William Nylander has spoken out about Mitch Marner’s departure from the Toronto Maple Leafs, offering some thoughts on his longtime teammate’s decision to move on for the first time since it happened.
Speaking during the NHL/NHLPA European Player Media Tour, Nylander addressed speculation that Marner had planned to leave Toronto well before the season ended. He dismissed those rumours, entirely and thought that they were just completely made up, as someone physically in that locker room at the time.
“Not sure where that stuff comes from, but I don’t think he was ever thinking of leaving ahead of time," Nylander said via NHL.com. “I actually asked him during the season and he said he was concentrating on Toronto. I didn’t want to press him on that and let him be because it was obviously on his mind, but his play was focused on helping us. Then I asked him after the season and he wasn’t sure.”
With Marner's free agency decision previously looming over the entire season, it's easy to see why Nylander didn't really feel like pushing him on the topic -- or wanting to beg for him to stay. But that is maybe more of an honest answer about what he was thinking and how his conversations with the new Vegas Golden Knight actually went.
All in all, after a summer of preparing to be on a team with one fewer star winger, Nylander just wants to look forward but is happy for Marner to go wherever he wanted.
“It’s tough seeing him go but I’m so happy for him and his family,” he said. “He got to pick where he went so, in that aspect, I’m happy for him. We’re going to miss him a lot but that’s just the business of the sport. That’s the way it is. So we’ve got to regroup as a team and figure out a way to keep winning games.”
And that's maybe the best thing about Nylander's comments. He, too, was able to decide where he wanted to spend the rest of his career. For Marner that was off to a team with a spoiled fan base that has only known success and with zero meaningful history -- a team with no soul. But Nylander, after signing his eight-year deal with Toronto to keep him here until 2032, he chose the Maple Leafs.
Marner’s move marks the end of an era for the Leafs’ core group, which had been built around Marner, Nylander, Auston Matthews, and John Tavares. With Marner now gone, Nylander and Matthews will be expected to shoulder even more responsibility as the team looks to remain competitive and chase its elusive Stanley Cup.