Maple Leafs, Golden Knights discussing trade for Mitch Marner's rights

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Brad Treliving wasn’t in a revelatory mood on Saturday.

With speculation swirling that the Maple Leafs and Vegas Golden Knights are working on a trade involving the rights to Mitch Marner, Treliving wouldn’t bite during his media availability after the 2025 National Hockey League draft concluded.

“I’m not going to comment,” the Leafs general manager said. “Tuesday is free agency, we will continue to work away at things, but nothing to report on that.”

An NHL source confirmed to the Toronto Sun on Saturday afternoon that the teams are having on-going talks regarding Marner, who is headed for unrestricted free agency on July 1.

Often in these sign-and-trade types of deals, the team trading a player’s rights gets a draft pick or two in return. But a potential deal between Toronto and Vegas possibly could involve centre Nicolas Roy, who had 31 points in 71 games last season and has two years remaining on his contact with an average annual value of $3 million US. Roy, 28, does not have trade protection.

The 6-foot-4, 201-pound Roy presumably would slide in as the Leafs’ third-line centre if he is acquired. He averaged 15 minutes 13 seconds of ice time last season. When the Golden Knights won the Stanley Cup in 2023, Roy had three goals and eight assists in 22 playoff games.

Another player whose name is being bandied about is defenceman Nicolas Hague, who is a restricted free agent. The 26-year-old is due a qualifying offer of $2.7 million. In 364 career NHL games, the 6-foot-6, 245-pound Kitchener native has 20 goals and 63 assists.

Vegas would have to clear some space under the salary cap to acquire Marner, as the Golden Knights, per puckpedia.com, have approximately $5.6 million at their disposal. Placing defenceman Alex Pietrangelo and his $8.8-million cap hit on longterm injured reserve would clear a good chunk of space, but there has been no confirmation from the Golden Knights that they will go that route with the veteran.

Rumours regarding Marner and Vegas as a landing spot have been happening for several weeks. The all-star winger would have to waive his no-move clause to approve a trade, but that is unlikely to be an obstacle.

As the top free agent available, Marner’s next contract likely will fall in the range of $13 million to $14 million a year on a longterm pact. Vegas could get him for eight years provided a trade is done.

With free agency looming, is there a greater chance of Treliving trading Marner’s rights than there might have been, for example, a week ago?

“I don’t know,” Treliving said. “I don’t know if the chances are greater today than they were yesterday, or they’re going to be better or worse tomorrow.

“I understand the interest, but we’ve got nothing to report, and I don’t want to get involved in speculation and how that runs. We’ll see how things unfold.”

Generally speaking, though, is it absolutely important that Treliving acquire a tangible piece for Marner’s rights?

“I think you’d always like to get something, right?” Treliving said. “That’s not always the case. That’s probably as far as I want to get into it. But we’ll see how things go.”

Aside from the Marner issue, Treliving won’t be idle before free agency opens. After getting a tidy piece of business done on Friday in re-signing John Tavares, Treliving said he has “some internal business that we’re focused on.” That might include talks with forwards Steven Lorentz and Max Pacioretty, both headed for unrestricted free agency, and restricted free-agent winger Matthew Knies.

Qualifying offers for restricted free agents are due on June 30 at 5 p.m. For the Leafs, that includes forwards Nick Robertson and Pontus Holmberg, as well as Knies. Treliving didn’t indicate that any of three would not be qualified.

And, then, of course, there will be targets in free agency for the Leafs.

The list of forwards has shortened, as Sam Bennett (Florida), Matt Duchene (Dallas), Jamie Benn (Dallas) and Trent Frederic (Edmonton) have re-signed with their current teams.

Brad Marchand, coming off an inspiring performance in the Panthers’ second Stanley Cup win in a row, would look just fine in a Leafs sweater. Marchand would deliver the kind of DNA change that Treliving seeks. The group of higher-end free-agent forwards includes Nikolaj Ehlers, Patrick Kane, Brock Boeser and Mikael Granlund, though one player who could be sought by Treliving is Toronto native Andrew Mangiapane. The winger was drafted in the sixth round by the Calgary Flames in 2015, a year into Treliving’s tenure as Flames GM, and has 243 points (123 goals and 120 assists) in 498 career NHL games. In 81 games with the Washington Capitals in 2024-25, Mangiapane had 14 goals and 14 assists.

“We’ve got a few days to see who gets signed (by their teams), so we’ll see what the list is at that point,” Treliving said. “We’ve got some of our own free agents that we continue to work at, but I think there will be players available that can certainly help out in different positions, and we’ll see where that gets to.”

tkoshan@postmedia.com

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