Colorado Avalanche: Top 3 takeaways from Cale Makar’s rookie season
2. 5v5 Scoring
While Makar’s power play production wasn’t as great as initially thought, he was extremely impressive at 5v5. The Avalanche put him in offensive situations early and often, as he has started 62.99% of his 5v5 faceoffs in the offensive zone. That’s the fifth-highest rate in the league, which isn’t surprising considering Makar’s a rookie and he’s quite young.
Anyone can be given a ton of offensive zone time, but not everyone can produce in those circumstances. This wasn’t the case with Makar. It’s undeniable his generous deployment plays a role in this, but the fact remains no defenseman has more 5v5 points per hour this season than Makar (minimum 500 minutes).
His individual point percentage of 49.12 shows how involved he has been when the Avalanche are on offense. Makar’s a defenseman and he’s one of their most gifted offensive players. There aren’t too many defensemen who you can say that about.
The Avalanche got a lot of offense from Makar. They’ll need him to continue to grow. Makar will need to remain extremely productive even while getting less favorable deployment. He’s proven he deserves more playing time and his underlying stats suggest he’s deserving of tougher minutes. Now it’s up to Makar to take his game to an even higher level. If he can do that, he’ll be squarely in the Norris Trophy discussion.