Apr 11, 2024; Toronto, Ontario, CAN; Toronto Maple Leafs forward Mitchell Marner (16) plays the puck against the New Jersey Devils in the third period at Scotiabank Arena. Mandatory Credit: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

Toronto Maple Leafs’ changes must start with Sheldon Keefe and Mitch Marner

Originally posted on Daily Faceoff | By Naftali Clinton | Last updated 5/6/24

Tyler Yaremchuk was joined by Colby Cohen to discuss what the Toronto Maple Leafs should do now on the latest episode of Daily Faceoff Live.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Sheldon Keefe came out after the game with a weird quote about how the Leafs beat themselves. To me, it’s like if you’re the head coach of the team and you’re talking how many consecutive years your team has beaten themselves, you’re putting your hand up and saying fire me. Get rid of me because I clearly can’t fix this problem.

I didn’t like that from Sheldon Keefe and the other guy that I wanted to hear from was Mitch Marner who said his priority is to be a Leaf for a really long time. I sit there and I look at those two, the coach and Marner, they’ve both under-performed a lot over these last few playoff runs. I think the Leafs need to make big changes this summer, that’s obvious. And I also think it’s kind of obvious that it’s gotta start with those two, do you disagree with that?

Colby Cohen: I completely agree with you but I think it goes farther up the train. From what I’m understanding Brendan Shanahan is very involved in day-to-day hockey operations, he’s vetoed trades, he’s been involved in contract negotiations, he’s not a president in name only. He’s heavily involved and the buck stops with him, I think Kyle Dubas would be the first one to tell people that now that he sits in that president and GM job in Pittsburgh.

And I think it has to go all the way up the ladder. This has been a failure the way this team has been built. I think it’s been a failure the way they’ve handled contracts and I think at the end of the day when you have a guy like Mitch Marner with a $10.93 million cap hit with one year left and a no-trade clause, the team has no leverage, the player has all the leverage, what contender has room for $11 million on the cap for a player that doesn’t show up in the playoffs?

I think that it would be a very underwhelming return for him unless he’s willing to go to a rebuilding team which wouldn’t make much sense for him to do. This is not going to be an easy move.

You can watch the rest of the episode here: