Reporter Indentifies Intriguing UFAs That the Leafs Can Spend Big on If Mitch Marner Walks

Surprisingly, the big story coming out of the trade deadline wasn't that the Dallas Stars acquired Mikko Rantanen, completing a full 8-year extension with the superstar winger.

In fact, it wasn't even Boston Bruins captain Brad Marchand being traded in the final few minutes of free agency to Atlantic Division rivals, the Florida Panthers of all teams.

No, the big story was about how the Maple Leafs had a trade on the table for Mikko Rantanen, and had asked Mitch Marner to waive his no-movement clause to try to facilitate the deal.

There is some speculation that the Leafs may have a huge mistake in asking Marner to waive his NMC last week. It may have planted the seeds of doubt in Marner's mind that perhaps the Leafs don't want him as much as they claim they do.

If the Leafs and Marner do happen to part ways this summer -- and that's a big IF -- the Leafs will have the luxury of having a ton of salary cap space with which to spend big in a surprisingly strong UFA market.

According to Matt Larkin in a recent release for Daily Faceoff, the Leafs may enter the market with their eyes set on the likes of Nikolaj Ehlers, Brock Boeser, Brock Nelson, Sam Bennett, Mikael Granlund, Brad Marchand, Jamie Benn, Aaron Ekblad, Jakob Chychrun, Ivan Provorov and others.

Ekblad, who was handed a lengthy suspension on Tueaday, is an intriguing option for the Maple Leafs, despite his laundry list of health concerns in recent years. The Leafs boast one of the top medical teams in the NHL and with Ekblad's recent injury history, the price tag might even end up being reasonably low.

The Leafs were also connected to Sam Bennett earlier in the week, so perhaps GM Brad Treliving will attempt to do what they did with Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Anthony Stolarz this past summer and bring two more Panthers in with Bennett and Ekblad both being available for only cap dollars. Larkin mentioned this as a possibility in the article referenced above.

Bennett is a particularly interesting case for the Leafs, specifically because of who their GM is. Bennett is a former draft pick by Treliving, who may have a desire to bring the feisty forward in if Marner doesn't end up sticking around simply because he knows the player well and he fills an area of need at center.

There's a lot of time between now and July 1st, but it never hurts to start thinking about these things early.