‘That’s all I’ve heard since I’ve been here.’ Will the William Nylander trade rumors finally come true this offseason?

It’s a melancholy annual tradition during the Toronto Maple Leafs’ hiatus from second-round playoff hockey, which extended to 18 years with their Game 7 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning last Saturday: the players and management meet with media a few days later for an extended end-of season availability, during which they search for answers as to why they couldn’t get over the hump this time.

And there are subsets within the annual collection of year-end topics at these pressers. One of them: right winger William Nylander’s future with the team. He’s the sacrificial lamb typically mentioned on comment boards and call-in radio shows every time the fans want blood following a playoff disappointment. And he’s used to it at this point.

“My summer will be the same,” Nylander said Tuesday at the Ford Performance Centre. “That’s all I’ve heard since I’ve been here.”

But are the roars getting a bit louder this time? It used to be only the xenophobic Canadians, the Coach’s Corner holdovers, anti-Euro sentiment baked into their hockey upbringings, picking on Nylander. They’d ignore all the good and parse out every frame of footage showing a lackadaisical backcheck or too-fancy stickhandling in crucial situations, using it as evidence that Nylander had to go.

After six consecutive opening-round playoff exits, however? Even the pragmatists are starting to wonder if Nylander must be thrown overboard. And it’s not because of poor play. Quite the opposite. He had career highs with 34 goals and 80 points this season. With Nylander on the ice at 5-on-5, the Leafs were outscored this season but actually held a 55-percent edge in expected goals, so he was unlucky in that regard. He set career highs in shots and individual shot attempts per 60 at 5-on-5. He led the team in power-play points. He sat in the 97^th percentile of all NHLers in takeaways per 60 to boot. Despite some down games in the Tampa series, he was also the Leafs’ best forward at times, named the top star of Game 5, during which he had three points.

But Nylander did all that at a relatively larcenous cap hit of $6.96 million – when compared to his ‘Core Four’ forward teammates Auston Matthews, John Tavares and Mitch Marner, whose AAVs clock in at $11.64 million, $11 million and $10.9 million, respectively.

Nylander, 25, has a highly affordable cap hit for two more seasons and has zero movement restrictions on his deal until 2023-24, when a 10-team no-trade clause kicks in. His contract has made him an extremely appealing player to own – but it also makes him an attractive contract to trade. And the Leafs are approaching a point at which they have little to lose. Will Nylander have to go if it’s as part of a package for a true No. 1 horse defenseman such as Jakob Chychrun?

It would hurt, as he’s been a much bigger part of the core than he often gets credit for, but the Leafs understand that change is inevitable when you can’t break through to Round 2 of the postseason.

“There’s always changes, and whatever management decides is necessary for the team, but we think we have something really special here, tremendous players, tremendous people,” said Leafs captain John Tavares Tuesday.

So what will management decide? In previous season-end pressers, GM Kyle Dubas was adamant about keeping the core together when asked about the top four forwards. He was determined to give them another chance. This year: it sounds like he’s slightly more open-minded should the right opportunity come around, but he does not want to force anything just for the sake of change.

“Maybe I felt in previous gatherings like this that I needed to be more adamant because of the way things had gone or different circumstances surrounding the players during those times,” Dubas said. “But we’ll sit down as a management group, look at our whole entire roster, look at who’s available, what can we bring in, and our goal is to make the team better. ‘Different’ may bring some applause and some accolades because it’s different, but if it’s not better, we’ll have a better chance of sitting here disappointed again.”

For now, Nylander remains a Leaf and eager to be part of the solution as long as that’s the case.

“I believe in this group so much and I feel like we’ve grown together and were so close, yet we didn’t win,” he said. “I feel like the progress is there. Everybody wanted to win this year. I’m just focused on being here and getting ready for next year.

“This is where I want to win and get that next step.”

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‘That’s all I’ve heard since I’ve been here.’ Will the William Nylander trade rumors finally come true this offseason?

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