Toronto Maple Leafs: Mitch Marner Season 2
By James Tanner
The Toronto Maple Leafs have an embarrassment of riches.
On any previous incarnation of the team, Mitch Marner would be the Franchise Player. He would be the guy we all go nuts for. The player who you think of when you think Toronto Maple Leafs.
This is a player who compares favorably (talent-wise, at least, since he’s only played one season) to Phil Kessel, Mats Sundin and Doug Gilmour as one of the best players in recent franchise history.
But lucky for him (if you, as I do, assume that kind of attention might actually have unintended negative consequences) he is only one of three legit franchise players the Toronto Maple Leafs currently possess.
It’s a little like showing up for Thanksgiving Dinner after nearly starving for the previous week, but we’re not complaining. The Leafs went through some lean times, and Marner, Matthews and Nylander are our reward for sticking with it. Or so it seems, anyways.
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It’s actually kind of crazy, if you think about it, how little fanfare Marner gets due to Matthews winning the Calder (and being potentially Connor McDavid’s rival) and Nylander winning the MVP at the Worlds. I mean, we are talking about a player whose ceiling is Hart Trophy/Art Ross/Hall of Fame levels.
Mitch Marner Is Going to Break out
Last year, Marner had 19 goals and 61 points. That’s good enough to be the Rookie of the Year in almost any other season. What’s more impressive is how well he compares to first ballot Hall of Famer Patrick Kane’s rookie season.
You can click the link if you want, but here’s an informative exert:
"In Kane’s rookie year, he scored 21 goals and 51 assists for 72 points.In Marner’s rookie year, he scored 19 goals, 41 assists for 61 points.To get his extra 11 points, Kane skated an extra 200 minutes of ice time in his rookie season and played in five more games.If we look at 5v5 scoring, Marner scored 15 goals to Kane’s 11. Kane had more assists and finished with three more points, and only skated a half-hour more."
No matter how you break it down, Marner – who didn’t get near the ice time that Kane did, especially on the power-play – compares favorably to the ex-Art Ross winner.
This bodes amazingly well for Mitch Marner: The Sequel. This season, at least for now, Marner is back with his old pals Bozak and JVR. While only one of these guys is a lock to finish the season in Toronto, it’s a nice line, while it lasts. Though there is no defensive presence to speak of, the line is explosive offensively, and having JVR out there as a foil gives Marner tons of room.
Additionally, this line will get a lot of looks against secondary (possibly even tertiary) defenses, which should allow it to be successful. The only drawback for Marner’s potential point totals is that he is on a team where all the talent means that he won’t likely get the kind of ice time players of his stature usually do.
Still, it’s not unreasonable to expect that Marner could put up 30 goals and 70 points for an encore, at a bare minimum. What I really look forward to though, is the day when the Leafs move Nylander to centre and Marner gets to play wing with Auston Matthews.
Matthews and Marner
Some of the kinds of people who like to make up random opinions out of thin air will tell you that they don’t play well together. This is insanity. Players like Marner and Matthews can play with anyone. Last year, they only paired together for 70 minutes, and while the results were not stellar, that is a really, really tiny sample size to be using to write off what could be the best combo in the NHL one day.
If I see a small sample size that shows promise, I want to see more. But if I see a small sample size that doesn’t, I still want to see more. Especially if it has the kind of game-breaking potential that a Matthews/Marner pairing does.
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Regardless of if and when that happens, this year is even more exciting for the prospect of seeing where Marner takes his game. I’m guessing he takes it to a top ten finish in the NHL points race.