Injury Report: Cale Makar - D [4th Overall] Part IV: Not A Prospect, Always Injured Ed.

CobraAcesS

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Yeah and I edited my post too because after I reread it I thought I was pushing it saying he was our best lol. But I definitely thought he was solid. His shot blocking in particular stands out for me.

Lol, I will say I'm not as down simply due to the playoffs as he does not have much experience in the role hes asked to play.

That said it does bother me he'll likely be next to Makar again. I personally think Byram, Girard, and Makar should all be on different pairs so we can replicate what we had when Barrie was here for the playoffs.
 

Balthazar

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I think the Graves hate comes from him playing a role that’s way over his head as opposed to him just flat out sucking. I think any team in the league takes him to play a bottom pairing role and kill penalties. Plenty would even put him in their top 4. However for us he’s playing on the top pairing and beside our love child so you know we’re gonna bash on him.

The problem with Graves is he plays like a PMD instead of a reliable D with size. If he could use his skillset differently he'd be much more useful but I don't think he can.

Personally I don't care if he doesn't score much, we need him to play like Oleksiak.
 

Foppa2118

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Yeah I don’t think it’s going to be much strength related improvements, although Makar was a late bloomer. I do think he will still get more comfortable and a touch less conservative/hesitant. It seems to me that he was really trying to not be a liability (which that’s good!) but he’d hang back a little too much.

I think the biggest improvements will come on the defensive side of things, and in his execution offensively.

I've mentioned this before multiple times, but it's one of my favorite stats in relation to him. Cale led the entire league (forwards and defense) in combined hit posts and crossbars. That just screams, "he's got more levels he can get to."

If he continues to work on his shot the way Nate does to make one of his biggest strengths even stronger, he's going to be hitting the net instead of the post on a lot of those shots, and his production is going to be through the roof.

As he gets a few years into his career and his confidence is at an all time high, we're going to see him make even more special plays individualy than we've seen so far. And that's kind of scary.
 

AllAboutAvs

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The problem with Graves is he plays like a PMD instead of a reliable D with size. If he could use his skillset differently he'd be much more useful but I don't think he can.

Personally I don't care if he doesn't score much, we need him to play like Oleksiak.
I'm not sure I agree with this. The coaches want their Dmen to push the play. He might be doing it a little too much but I don't have too much of a problem with the way he plays. Obviously he had some issues during the Dallas series however I would argue that they looked a lot worse than they should have due to our goalie problems.

With that said I agree it would be nice to push him down the lineup with a proper partner for Makar. I'm OK with starting the season with a Graves-Makar pair again but it needs to be addressed by the deadline either internally or by trade so we have a stronger top pair entering the playoffs.
 

Foppa2118

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I'm not sure I agree with this. The coaches want their Dmen to push the play. He might be doing it a little too much but I don't have too much of a problem with the way he plays. Obviously he had some issues during the Dallas series however I would argue that they looked a lot worse than they should have due to our goalie problems.

With that said I agree it would be nice to push him down the lineup with a proper partner for Makar. I'm OK with starting the season with a Graves-Makar pair again but it needs to be addressed by the deadline either internally or by trade so we have a stronger top pair entering the playoffs.

Yeah I agree. Graves is making plays with the puck because that's what the coaches want, and I'm ok with that.

He should just be playing that was as a true 4/5 type getting around 17 minutes in TOI, not a Makar partner averaging 19 and 20 minutes like he did in the regular season and playoffs.
 
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