On July 22, 2022, the Calgary Flames acquired Jonathan Huberdeau in a mega-deal with the Florida Panthers. The following month, they signed him to the largest contract in franchise history, committing $84 million over eight seasons to Huberdeau.

At the time, the gamble made sense: Huberdeau was coming off a 115 point performance in 2021-22 and his vision and passing ability seemed like it would be able to translate to the Flames’ attack for years to come.

Two years later, with the first season tolled on Huberdeau’s contract, it’s hard to pinpoint precisely what went wrong for Huberdeau in Calgary that’s led to his production taking a dip. In 2021-22, he had 115 points. Between the 2022-23 and 2023-24 seasons with the Flames, he’s scored 109 points combined. (If we’re being honest, a bunch of things probably went wrong in tandem.)

When trying to set expectations for Huberdeau for 2024-25, his production drop-off begs the question “What is Huberdeau now?” We dug into the data via our pals at Natural Stat Trick.

Is he generating fewer offensive opportunities than in Florida? Yes, especially on the power play. His five-on-five per-game production hasn’t dropped all that much. Comparing his last two seasons in Florida to his first two seasons in Calgary, he’s generating 0.01 fewer individual expected goals, 0.07 fewer shot attempts, 0.14 fewer scoring chances and 0.10 fewer high-danger chances per game at five-on-five. His all situations production dropped by 0.05 individual expected goals, 0.76 shot attempts, 0.42 scoring chances and 0.19 high-danger chances per game.

He’s also been the victim of puck luck; both his own and team-wide. His on-ice shooting percentage has dropped by 3.86% (all situations) or 2.18% (five-on-five), while his personal shooting percentage has dropped by 4.45% (all situations) or 5.61% (five-on-five).

So he’s generating less, especially on the power play, and he’s snake-bit and unable to bear down on chances as effectively as he did late in his Florida run. That suggests that if the Flames’ power play can be resuscitated this season – and become something even approaching average – that perhaps Huberdeau could get some of his mojo back, and perhaps that could bleed through to improved five-on-five performances, too.

Perhaps.

The old saying goes “You are what you repeatedly do.” And through two seasons wearing the Flaming C, Huberdeau’s shown flashes of brilliance, but he hasn’t found that mojo or swagger or confidence consistently. He has been, with the Flames, a 50-point player. We’ll see if he has more to show in 2024-25.

Ryan Pinder and I have this discussion frequently. I thought Huberdeau was consistently good and occasionally great in the 2024 part of the 2023-24 season. Once the calendar flipped over to January 2024, he scored 36 points over the remaining 45 games of the season. That’s a 66-point pace over an 82 game season.

Huberdeau maintaining that pace, which would require him to play well both at five-on-five and on special teams, would probably be exceeding expectations based on his recent history. Heck, we’d argue that if he breaks 60 points in 2024-25, that would be quite impressive and a positive development.

You are what you repeatedly do. Huberdeau has scored 55 and 52 points, respectively, in his two seasons in Calgary. If his point production is somewhere in the 50s, ignoring his cap hit and focusing entirely on recent performance, that would be in line with where he’s been as a Flame thus far through 160 games.

If Huberdeau fails to crack 50 points in 2024-25, it should be considered a disappointment.