Frei: It’s not Makar vs. Josi. Well, except on the ballot

When the ballots for NHL Awards all are in Monday night, Nashville’s Roman Josi and Colorado’s Cale Makar likely will be the top two vote-getters in the race for the Norris Trophy. The winner won’t be announced until after the Stanley Cup Finals.

Who’ll win?

That’s far from certain, especially given Josi’s stunning late-season rush for the Predators.

Because the ballots from members of the Professional Hockey Writers Association already will be in, nothing that happens in the upcoming Predators-Avalanche first-round playoff series will affect the vote.

But the Makar and Josi Show in the series that begins Tuesday night in Denver will add to the intrigue.

“Fo me right now that’s put behind,” Makar said of the Norris Trophy race after the Avalanche’s Sunday practice at Ball Arena. “The ultimate goal is obviously making it those four rounds. That’s not even in the forefront of my mind.”

Makar and his usual defensive partner, Devon Toews, were the two Avalanche players made available to the media Sunday. Toews also had a terrific season and might even draw some Norris votes, since voters make five selections for the award. They list six defensemen in the voting for NHL All-Star teams.

Makar and Toews not only cordially answered inquiries about going up against Josi, they showered him with compliments.

First up, Makar.

“Personally, I watch a lot of him throughout the year,” Makar said. “He shows up in so many different areas of the ice where you wouldn’t expect him to be. At the same time, he’s committed on both ends. He’s an outstanding player and he’s definitely the drive for their team. He’s a guy you have to stay on top of and make sure you don’t give him those extra looks that he gets sometimes.”

Toews’ view was similar.

“I think we’re always trying to learn, see things differently, see what he’s doing, how he’s moving,” Toews said of Josi. “He’s a great player and he jumps in the rush at about very opportune times. He’s very well-timed with it. It’s going to be a challenge for us as a team to defend him. I don’t think it’s up to one person, one line to defend him. It’s a group effort from us. I think Cale and I are both taking things from his game, watching him. There’s so many great D in this league that you can learn from.”

Josi, 31, finished the regular season with 23 goals and 73 assists for 96 points. He was a plus-13 and averaged 25:33 of ice time. The offensive numbers, of course, aren’t the sole measure of a defenseman’s effectiveness. But in this age of talented hybrid defensemen, the ability to be difference makers at both ends of the ice increasingly has become the elite standard.

Makar finished with 28 goals and 56 assists for 84 points. He was a plus-49 and averaged 25:40.

Toews had 13 goals and 44 assists for 57 points. He was an eye-popping plus-52 and averaged 25:22.

It’s safe to assume that Makar and Toews will be out against Nashville’s top line — Mikael Granlund centering Filip Forsberg and Matt Duchene — much of the time in the series. It’s safe to assume that in part because Avalanche coach Jared Bednar didn’t try to pretend there’s uncertainty on that point.

I asked both Makar and Toews what specifically need to try to do in a series against the Predators.

“Just do what we’re asked,” said Toews. “If we’re playing together, we’re playing together. If not, it’s more so about our group back there, how we’re going to defend it, how we’re going to attack their forward group. They have a big, heavy group with a lot of skill at the top end of it.”

Makar said they will “just try and play our game as much as possible. Their top two lines are obviously very skilled offensively, so for us it’s just going to be making sure we do the right thing defensively and turn those into our opportunities on the offensive end.”

With carte blanche to jump up into the play from Bednar and assistant Nolan Pratt, who runs the defense, Makar and Toews are illustrative of how the old model — pairing an offensive-minded-D with a stay-at-home D — has been disappearing. Even in the Avalanche’s Samuel Girard-Josh Manson pairing, Manson has clearance to jump up and do more than cover for the swift-skating Girard.

“I think we have a really good rapport that we’ve built over the last couple of years here, but the games change and you’re playing against different lines, playing with different lines,” Toews said of playing with Makar. “We’re trying to control what we can control on the back end and do what we can to help our team.

“I think we just read off each other. We both want to play quick. Defensively, I think that’s the side of things that don’t get looked at much. Offensively we can create a lot and a lot of times we play with Nate’s line and it gets easy to create offense. I think if you look back at the other end of the rink, we’re getting out of our zone really quick, we’re closing fast and using our speed and IQ to break pucks up and break plays up. That allows us to play more offense.”

Makar said the pairing embraces that both are expected to — or must — jump into the play.

“For us, that role kind of rotates,” Makar said. “One of us is not always going to stay back and that’s what makes our pairing so unique. We take a lot or pride in the defensive aspect of the game but one of us is going to always be up in the play, giving that extra layer of options to the forwards. Obviously one of us doesn’t play a specific role, we kind of intertwine and switch it up. I think that’s what makes it unique.”

They sometimes are split up within a game for a myriad of reasons.

“The best teams have to be able to play with everybody on the back end,” Makar said. “Major components to the game is that we are versatile in that aspect. I love playing with Tayzer. It’s a lot of fun but it’s a lot of fun at the same time when you mix it up too and change it up on the other team.”

Terry Frei (terry@terryfrei.com, @tfrei) is a Denver-based author and journalist. He has been named a state’s sportswriter of the year seven times in peer voting — four times in Colorado and three times in Oregon. His seven books include the novels “Olympic Affair” and “The Witch’s Season.” Among his five non-fiction works are “Horns, Hogs, and Nixon Coming,” “Third Down and a War to Go,” “March 1939: Before the Madness,” and “’77: Denver, the Broncos, and a Coming of Age.” He also collaborated with Adrian Dater on “Save By Roy,” was a long-time vice president of the Professional Hockey Writers Association and has covered the hockey Rockies, Avalanche and the NHL at-large. His web site is www.terryfrei.com and his bio is available at www.terryfrei.com/bio.html