Has Cale Makar already surpassed a prime Erik Karlsson in just his first 4 years?

[abo9]

You must be dense. Makar just shut down the best player in hockey while producing at the other end. Makar is not potential. He is inevitable.


Can’t watch raw stats, gives example of raw stats. Lol.

Just by eye test Makar is probably the 2nd best skater in the NHL under only McDavid. He actually plays defense. And has a better scoring touch than Karlsson. If we’re trying to avoid raw
Stats we can just look at eye test. And Makar is the most dynamic defender I’ve seen in 30 years of watching hockey.

I think Karlsson's defensive woes are overstated. But that's more difficult to assess with the metrics available.

Offensively though, Makar still has to reach peak Karlsson. Karlsson had finishes of 5th, 11th, 14th in points vs the entire league (forwards and Ds). Led the league in assists once in his career.

Makar this year was 16th in assists, 20th in points, did not lead defensemen offensively but he does score more goals that's for sure.

Makar is 5th in playoff scoring after 3 rounds. EK also played 3 rounds and ended up 6th in playoff scoring (I don't even get into the quality of teams argument)

EK was also 11th in playoff scoring on the Sharks in 2018-19 while being a shadow of his former self...

EK also had a Norris at Makar's age. Would win a second one the year after. Though Makar might win his first one this year - deservedly so.

E. Karlsson still had a better peak offensively. I believe that he had a better on-ice impact, but marginally, the two of them are clearly the best at their position imo. Of course, EK also has the better career overall too right now, but if Makar avoids career-defining injuries, he probably ends up with the better career.

 

[Rodgerwilco]

recency bias is a hell of a drug... Karlsson was SO damn good back in his prime. Like crazy good.

 

[Puckstop40]

Let's see him do it on his own with a bad team like Karlsson did rather than water ski on the coattails of MacKinnon, Rantanen, Landeskog

Tell me you don’t watch the Avalanche without telling me you don’t watch the Avalanche.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Mods can probably merge this thread with the current existing one, it’s the same thread.

Who is better? Prime Erik Karlsson or Current Cale Makar

Title says it all.

hfboards.mandatory.com

 

[OmniSens]

Can't really argue the teams that surround Makar are much better than whatever surrounded Karlsson.

That being said, yes.

 

[Siludin]

He's defiantly better than... Ray Bourque!

Whao whoa whoa whoa whoa.
Let me do some counting
Cups in Colorado:
Bourque - 1
Makar - 0

 

[Calad]

Karlsson singlehandedly beat the Rangers on 1 leg in 2017. Makar is great and obviously has been dynamite these playoffs, but he's gonna need a bit more of a track record to justify claims like the thread title. Anyone arguing otherwise has a very short memory or didn't actually watch prime Karlsson. I will say that he very much reminds me of Karlsson before his injuries.

 

[apparentlyclueless]

A 4th place finish in scoring completely arbitrary in comparing Karlsson and Makar. Connor McDavid scored 48 points in 45 games in 2015-16 and was/is a much better player than Karlsson.

Ice time also factors heavily into scoring. In 2015-16 Karlsson played 2375 minutes total. The highest forward (Kopitar) played 1690 minutes. In 2021-22 Makar played 1976 minutes total.

Being on a bad team also meant that Karlsson was on the ice for hundreds more minutes than usual. Karlsson's 5v5 Points Per 60 in 2015-16 was #185 in the league (1.55 5v5 P/60) tied with Tom Kuhnhackl, Chris Stewart and Alex Killorn.

86 points in 1976 minutes >> 82 points in 2375 minutes

Again, you don't seem to understand league wide scoring trends.

This is like saying JT Miller is better than Crosby since he scored 14 points more (vs. Crosby in 15-16) with similar ice-time.

 

[Deebs]

Like Wayne said last night, he's the best defenseman since Bobby Orr. He's special

 

[Vukotal Recall]

Man, recency bias is overwhelming on this forum, but of course it makes sense since many of you are so young (even given that Karlsson's prime wasn't even that long ago). As others have pointed out, Karlsson was the most dominant player in the NHL at his peak and almost single-handedly took his team to the cusp of the Finals. The myth that he couldn't/can't play D is tripe. Also, as amazing as Makar is -- and he is undeniably incredible -- he arguably is not even better than Fox right now, who is also jaw-droppingly amazing. So chill out.

 

[tacogeoff]

EKs peak? Nope. BUT it was a very short peak

 

[MadeUpName]

Again, you don't seem to understand league wide scoring trends.

This is like saying JT Miller is better than Crosby since he scored 14 points more (vs. Crosby in 15-16) with similar ice-time.

That seems like a weird example given that Crosby's stats are stagnant since 2015-16. Where is this increase is "league wide scoring" in Crosby's stats?

Year	GP	Pts	P/GP
2015-16	80​	85​	1.06​
2016-17	75​	89​	1.19​
2017-18	82​	89​	1.09​
2018-19	79​	100​	1.27​
2019-20	41​	47​	1.15​
2020-21	55​	62​	1.13​
2022-22	69​	84​	1.22​

I think you are conflating "league wide scoring trends" and a career year. Karlsson had 2-3 great years. Miller just had one great year.

 

[SoulDynasty]

Makar won’t be better than Karlsson until he’s traded to Seattle. Forget his stats, talent, vision, competitiveness, elite defensive, transition and offensive abilities, or any other positives he has or will acquire. Because Karlsson played for a weaker team, he will always be better than any other modern day defensemen. Come on guys, do you not realize he led his team in scoring?!?

 

[Agent Zuuuub]

If you took the hockey IQ and passing of Fox and combined it with the skating ability of Makar, you would get one in pime Erik Karlsson.

So no.

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

No.

 

[Frolov 6'3]

recency bias is a hell of a drug... Karlsson was SO damn good back in his prime. Like crazy good.

I am more surprised about how many Karlsson “was so damn good” comments I am reading the last few months. I am starting to wonder what is going on.

 

[abo9]

Didn't McDavid just score 7 points in 4 games? Makar was on the ice on for 4 goals against last night with a negative xGF%. Is that really shutting down the best player in hockey?

Yeah idk what people saying Avs shut down McDrai are smoking. Avs won with their better depth and better coaching/goaltending from Francouz.

The Avs/Oilers series was anything but a defensive battle lol

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Makar just shut down the best player in hockey while producing at the other end. Makar is not potential. He is inevitable.


Can’t watch raw stats, gives example of raw stats. Lol.

Just by eye test Makar is probably the 2nd best skater in the NHL under only McDavid. He actually plays defense. And has a better scoring touch than Karlsson. If we’re trying to avoid raw
Stats we can just look at eye test. And Makar is the most dynamic defender I’ve seen in 30 years of watching hockey.

You’re underrating Karlsson pretty badly. He wasn’t garbage defensively. And he was more dominant offensively than Makar.

Makar isn’t at his peak yet. He’s an exciting player… but every time some guy has a great year they’re suddenly better than Gretzky or Orr.

He’s a great player, leave it at that. Please don’t come in here talking like he’s ‘surpassed’ Karlsson, it just undermines the player. It’s like some folks think hockey has only been around since last month.

Makar has incredible potential. Let’s just wait and see what he does with it before annointing him Bobby Orr part II.

 

[Erik Alfredsson]

Anyone trying to say that Makar is far better defensively than prime Karlsson probably didn't watch Karlsson. The funniest part is that Makar's biggest flaw defensively is the same as prime Karlsson's, which is defending in front of the net. I find this is the one aspect of the game that Makar struggles with, which Karlsson also did too.

Makar is a special player, but Karlsson was a one-man-team. The guy was entirely responsible for the Senators offensive output. It was basically to the point of if Karlsson wasn't on the ice, the Senators weren't scoring.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

What an arbitrary and useless metric. Karlsson "finished T-4th in league scoring" with 82 points in 2015-16. That wouldn't even crack the top-25 this year. The 2nd leading scorer in 2015-16 (Jamie Benn with 89 points) would have been #17 in the league in 2021-22.

Roman Josi had significantly more points this year than Karlsson ever scored in any year of his career.

Makar >> Karlsson

Do you honestly think 82 points in a tighter league is the same as 82 now? Do you really think that the team you’re on doesn’t matter?

It’s the same as Tampa fans declaring Vasi as the best goalie ever. Ridiculous.

Teams matter. The league you’re playing in matters. How you do vs contemporaries matters….

 

[apparentlyclueless]

That seems like a weird example given that Crosby's stats are stagnant since 2015-16. Where is this increase is "league wide scoring" in Crosby's stats?

Year	GP	Pts	P/GP
2015-16	80​	85​	1.06​
2016-17	75​	89​	1.19​
2017-18	82​	89​	1.09​
2018-19	79​	100​	1.27​
2019-20	41​	47​	1.15​
2020-21	55​	62​	1.13​
2022-22	69​	84​	1.22​

I think you are conflating "league wide scoring trends" and a career year. Karlsson had 2-3 great years. Miller just had one great year.

Boy oh boy. First you compare raw totals from two wildly different scoring enviroments to make a point and then try to discredit league-wide scoring by using one-player sample size.

First, you can see clear uptick in scoring in Crosby's stats that you used, so yes, you can see the scoring going up even from Crosby's stats. You just have to look at the p/gp column. It's not linear but it's a growing trend and when you take Crosby's aging into account you would expect the p/pg to be falling, not increasing.

My point about JT Miller was a bit exaggerated but you do get it, right? You can't really compare raw totals from two different scoring enviroments without context. And with this context Karlsson's season in 2015-2016 is hell of a lot more impressive than anything that Makar has done so far. Vastly inferior teammates, much more difficult scoring enviroment and still out-scoring most of his peers by pretty wide margin.

I do believe that Makar can and fairly likely will surpass Karlsson but we're not there yet.

 

[Pi]

Makar is the Connor McDavid of defense. He will go down as the best defenseman of the 21st century so far and become one of the all time greats.

 

[Rodgerwilco]

I am more surprised about how many Karlsson “was so damn good” comments I am reading the last few months. I am starting to wonder what is going on.

You don't remember Karlsson's prime? Man, he was absolutely electric!

 

[Pi]

You don't remember Karlsson's prime? Man, he was absolutely electric!

Broken ankle/leg Karlsson taking his team to Game 7 of the ECF is one of the best runs by a defenseman ever. If the Sens won that game, there is no doubt in my mind that he wins the Conn Smythe even if the Sens lost to Nashville that year.

 

[Rodgerwilco]

Broken ankle/leg Karlsson taking his team to Game 7 of the ECF is one of the best runs by a defenseman ever. If the Sens won that game, there is no doubt in my mind that he wins the Conn Smythe even if the Sens lost to Nashville that year.

It was really impressive how he put the team on his back. One goal away from the finals in double OT. FWIW I think they would have beaten Nashville.