Makar's problems ain't just defence, he looks slow in his decision-making, slow to loose pucks, slow in covering his man, stops being a catalyst with the puck, keeps giving MacKinnon the puck so he doesn't take it, and seems behind the play...even when he has the puck.
You say that as if the main problem is the forwards.
On individual games you might have this argument where the Avs defense is just bad. Overall though, the Avs defensive numbers are really not much worse than the Cup team. The might have moved from say ~5th to ~8th in the league (and they won't touch the clearly top numbers of the first post pandemic season), but this team is overall clearly still a top 10 defensive team that is getting bottom 5 goaltending. The problem is in net far more so than the defense.
IMO Makar's mobility having issues is causing him to not quite have the space and time as he is used to with the puck and not able to close in situations where he has in the past. He's still an absurd skater, but that half step off of everything is making things much more difficult for him. Weird to say, but hopefully there is an injury and this is correctable more than him just losing that half step.
Part of the problem is his rebound control is so damn poor. I don't recall a goalie recently being so bad at containing pucks with his glove. He can't trap a damn thing lately and many times it is going off his wrist and bouncing into the slot. In a very large contrast, where Mitts had a great chance against Otter in the slot, when it hit Otter in the wrist... Otter deflected it down to his pants where he could just smother the puck and it looked like a simple hit the crest of the jersey shot. Where George is bouncing that puck 10' back into the slot.
Yes, we've seen this movie before. Same leading actors.
An eye sight and puck tracking issue....?
Plus your opponent elevates his game as well......
Noticed that all year. Even when he is making the save he's punting the rebound right back into the slot.
I think it is a technique issue. George's glove is always a few inches further forward than most goalies. He's a quick reflex goalie, so the theory would be that it takes up more space and leaves less room while relying on his reflexes to cover. The problem is, when he's off, the pucks don't die... they get shot out and it leads to scrambles.
They miss Nuke. The real thermonuclear Nuke. He's been missing since the last LBI. Heck, the last intervention.
Even off his legs it happens... it is like he is twitching and shooting the puck out with a save. Probably just too active overall.
Time to re-up the booger sugar.
I agree. He's been too active. Does not convey any sense of being steady in net.
He's a 3 million dollar goalie with a good win stat (despite wins being a team stat). I wonder if they dump him in the off season and look elsewhere.
Not from our recent viewing of him. Looks calm, collected and catches puck through traffic.
So we are basically Edmonton South?
In the last game he played, there were around 5 plays I recalled where Annunen tried to catch it and it bounced out of his glove or he was one second delayed. What helps with Annunen and rebounds is that his mass is just huge so second opportunities hit him more often than not instead of Georgiev who is always scrambling and has open holes all over the place. The biggest difference between Angeryiev of last season and this season is he's scrambling a lot more/too aggressive and to me, that is a sign of a lack of IQ (not necessarily smarts for the game, but confidence) and getting away from the structured game I described before.
I feel like when it happens with Annunen, the puck is falling within a range where he can grab it quickly. Like the Otter example where it was missed but brought in... Annunen is missing it, but it falls less than a foot from him so he can quickly reach down and kill the play. Where George is bouncing 2-3 feet away and right into harm's way with 2nd chances.
Minnesota without even being able to call ourselves the state of hockey.
I don't disagree on Makar being useless right then and there, but Duhaime absolutely can follow Pavelski down low. If Pavelski kicks it back, Val challenges the strong side point while Duhaime recovers back to the slot/weak side point.Toews has made his share of mistakes this year, but I think that one's more on Cale.
Devon has to be ready to switch off with Duhaime, who can't follow his man below the goal line on the PK, and when he does that, Cale needs to take the man driving the net.
Yeah it would have been nice if Toews blocked the pass, but look at Cale here. He's out of position covering nobody. That's not a tight PK box. Val has Benn at the point. Duhaime should be able to circle back up toward the other point.
Cale is useless here. There's no forward on the left halfwall and he shouldn't be planning on stepping up on Benn at the point. The other D man is on the right side out of screen.
