We drove the GMC Canyon Denali and the Honda Ridgeline and one of these small pickups has the edge

Small pickups were once an essential part of the truck mix. A lot of young folks enjoyed them as an inexpensive starter vehicle.

But gradually, automakers phased them out in favor of crossover SUVs while concentrating on the full-size pickups that are their most profitable products.

In the past few years, however, smaller pickups - bigger than the modest Ford Rangers and Chevy S-10s of the past - have staged a comeback.

For US carmakers, Chevy's Colorado almost single-handedly revived the segment, which had been filled by trucks like the Toyota Tacoma and the Nissan Frontier. Soon, Ford wwill bring back the Ranger.

Of course, Honda has long had a small pickup in its lineup: the oddball Ridgeline. This wasn't a truck for truck people. It was more of an SUV with a pickup truck bed.

The styling was offbeat. But for the latest generation, perhaps sensing that small pickups are the comeback trail, Honda made the Ridgeline into more of a proper truck. We checked it out last year and were impressed.

So we thought it would be good to compare the new Ridgeline to more of a true pickup.

And then the GMC Canyon Denali landed in our driveway.

The Canyon Denali is the GMC version of the Chevy Colorado, given some further snazziness with the upscale Denali treatment.

On paper, it stacks up well against the Ridgeline, costing about the same and running a similar V6 engine. But there are some crucial differences: