With Huberdeau signing his new deal, of course Mitch Marner is trending; but do the two deals even compare?

The fact of the matter is that, yes, when Marner signed his deal back in September of 2019, it was likely a slight overpay at the time. However, since then, the Markham, ON native has lived up to his end of the deal and then some. The only thing left for Marner now is some playoff success - something Huberdeau didn't experience until he was 28 years old on the fringe of turning 29. Yet for some reason, there is a large number of fans who believe that Huberdeau, who has already reached his ceiling, is better than Mitch Marner, who has yet to reach his.

As for Huberdeau, his overpay will begin pretty soon after his new deal kicks in. The first couple years of the deal, the Flames will certainly get their money's worth. Once he hits 32-33 years old, however.. that might be a different story. In terms of how they stack up at the moment, Marner himself projects to account for 3.6 wins for the Leafs this season. Huberdeau projects to account for just 2.5 wins for the Flames, per Top Down Hockey and JFresh Hockey.

As for who is the better player, that comes down to the criteria you're using to compare them. If we're comparing them on a purely offensive basis, Huberdeau's best season is superior to Marner's best season - so even the most die hard of Leafs fans might have to make that concession. But when you factor in their defensive impacts, Marner is vastly superior.

In my personal opinion, the comparisons are a reach. Marner is a full 4 years younger than Huberdeau. He's played just 6 seasons in the NHL to Huberdeau's 10. Marner relies on his speed, shiftiness and stickhandling, whereas Huberdeau is much stronger on the puck and relies on his strength to create space. Huberdeau also possesses a much better shot. They're different types of players. Yes, they're both playmakers, but Huberdeau is a pure offensive talent, while Marner is a 200-foot player with strong defensive instincts. It's like comparing apples to oranges. They're both fruit, but other than that..

The unrest that all of this is causing between Leafs fans and Flames fans (and I'm sure fans from other rival fanbases) over $400K is actually pretty overblown, if you ask me. They're both elite wingers for different reasons and comparing them would be doing a disservice to both of them. After all, they do rank 7th and 8th as the league's highest players. We know that Marner will continue to get better, we know that Huberdeau will eventually run out of steam as he gets older, so you can likely tilt the argument in Marner's favour there, but I'm sure neither team is losing sleep over which elite winger is more elite.