Mitch Marner the target of wild accusations from Toronto reporter

Marner and reporters in Toronto have had quite a few run-ins over the last couple of years. Just this season, Marner refused to discuss his perceived ankle injury with members of the media in Toronto, repeatedly brushing off their questions and providing non-informative answers.

On Tuesday, Mirtle and his colleague from The Athletic, Jonas Siegel, released a brand new "Leaf Report" podcast, where Mirtle made a wild accusation that Marner has hired private security, who have actually harassed certain members of the media.

"Regular season, he's been a great, great player, and I think we've written that. But there's such a sensitivity there. And, so you hear about all these feuds going on, and you hear about he's got private security people that harass media people, and there's just, there's really weird stuff that's going on."

For added context, Mirtle suggested that Marner and his camp are very selective about who is allowed to speak with him and won't address certain topics at all. Mirtle also accused Marner of completely shutting him out, refusing to speak with him and Mirtle claims to have no idea why.

Obviously, Marner has taken quite a bit of heat during his time in Toronto, largely due to his most recent contract negotiations, which resulted in the Markham, ON native squeezing the Leafs for every last dollar on his current deal, which pays him $10.9M per season. With the amount of criticism he faces throughout the course of a season, I suppose it makes sense as to why he's so standoffish with reporters.