You won't hear this one publicly, but I am told the Leafs have internally set an "end of July" deadline to come to terms with Mitch Marner...
"After last year's holdout and all Kyle did to open up space we need to know this player is with us, and if he is not we need to do a whole lot to fill some even wider needs," a source close to the Leafs situation informed me this morning, "We feel we've done a lot here to show our desire to have Mitch a Leaf for life, but everyone hates not having any control."
I texted back, "Any progress towards a deal?"
His response, "Hard to tell. We have put out various scenarios, and we need to know which they want, shorter, longer, etc. Once we know, yes a deal can get done very quickly."
On Gardiner...
"Expect big news in the next 24 hours."
I am digging...
Salary Arbitration Dates Via the NHLPA
July 20
Joel Armia
Jordan Binnington
Jason Dickinson
Alex Iafallo
Brock McGinn
July 21
Andrew Copp
July 22
Zach Aston-Reese
Christian Djoos
Ville Husso
MacKenzie Weegar
July 23
Evan Rodrigues
July 24
Neal Pionk
Oskar Sundqvist
July 25
Connor Carrick
Jacob Trouba
July 26
Colton Sissons
July 27
Sam Bennett
Chase DeLeo
July 28
Mirco Mueller
July 29
Pavel Buchnevich
David Rittich
July 30
Scott Laughton
July 31
J.T. Compher
August 1
Remi Elie
Ryan Lomberg
Chandler Stephenson
August 2
Will Butcher
Charles Hudon
Linus Ullmark
August 3
Artturi Lehkonen
August 4
Sheldon Dries
Joel Edmundson
Anton Forsberg
Rocco Grimaldi
Jake McCabe
Rinat Valiev