Welcome back my Cap-friendlies! Hope that everyone is staying warm and safe out there with the winter weather we have so far missed in a good portion of North America, finally making its grand entrance.

I must start this week by saying that probably like most of you out there, I have a pretty active group chat for my main fantasy league. We have a fun time with it and sometimes on Monday's we'll chat for a bit, and I'll throw random NHL topics out there for conversation, most of which I come up with when I should probably be working my regular 9-5 instead, but hey, fantasy hockey is 24/7. This past week I had a variety of topics like, "Do you believe…in the Carolina Hurricanes", "Make the case – Hawks are the worst team in the NHL right now" …so on, but one that I came up with made me scoot my office chair back and really think on it. That was, "Are we seeing the best version of Nathan MacKinnon right now?" This then led to me thinking, could he be the best player we've seen to never win a Hart Trophy? It's time here on Capped that we talk about the Avalanche and Nate MacKinnon.

I've wanted to focus in on MacKinnon here for a while because if you're new here, this is a blog all about the salary cap, and the player that has the highest cap hit this season is Nathan MacKinnon at $12.6M. That's also 15.1% of the Avalanche salary cap as a whole. Now I had a take at one point that I thought that MacKinnon was the best player in the NHL right now but quickly reacted on that as I have two things: Internet connection and access to watch Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers. Okay so maybe McDavid is the best player in the NHL right now, but at the time I considered it to be MacKinnon one thing can't be disputed as that's MacKinnon's contract back from 2016-last season was a bargain. A $6.3M cap hit with a length and value of seven years, $44.1M that took up 8.63% of the Colorado salary cap. There's a reason why Colorado was able to make all the acquisitions that they did during that time, and also were able to make a few key extensions as well.

I don't think it was MacKinnon's deal that exclusively led to them hoisting the Stanley Cup in 2022 but it certainly did not hurt, as the Avalanche were able to be a little bit more flexible with spending than they are today. Really, go take a gander at their recent shift charts. Right now, I'm going to take a wild guess here and go out on a limb and say that the Avalanche make playoffs but has any team in the salary cap era won the Stanley Cup with the highest paid player on their roster? The answer here is no, but like I've said it's only impossible until someone does it. The closest example that we have is Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane who signed their matching $10.5AAV following the Hawks last Cup win that made them the two highest paid players in the NHL the following season, with Anze Kopitar coming in right below them at $10M. I really do think that the way the cap is structured right now with a ceiling of $83.5M, I that a club like Colorado could manage to win a Cup with a 15.1% being designated to one player and I'd even argue that you could take that percentage as high as 17-18% but not higher than that at the moment. The reason is in three parts.

First is sort of team dependent but I do think the clubs that get in the most trouble with the salary cap is often those that try and get too creative with it, which so far has not been the case for Colorado as they have managed to navigate the salary cap well in the past few seasons. I think the next reason is something that we're going to see here shortly and lucky for us it involves, you guessed it, the Avs, and that's the use of LTIR. Right now, Gabriel Landeskog and Artturi Lehkonen are on LTIR, but if available to come back the roster come playoffs, they Avalanche would have the luxury of adding these two players back with no salary cap ramifications as there's no cap come playoff time. This isn't really new concept here as it seems like the last few Cup winners have a similar situation, but it is worth noting. The last reason I think though goes overlooked but it's simple when we really think about it. If you're paying a player like MacKinnon, or really any player that substantial of a contract, they're probably a difference maker out on the ice and I'd also venture to guess one of the top five players we have in the game today.

The NHL hit a point in the mid 2010's where Alex Ovechkin was the highest paid player against the cap and held that title for multiple seasons in a row, but recently I think the trend will start to go the opposite direction and that's just a product of how talented the league is right now and when these superstar players are coming due for their next contract. For example, last season the highest cap hit was Connor McDavid, this season it's MacKinnon, next it will be Auston Matthews with his extension kicking in next season, then McDavid comes back into the picture as his current deal will be up. With a rising cap and more top end talent taking shorter contracts, I could see more turnover taking place in that regard.

So, I asked two questions to start, first of which is this the best version of Nathan MacKinnon we're seeing right now? Have we reached an apex that could last this season and potentially another one or two beyond it? I would say here, that yes, we're here right now at the peak of his powers so to speak. At 28 years old he's coming off his first 100-point season having gotten into the mid to high 90's three times. Right now, he also has the most assists in the league, points, second in SOG, the highest xGP, and most high danger goals for. To add to this, his TOI has been outrageous this season. His ice time average is right around 23 minutes a game, but it can't be overstated just how much Colorado is using him. Just this week he skated for a half hour against the Bruins and got close to that number again versus Montreal. He also has more bursts of 22mph than any skater in the NHL this season…I don't know how to quantify that; I just think it's cool.

The second question, could he be the best player to not win a Hart? He has finished second twice (I'd argue in 2017-18 he should have won), and a third place once. I typically don't like playing the, "If the season ended today…" game, but for this purpose if the season ended today, I'd give my imaginary vote to Nate, with all the stats I listed, his team's play, and just eye test how much he has dominated games on the Colorado top line, I think he would likely take Hart Trophy honors. I'm not alone on this as well as last week MacKinnon was tied with the best odds at +300 with Connor McDavid but this week, he has moved to +200, with McDavid staying put at +300, Nikita Kucherov right behind him at +325. This is all dependent on what sports book you check of course, but this could be a good indicator of things to come. However, the NHL is unpredictable, and crazy things can happen. McDavid could go on a heater here the last two months to win his fourth Hart Trophy. Nikita Kucherov has been outstanding so far this season, maybe he goes on spree to close out the season where we look around and say that nobody was better. Anything can happen here but here's where my league group chat I mentioned earlier really got spicey. Let's say that an outcome outside of MacKinnon winning the Hart occurs, now we're into the 2024-'25 season. I'd like to think that MacKinnon would be just as good, if not better, than he is right now but that's a whole 'nother season with the same names I listed above coming back, if not more names added to the field. Let's say Jack Hughes plays an entire season at the level he played up until getting hurt in November, he would absolutely be in the mix. Maybe David Pastrnak continues to play at an exceptionally high level, the Bruins take home President Trophy honors next season, and we undoubtedly say that he's deserving of the award. And again, McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Auston Matthews…so on so forth.

Now we're two or three more years down the line, where do things fall now? Kirill Kaprizov? Tage Thompson? Matthew Tkachuk? And then how far off are we from potentially Connor Bedard or maybe even a name we're not even thinking about right now? Heck, maybe the award goes to (gasp) a goaltender? Again, all speculation and fun conversation but just thought that it would be so strange years from now to go back season-by-season and not see MacKinnon's name next to a Hart trophy.

*Salary Cap data from CapFriendly.com

*Statistics from Edge.NHL.com, NaturalStatrick.com, HockeyReference.com

For continued fantasy news and notes, follow me on Twitter @ndySanz.