.

• In York’s place, I called up Oliver Bonk to the top four. If we want to give York a deal with Torts out of the picture, I suspect $7.4M is more than enough to get that done.

• Jett Luchanko is a major issue at 1C, but you can see the vision with a reasonable second line and a very good third line. Michkov plus Marner would be completely ridiculous levels of “Zach Hyman standing with his stick on the ice backdoor and not moving” vision and playmaking.

• I have no memory of Tippett signing a mega-extension, but if you want to try to float him for a mid-tier center, I don’t think that’s the worst idea in the world, even if you get a bit older in doing so or have to add a prospect package to the mix to draw out a bigger name. Say, does new coach Rick Tocchet know anyone? Perhaps from his old job?

Steve Yzerman has yet to find a 28-year-old free agent he won’t throw millions upon millions of the Detroit Red Wings’ dollars at:

• The Red Wings and Patrick Kane have rumblings of mutual interest, which makes this doubly complicated to get done. In reality, Marner and Kane are pretty similar players, so the aquisition of one probably means the other goes elsewhere.

• But we don’t take the easy way out here (just don’t count all the times I’ll take the easy way out here), so two top-six staples are signed for a total of $20M. With Raymond, Larkin, and Seider locked up for the next six plus years, there are no mega-deals in the immediate future to worry about, at least.

• Soderblom gets $2Mx2 to stay in a bottom six role, Berggren gets just over a mil to fill out the roster, and while you can quibble with Kane’s number, it’s been reported that he wants term, and I think $6Mx3 is fair.

• This leaves us substanially above the cap, so I have bought out Petr Mrazek (~$1.7M savings this year) and let Alex Lyon walk in free agency with Cossa in the pipeline.

• Finally, with a couple mil still needing to be cleared, I’ve shopped Justin Holl to a team that loves acquiring bad right-handed defensemen on middling deals. Holl gets traded to the Dallas Stars for a Nils Lundkvist reclamation project, and Dallas recoups a ‘27 3rd and ‘28 5th for their failed investment a few years back (they gave up a first! and then never used him!). Lundkvist gets a $1.4M show-me deal and a role in the top four alongside Simon Edvinsson. It’s now or never, Nils.

• Raymond-Larkin-Marner is pretty sweet, and we know DeBrincat-Kasper-Kane is good. We just need to survive Ben Chiarot’s final year here, and nearly $11M allocated to Compher and Copp for the next two. Woof.

What if Marner just doesn’t want the pressure of the Toronto market, but wants to stay in Canada? After all, he’ll be facing off in his first Olympic Games in 2026, and what better way to stick to the Leafs fans than to star in an Olympic Gold effort and following that up by bringing the Cup back to Canada, one year post-Toronto?

The Edmonton Oilers would be awfully enticing, wouldn’t they? While the pressure would certainly hit a fever pitch come May, Marner would probably sleep well knowing that it can’t possibly be worse than Toronto. And unlike Toronto, his star center(s) raise their game for the biggest moments.

• Surely Marner doesn’t fit into the salary cap, right? Wrong!

• Bouchard gets his mega-deal, $9.75×8, while Kapanen and Perry sign for one year deals.

• Evander Kane gets shipped out of town, with a 2nd, to his hometown Vancouver Canucks, in a cap dump that both teams shook hands on. Adam Henrique gets moved to NJ, where he started his career and remains beloved (and they could use a bottom six center) for a 4th. Finally, the Viktor Arvidsson experience draws to a close with a buyout after a tough year.

• We’re still a good bit over the cap, so we call in AHL reinforcements in Hamblin and Max Jones, pray that Sam O’Reilly or Matthew Savoie can step into an NHL job, and shop Mattias Ekholm, who has no trade protection and is coming off a troubling postseason after his injury.

• The Anaheim Ducks, having just missed out on Mitch Marner, will look to bolster their playoff chances and have a wealth of young, cheap defenseman to draw from. Pavel Mintyukov has a duplicative skillset to that of Olen Zellweger, and he should catch the Oilers’ interest. Adding the 2nd they received for Cam Fowler (a 2027 pick) gets the job done, and the Oilers press accept on the deal that gives them the space to sign on the dotted line at $13.4M AAV for Marner.

If you want some existential crisis in your life with a similarly strong team, but one where you won’t be the story once the page flips to the postseason, how about traveling a bit East? The Winnipeg Jets won’t be resigning Nik Ehlers, but perhaps they have a pretty good replacement!

• A 21 player roster is not ideal, but keep in mind Adam Lowry is likely to start next season on LTIR, as he had surgery post-elimination that seems likely to have him missing a chunk of next season. That should give them roster flexibility for the first several weeks of the season, at which point it’s likely there will be more injuries and ways to maneuver the cap.

• Gabe Vilardi and Dylan Samberg are two big ticket items hitting RFA, while as mentioned above Nik Ehlers is all but gone, and certainly is not an option with Marner in the fold. Vilardi should command somewhere in the $7.5-$8M range on a long-term deal, and Samberg’s dominant season could see him cash in, though I think a more reasonable number matches that of Josh Morrissey (signed a few years back), at $6.25M AAV.

• Depth will be tested, and hopefully Brad Lambert and Brayden Yager are up to the task to fill in crucial top 9 roles, with either Lambert or Vilardi forced to play C (especially with Lowry on the shelf).

• Nino Niederreiter is a cap casualty in this scenario, being bought out (or traded, as he likely has limited value around the league), while Colin Miller is not a necessary piece on the blue-line, with a cheap deal that I could see a team like Tampa giving up a late pick to bolster their depth and give themselves a viable PP2 weapon. These moves bring WPG into cap compliance, though again Lowry on LTIR might make these moves unnecessary.

Let’s stay out West before we head back for the Eastern Canada revenge circuit.

The Calgary Flames would certainly be interested in Mitch Marner. Just don’t ask them how shelling out an 8-figure AAV went the last time they tried.

• Huberdeau-Kadri-Marner, Coleman-Backlund-Coronato is pretty nice. I have Zary getting a bridge deal, while Kevin Bahl likely commands a 4-5M salary over a mid-length deal.

• With $3M left to play with, it’s possible CGY brings back Dan Vladar, bumps up their offer to one of the RFAs, or even tries to build a package around pending

  UFA Rasmus Andersson to make a play at another player in the league (Byram comes to mind as a fit here) with Zayne Parekh making a charge toward a top pair role sooner than later.

The Vancouver Canucks would love to show Quinn Hughes they are serious about keeping him. Mitch Marner, after years of having Morgan Rielly to keep afloat, might actually enjoy having a world-class defender glued to his hip!

• Thatcher Demko goes on LTIR for this exercise, and quite honestly I’m not sure whether Demko never plays in the NHL again or if he’s playing 41 games in a timeshare next year. I sure do lean the former, however.

• No key pieces are up for renewal other than Pius Suter who improbably seems destined for a $5M+ salary, so I am happy to let him walk and throw a $2Mx2 deal at Aatu Raty. The team looks very similar to last year, as a result. Chytil with DOC showed some life late last season, and DeBrusk-Pettersson-Marner looks pretty good to me. When you consider a D-corps led by Hughes and with MPetey and Hronek under wraps, Vancouver should look to make a return to the playoffs.

If it was truly the fans that Marner didn’t like about Toronto, there’s no better way to stick it to them than to cross enemy lines in the Battle of Ontario. The Ottawa Senators sure would love to build off the momentum of a playoff berth in 2024-25:

• Adam Gaudette and Leevi Merilainen get small NHL deals, while the Marner signing means that there’s not much room for anything else but internal auditions, with guys like Tyler Boucher and Stephen Halliday asked to play meaningful roles in 25-26.

• Carter Yakemchuk is the big-ticket entry here, as after making the team out of camp in 2024-25 he was returned to the WHL within a month, after which he didn’t make the WJC team and had an up-and-down season.

• If Yakemchuk can show out in a top-four role, then Nick Jensen’s injury history (LTIR currently, though if healthy he has no trade protection as a cap dump) should lead to a nice transition, while David Perron is bought out as the final transaction to make room.

• After this writing, Fabian Zetterlund was signed to a ~$4Mx3 deal. With this move in mind, Shane Pinto’s salary, if moved for draft pick compensation, would clear the necessary space.

The Montreal Canadiens may appeal to Marner simply on the basis of the coach, who may be the only player who was better at what Marner does at a similar size:

• Without moving obvious problem contracts like Laine, Gallagher, and Anderson, Montreal is forced to say goodbye to useful players like Christian Dvorak and Joel Armia once Marner signs. Stylistically, this lineup is a bit of a mess, so it is very possible that one of these players is convinced to waive their NTC (modified NTC, of which I did not look into the specific details for each player individually) to create the necessary room. That said, Marner+Suzuki should pull 27+ minutes a night in important games, playing in all situations, so depth is not a critical problem here. It seems quite possible that Armia + Dvorak could cost more than $7M on the open market, meaning Laine would be far better to move, but they also just acquired him last year for pennies, so that may be a tall task.

• With Beck, Roy, and Demidov providing a youthful offensive spark, Caufield-Suzuki-Marner runs roughshod on the NHL playing strong two-way hockey and shooting the lights out while Slafkovsky insulates Demidov in his first full year in the NHL. Turning one of these superb wings into a C would be a great outcome, but if Dach is healthy he could be serviceable, at the very least.

• The defense group could see a large boost with Reinbacher replacing David Savard (retired), though his fitness and development path is questionable considering how much of the season he missed after knee surgery last season. Jayden Struble is left to walk, in this scenario, though he could be managed at an AAV number starting with a 1.

• Jakub Dobes gets a small deal to back up Montembeault, and Fowler will continue to develop in the AHL.

But wait, there’s one other team that plays the Canadian National Anthem at their home games, and the Buffalo Sabres (whose arena sits ~5 minutes from the Canadian border, for those unfamiliar with Western New York geography) would certainly love to secure the services of Marner, who is small and skilled just like every other Sabres forward selection in the hundred years:

Believe it or not, Buffalo was the toughest team to this point to construct. They are so fucked. Turns out buying Jeff Skinner, then using that money to do absolutely nothing last year while eating a $4.4M cap charge this season was a bad idea. Who knew? Also not good ideas, signing $8.75M AAV in new cap commitments to Jordan Greenway and Jason Zucker (and getting nothing in return via a deadline trade…) with no fewer than five players who should be NHL players sooner than later in the AHL.

Fortunately, the RFA status of JJ Peterka and Bo Byram means that at least the Sabres have some flexibility here, not to mention Jack Quinn, even though Marner makes up the majority of their current remaining cap. Let’s see if the kids can play.

I think I absolutely nailed this Sabres offseason, so it is safe to say they will do nothing, sit on their hands, and finish with 78 points next year after a strong 6-2-2 start or finish (or both!).

• Carolina has lots of ammunition and they need a player who can score goals. The Sabres need a right-shot defender who doesn’t suck. Scott Morrow is likely blocked long-term in Carolina by Alexander Nikishin, and Peterka can finish in a way that in Carolina should more than make up for his defensive deficiencies. Connor Clifton is going the other way, as someone with supreme fancy stats.. before Buffalo.. and who will probably find his game and be a Sean Walker-esque breakout for the Hurricanes in this scenario. You can quibble with the draft picks, but I have Peterka and Clifton fetching a 2026 DAL 1st (likely late 20s), a 2027 2nd and 3rd, along with Morrow.

• I then have the Sabres turning most of that compensation and packaging it with Jack Quinn to go the Flames for the final year of Rasmus Andersson, who appears likely to move on in free agency. Andersson with 50% retention fetches Quinn, that Dallas 1st, and a 3rd.

• There’s still not enough room for Ryan McLeod, so I’ve sent Byram off to Los Angeles, who will want to replace Vladislav Gavrikov on the left side, in return for Jordan Spence and a 3rd, since it’s already being floated that LA feels they don’t have the room for both Spence and Clarke.

• Bernard-Docker gets a little raise to $1.8Mx2 to now be the 7th defenseman, and Levi gets a one-year prove-it deal rather than locking in at a lower number, which I think makes sense for both sides given his upside and NHL results to-date.

I love this roster. Please hire me, Terry. I can fix this.

But we all know, of course, that Mitch Marner wants to win, so he’s going to join a contender. Before we get to those teams, let’s knock out the rest of the league.

The Boston Bruins? That’s a pretty good revenge spot. I hear they employ someone who is pretty good at hockey.

• Geekie and Lohrei each get good-sized extensions, with Lohrei getting fewer years to enter free agency in his prime and Geekie locking in until ~age 33.

• With goaltending accounting for $11M+ in cap obligations, a Casey Mittelstadt buy-out is required, freeing up over $4M this season. Such a move allows for a number of rookies to slot in, along with serviceable fourth liners in Lauko and Koepke on cheap deals.

• Only 22 roster spots here, but I’m happy with the team.

The St. Louis Blues are known for making bold moves, if you started paying attention to the NHL roughly 11 months ago. They do so again here, landing the biggest prize in free agency:

• Marner slots in alongside Buchnevich and Thomas, while Holloway-Schenn-Kyrou stays intact. The all-rookie third line is offset by the efficient fourth line, in what must be the most unbalanced offensive/defensive zone-start bottom six in NHL history.

• The defense is in place, and Hofer needs a new deal, which I gave him $2.6×2, right around his projection to back up Binnington.

• Jake Neighbours is the odd-man out here, and if only there were a team out East who just traded their net-front PP guy who is capable of scoring 30+ goals. The Rangers will happily trade their 2026 1st for the 23-year old Neighbours, along with a mid-round pick and a 7th they acquired from Vancouver.

• We’ll figure out how to give Holloway a massive raise next offseason. On we go!

What better way to celebrate a new Kirill Kaprizov extension than to lock in another megastar on July 1st? The Minnesota Wild are fresh out of Cap Hell thanks to the buyouts of Parise and Suter finally timing out, and are ready to throw the big bucks around:

• Kaprizov-JEEK-Boldy was fun, but now Boldy gets to carry Hartman and Mojo around as the sun sets on Zuccarello’s career, with Marner being a natural replacement on the PP1.

• The only other signing here besides Marner is Travis Boyd. That Marner money was taken from a potential Marco Rossi deal, so I moved him to Montreal (where he’s going to love playing with Ivan Demidov behind Nick Suzuki!) for a CBJ 2nd, a ‘27 3rd, and Owen Beck. That might be light, but I don’t think Minnesota has done themselves any favors with Rossi’s value the way they’ve stabbed him in the back repeatedly. Owen Beck is a decent prospect, who probably tops out as a good 3C, and importantly for the Wild is 6’0”, which apparently is a requirement to be good for Bill Guerin’s team. You could convince me that a #1 is required here, but for now I’ve avoided including a first.

• Enjoy Ryan Hartman, Matt! Godspeed.

Here come four absolute doozies.

The New York Islanders will sign Mitch Marner, who immediately takes #91 and becomes the most beloved player in Islanders history:

The dead cap figure here is wrong - J-G Pageau has been traded to Florida (as a Sam Bennett replacement alongside Eetu Luostarinen as Lundell moves up to Tkachuk’s line) with 50% cap retention for Jesper Boqvist, a 3rd, and a 4th. That means his dead cap should be $2.5M, not $5M, making this team legal.

• Otherwise, Anthony Duclair has been bought out by the new front office (who know him well, given the stint he had with the Lightning) and Maxim Tsyplakov has been sent to the Winnipeg Jets for a 2nd round pick. He feels like a Jet. Not sure why that is.

• Noah Dobson has been given a $9.1Mx8 contract, and deservedly so. Keep in mind that #1 Overall Pick Matthew Schaefer is likely to make the opening night lineup as well, so Boqvist likely serves as a 7th defenseman.

• The big swing for the new front office involves an Anders Lee trade. Needing to clear lots of salary for a Marner contract, the Isles package Anders Lee, unsigned RFA Alexander Romanov, and the COL 1st round selection they received in the Brock Nelson deal for Utah’s #4 selection in the draft. With that selection, they take James Hagens, who immediately becomes the third-most beloved Islander, behind Marner and new GM Mathieu Darche. Utah gets a solid #3/4 defender, a net-front PP weapon and veteran leader in Lee, and a 2026 1st as they push to reward their fans with a playoff berth. The #4 pick feels like the most found-money scenario in NHL draft history, as winning the lottery is #random yet they didn’t move up to #1, so I think they actually might trade this pick.

I can dream.

Speaking of dreams, the Seattle Kraken’s pitch to Mitch Marner: “Did you know Washington state has no Income Tax?”

• Kartye, Evans, and Kakko all need new deals. A shade over $5Mx5 for Kakko works for me, as does a bridge deal for Evans and a cheap one-year deal for Kartye.

• Eeli Tolvanen makes a bit too much to fit on this team, and as one of the only members without trade protection (guys, I think Ron Francis might not have been the best man for the job…) he gets shuffled off to Chicago for a 4th, where he will play responsible hockey and insulate their middle-six young forwards.

• Grubauer is a prime buyout candidate with Daccord’s emergence, and doing so saves ~4M this year, and that’s just enough to fit Marner in with a full crop of young players to fill out the bottom of the lineup.

Kyle Dubas will definitely give Mitch Marner the contract he wants, we know that for sure. The Pittsburgh Penguins, darkhorse landing spot for Marner?

• A one-year deal for Tomasino and PO Joseph? Sure.

• This likely means that Matt Grzelcyk walks, and who knows if EK65 gets another kick at the can in Pittsburgh. Rather than figure out the Penguins d-pairs in June, let’s just call this roster good. Moving on.

Many a free agent has enjoyed signing in Nashville, and Mitch Marner would be no different. He’d be a top-three player on a Nashville Predators squad that has a bona-fide set of superstars and an intact leadership group.

• A center would be nice, but the Haula deal helps them in that category a bit by freeing up Stamkos to play the wing in the top six alongside Svechkov.

• Forsberg-ROR-Marner is not bad, and a $2.5M Evangelista deal makes the third line pretty decent, with McCarron and Smith waiting in the wings if Wood doesn’t have a game that plays in the bottom six just yet, though given his size I expect him to at least be serviceable.

• The only cap-clearing move required is to buy out Michael Bunting’s $4.5M contract, which had one year left and saves $3M this year. Easy sacrifice to add Marner.

Some good teams were listed above, but most of them are nowhere near the level of the final batch, which is a set of contenders. Most of these teams would require serious moves to make a Marner contract work, but clearly Marner would be drawn to being a complementary piece surrounded by star talent, so let’s get to work.

The Colorado Avalanche took a chance by trading Mikko Rantanen, and then spectacularly flamed out in the playoffs. Let’s right the wrong and get them a star winger for Nate MacKinnon:

• While there are several unlikely teams to land Marner, Colorado might be #1. Their signing of Brock Nelson to a long-term deal says as much, and with Landeskog seemingly healthy, there’s simply no way to make the money work.

• So let’s pretend that Landeskog was only showing up in the playoffs to prove he could, and that he’d rather not risk long-term damage to his body post-NHL. If he goes on LTIR, then what?

• Malinski gets a small $1M deal, but lots of money still needs to be moved out.

• First up is Martin Necas, who desperately wants to play alongside David Pastrnak in the run-up to the Olympics, where they look to lead the Czech team to Gold in an unprecedented medal run. Boston forks over the first rounder they acquired from Toronto in the Carlo trade, along with a second, lightening up the COL load somewhat with Necas carrying a $6.5M salary for one more year (at which point with Marner, COL is absolutely not finding room for him!)

• Next is MacKenzie Blackwood, who carries a ~$5M cap hit. Edmonton is searching for a goalie, and would even eat salary on Stu Skinner to move him along. Let’s make a deal, where Colorado gets Skinner on a $1.3M contract, as well as a 2nd, in exchange for Edmonton’s long-term answer in net.

Next up is the Dallas Stars. This ought to be fun.

• This is why they pay me the big bucks.

• Bourque gets a light deal, Back and Blackwell sign for near league minimum, Blumel too. Benn gets a ~$2M deal.

• With Marner, we are laughably over the cap.

• Fear not, we will use San Jose as our clearing house. A condition of the Carolina trade for Rantanen was that the 2026 #1 transfers if the pick is not top ten. Let’s assume Dallas makes the playoffs next year, meaning the Stars would send a 2027 1st, Matt Dumba, and Ilya Lyubushkin to the Sharks for a 2027 7th.

• Now we know why JRob has been in trade talks, it’s because the Stars want to take a run at Marner. Well, Columbus sure could use a JRob type to go with their Fantillis and Johnsons. Yegor Chinakhov (50% retained), Denton Mateychuk, a 2026 1st (unprotected), and Colorado’s 3rd round pick ought to do the trick.

• $500k to spare with one roster spot unfilled. Not bad.

• Matt Duchene just signed a $4.5Mx4 deal prior to posting. If you take Benn out of the picture and lower the offer to Marner to ~$12.5M, a smidge above Rantanen, Marner fits. You may have heard about the taxes…

Mitch Marner just deeply respects and has heard nothing but good things about Spencer Carbery, who coached the Leafs affiliate prior to getting the Caps job, and wants to join the Washington Capitals to help Alex Ovechkin reach 1,000 goals over the next two seasons:

I couldn’t find $19,000 for Marner to reach $14M flat. I called in a favor and Marner is joining Ovi and Nick Backstrom for a commercial shoot focusing on a changing of the guard premise to make up the difference.

• Rasmus Sandin must go, or we need to find a home for Strome or Tom Wilson, if we’re going to make Marner work. I opted to go the Sandin route, and Chicago was happy to give up a 2nd rounder (NYI) plus Nolan Allan. Sure.

• Alexeyev gets a small deal to fill in the defense group, and Ryan Leonard and Miroshnichenko are guaranteed opening night roles. Works for me. Go score, Ovi.

The New Jersey Devils are keeping their powder dry for 2026, when Quinn Hughes mania could reach its peak… but will they really sit idly by while Mitch Marner begs and pleads to play with Luke and Jack?

I don’t think so, there’s too much that could happen (and Vancouver is too incentivized to keep Quinn…) not to act accordingly:

• Good thing Jack Hughes took that sweetheart deal, now his linemate will be making a cool $6M per year more than him. Luke Hughes also needs a new deal, and fortunately for the Devils I don’t see him demanding more than Jack, so I’ve penciled him in at $7.5Mx5 (walking him right up to unrestricted free agency at the same time as Jack, should there be any interest in a Hughes reunion!) as a tradeoff.

• These deals leave a massive overage, so giving Glass his projected $2.6Mx2 doesn’t help matters.

• Dougie Hamilton has been rumored to be available, and what if Columbus decides that the Dante Fabbro game is not for them? I’ve put together a package of Dougie, Dawson Mercer, and a 4th for Yegor Chinakhov (with 30% retention) and prospect Luca Marrelli, as the Jackets deal from their organizational depth defensively to get a top pair RH defender and a defensively capable middle-six forward who can fill in for Boone Jenner down the road.

The Vegas Golden Knights are in on every big name dating back to the franchise’s inception. Marner is no different, with all sorts of moves already being floated as potential cap-clearing transactions by the normal media folks:

• We start by re-signing both Holtz and Saad to small deals, and giving Trevor Connelly a chance in the show.

• Clearing salary becomes paramount, and Ivan Barbashev’s $5M makes a ton of sense to get out from underneath.. Utah will happily take a flexible wing, in exchange for a mid-round draft pick.

• Nic Hague still needs a contract, and the Flyers would love to get something in return for Cam York, who I suspect will be cheaper than Hague. The main draw in this deal for the Flyers, however, is William Karlsson, who gives them a reliable option down the middle and takes pressure off of Sean Couturier and company. Karlsson and Hague net the Knights York, unsigned RFA Jakob Pelletier (who will become a top-tier sniper next to Jack Eichel within 2 years, somehow), and a 2nd round pick.

• Marner-Eichel-Stone is a good start. But we still need a small amount of cap to get this team started.

• The Sabres need a right-shot defenseman, and the Knights have shown a willingness to use Hutton and Korczak in a third-pair role. Zach Whitecloud and his $2.7M salary will be shipped off to Buffalo in exchange for center prospect Noah Ostlund, who is probably NHL-ready now after an impressive showing in his AHL rookie season and will get a chance to produce immediately in Vegas.

The Carolina Hurricanes are another team that has been regularly connected to Marner, with their interest apparently dating back to the trade deadline, where before the trade with Dallas they floated the idea of a Rantanen-for-Marner deal:

• Cap space is not a problem here, so Marner gets his $14Mx8 with no sweat.

• If Carolina wants to sign Burns for a year, they can top any offer from any team, presumably, though Carolina would be entirely in their right to let him go and elevate both Nikishin and Morrow to prime roles.

• You simply can’t go into next season with Kotkaniemi as a top-nine center, so more will be done here, especially with the draft capital Carolina has from the Rantanen deal. But this is a pretty good start and shows how incredibly managed the Carolina Hurricanes are.

Speaking of incredibly managed.. the New York Rangers. It’s incredible, alright:

• Who wants to pay Will Borgen $4.1Mx5? Just Chris Drury, I guess. He’s gone, months after being traded for and extended, attached with a 2nd to San Jose a la Jake Walman.

• Will Cuylle gets a $3.5Mx3 deal, and Zac Jones gets a $1.1M one-year deal.

• K’Andre Miller is in need of a deal, but there’s no way to fit that in with Marner in the fold. With Marner coming in, it’s also a great time to move on from Alexis Lafreniere, if they are ever going to do it. So I have them calling up the Los Angeles Kings and hammering out a deal centered around Lafreniere and Quinton Byfield, where the Kings add K’Andre Miller for Jordan Spence as well. This 2×2 deal doesn’t feel perfect, but it’s good enough and I truly have no idea how each front office values their players at this point in time, let alone the other side!

• (Can we also trade Mike Sullivan for Jim Hiller?)

While we’re on the topic let’s swing across the country to L.A., where we see how the Los Angeles Kings sign Mitch Marner:

• While the Kings will not be able to sign Vladislav Gavrikov in this scenario, they are able to give Kuzmenko a $4Mx2 deal and even extend Alex Laferriere at $5Mx4.

• In reality, we probably would see L.A. make a move to bolster their defense, as Alex Laferriere on your fourth line is probably a waste of talent. In any case, this team is cap compliant and looks really damn good. We know L.A. is going to be in the mix, but I’m pretty sold on this being a top-tier option for Mitch Marner as well.

Finally we get the Florida teams. Let’s start with the Lightning:

• Look, I don’t know what you want from me, here. If Marner signs in Tampa, it won’t be for the money. I have carved out $10.5M for Mitch, making him the highest paid player on the Lightning by a comfortable margin.

• To do so, I moved J.J. Moser to the Canadiens for Owen Beck as they look to build out their blue line for the present and future.

• I also bought out Conor Sheary, saving a cool mil in the process ($2M AAV = save $1M this year).

• Finally, Oliver Bjorkstrand simply won’t fit, and fortunately for the Lightning they have their right-handed PP1 fixture now. This would require Kucherov to pick up more of a shooting role, but he’s better suited for it than Marner, so I’ll be watching closely to see just how dynamic they can make this PP1. The Dallas Stars could use a right-shot finisher, and I think they can find the money for Bjorkstrand, so they’ll move a 2nd to get something that they sorely lack (Wyatt’s game is less predicated on shooting than Bjorkstrand, and also Wyatt plays down the middle which doesn’t count in this scenario I just made up).

• I know, I know. Each one of the six of you who have made it this far are screaming “JUST TRADE RYAN MCDONAGH”, to which I respond… they tried that. Everyone hated it. They traded for him back. I don’t think they’re going to do that again, I really don’t.

Finally, your Cup-winning Florida Panthers, the team that ended this era of the Toronto Maple Leafs:

• Quick, finish this before the hangovers wear off and Sam Bennett inks his $8Mx7 extension.

• I can find $11.5Mx8 for you, Marner. Take it or leave it (I say he takes it).

• This pre-supposes that both Bennett and Ekblad chase the money in free agency. It’s nearly impossible to figure it out otherwise.

• I did find room for Brad Marchand though, at $4.1M, and I of course am bringing back Mackie Samoskevich for whatever he wants ($1.3Mx1 is what he’s projected at.. sure!).

• The W depth here is wild, and the Cs and D are pretty horrific. My guess is that the Panthers would deal from this stockpile (ERod, Eetu, even Mackie all should have some value around the league, Cup not-considered) to bolster their 3C position and to find some cap relief to sign something other than create-a-players for their bottom two pairs.

• Flags fly forever, however, and Marner joins the back-to-back Champions with the intention on making it a three-peat.

After putting this together, I still am not convinced Toronto should be done with Marner. Obviously, he is from there, and that matters too. Florida winning the Cup should only drive that point home further that this team is still really-fucking-good, and their window is wide open at the moment, regardless of whatever the writers who chase whatever shiny object they last saw want to say. I am putting them 5th on my big board of landing spots.

Just ahead of Toronto I think is Chicago. If Marner’s going to a rebuilder, Chicago is likely the spot over Utah, and I think the allure of playing with Bedard is stronger than anything the other teams in that tier have to offer.

A quick intermission to note three of my favorite builds: the Sabres, Red Wings, & Blue Jackets. They are all close enough to home that that could be a factor, and he’d be hailed as a savior from day one. But more than that, the teams I have built look awfully good, too. Sometimes, you just gotta put the hard hat on and get to work. A true visionary, some have called me. I don’t think they are options, but if you asked me for a dark-horse not on this list, I’d bet on one of these three teams.

Ottawa is the funniest Canadian market, but also if he wants to play in Canada, getting Brady Tkachuk to be your running mate is an awful lot different than his time in Toronto, where the team was constantly berated for being too soft. Is it the third-most likely? No, not really, so that award goes to the Carolina Hurricanes. I don’t think there’s much there that Marner would want, per-se, so I think they would have to still be the high bidder. Among the upper-crust of teams, however… they have all the room in the world to be the high bidder.

I think the L.A Kings offer a nice mix of completely different lifestyle, strong on-ice team, and flexibility to mold the squad around Marner. If they had a different coach, maybe I’d be a bit more excited by Mitch’s prospects.

Before the Edmonton Oilers (according to rumors) gave Trent Frederic $4Mx8 (…what?), I truly thought they were a major contender for Marner. The cap gymnastics are insane, especially with McDavid needing a mega-deal next year, but Darnell Nurse is such an obvious albatross that I think the Oilers could have easily bullied him out of town. With Edmonton’s self-inflicted bullet wound, I’m giving the edge now to the Winnipeg Jets. I truly don’t believe Marner leaves Canada. I don’t know what it is, but I think he wants to be the hero more than anything else. The move to an established star-studded team doesn’t feel right to me.

It didn’t work in Toronto, but there’s no reason to think that the reigning-President’s Trophy winner, with the game’s best goalie and MVP, shouldn’t be all-in on Marner, especially with Nik Ehlers walking to free agency.

Mitch Marner, Canadian Hero? The prophecy was foretold all along.

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