The Mitch Marner era with the Toronto Maple Leafs is officially over, but the aftermath of the star winger's sign-and-trade to the Vegas Golden Knights keeps reverberating.
Even if Marner spent nearly a decade in Toronto, falling just one year short of making it 10 years in Ontario, not everyone’s mourning the loss.
During an appearance on TSN's "First Up," NHL analyst Matthew Cauz labeled Marner’s time with the Maple Leafs as “nine years of ineptitude” when it came to playoff performance.
“(Marner's exit) was so weird,” Cauz said. “It’s just the nature of the game, and it’s also the nature of nine years of ineptitude in big games that, for the Maple Leafs to go further in the playoffs, they actually have to subtract someone as talented as Marner.”
Marner had 102 points during the regular season, his best outcome since entering the league in the 2016-17 campaign, but only managed two goals (13 total points) in the playoffs.
Cauz, however, acknowledged that Toronto's postseason woes weren't only due to Marner's underperformance, but rather a team-wide issue.
“(Trading Marner) speaks to many things, " Cauz said. "It speaks to whatever has just gone wrong with Marner consistently over the years—and by the way, not just him. Morgan Rielly, Auston Matthews, John Tavares, William Nylander, all of them. It’s not about Marner, it’s about a collection of all of them together.”
Cauz pointed to Toronto’s top-heavy roster and lack of role diversity as another major flaw the Maple Leafs will need to address if they want to become a bona fide contender.
“You need a little bit of everything,” Cauz said. “What you do to dominate in the regular season doesn’t translate in the playoffs.
“What the Maple Leafs have done in these wonderful regular seasons has never translated, and the way to fix it is to be okay with not having Marner—an incredibly talented player—(as) the makeup just never worked.”
The Maple Leafs have made the playoffs every year since Marner joined the team, but they have only advanced past the first round twice, in 2023 and 2025, both times crashing out in the second round of the playoffs.
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