There's a halfway decent chance that William Nylander is traded on draft day
As Leafs Nation continues to hold their breath on Auston Matthews and William Nylander extensions, the media continues to focus on Nylander and what his next contract could look like. The focus is on Nylander simply because he is the most tradable of the "Core 4". His negotiations were the most tense last time and he has the same agent as Johnny Gaudreau, Lewis Gross, who essentially screwed Brad Treliving and the Flames last off-season.
On TSN's 1050's OverDrive yesterday, analyst Dave Poulin joined Bryan Hayes, O-Dog and Noodles to discuss the current situation with Nylander.
"I'd go with comps on my own team. I'd keep it really simple. One guy that's a pretty easy comp and that's Mitch Marner. Marner has 2 first team all stars. The other guys not far behind him and the other guy has more goals. If you're Nylander's camp don't you have to start there? Most teams, Nylander's a top line guy. I think that's a fair asking point for Nylander. You can run it back for one year but in terms of changing, I think they have to change something in that group and this might be the thing that does. Nylander wants to be paid in equivalency to Marner. It's been very quiet but it's got to come to a head at some point," said Poulin.
Given that Poulin believes Nylander's camp will start negotiations with a comparable contract to Marner's current deal, the Leafs will have to make a decision sooner rather than later about Nylander's future. The issue for the Leafs is that teams typically don't like to make big trades once they have spent all their cap space, which means that a draft day trade could be in the cards for Treliving and Nylander, if the Leafs want to collect a "futures" package with another 1st rounder in this year's draft instead of players that can help now.
Sure, the Leafs could wait until later in the summer to trade Nylander and still target a futures package, but then, they run the risk of a 2024 first round pick being anywhere from a top-5 or top-10 pick to a pick that may be closer to 25th, 27th, 28th next summer. Considering the talent that Nylander has, a late first round pick, even packaged with other future assets would not look like a good deal for the Leafs.
The two most obvious solutions are that Nylander signs an extension at some point this summer or the Leafs decide to trade Nylander for a package of players that can help the Leafs win now, which will depend on whether Treliving sees the Cup window as slightly closing or still open.
| POLL | ||
JUIN 27 | 511 ANSWERS There's a halfway decent chance that William Nylander is traded on draft day What's the best outcome for the Leafs with regard to William Nylander? | ||
| A trade for futures | 60 | 11.7 % |
| A hockey trade, player for player | 200 | 39.1 % |
| Sign him to a long-term extension | 143 | 28 % |
| Sign him to a short-term extension | 108 | 21.1 % |
| List of polls | ||
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