Cale Makar Gives New Jersey Devils Prototype Into How To Treat Ty Smith
By Nick Villano
The New Jersey Devils top prospect is undoubtedly defenseman Ty Smith. They should learn from the Colorado Avalanche how they should use him in 2020-21.
Cale Makar is having one of the best defenseman seasons from a rookie in a long time. The last time we saw a rookie defenseman hit 50 points was Vladimir Malakhov back in 1993. (Well, besides when Quinn Hughes did it a couple weeks ago.) Makar has been great thanks to the position the Colorado Avalanche put him in, and the New Jersey Devils need to be taking notes.
The Devils have their own defensive dynamo prospect in Ty Smith. Smith’s dominance of the WHL is similar to that of Makar’s dominance of the NCAA. Now, we want to make it clear we know that Smith is not the prospect that Makar is, but they aren’t completely far off. Nobody would be floored if Smith became a top 15 defenseman. The ceiling for Makar is through the roof, and Smith’s is below that considerably, but the Devils can still learn how to make Smith’s rookie year a success thanks to the Avalanche’s stud.
Smith is having an insane season with the Spokane Chiefs. He has 59 points in 46 games, won a gold medal with Team Canada at the World Junior Championship and learned how to be much more sound defensively. He made the kinds of strides on the defensive side that Makar made on the offensive side in his sophomore season at UMass.
Both players will make play their first full NHL season two years after they were drafted. Obviously, we all thought Smith was going to be here to start this past season, but a paltry showing in the preseason forced the Devils to send him back to juniors. It was for the best, as we saw with Jack Hughes, no rookie was going to be able to thrive on the mess that was this Devils team.
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Now that those issues are likely behind us, the time is right to have Smith start his career.
In Makar’s case, the Avalanche are sheltering him as much as they can. Or, another way to put it, they are putting him in the best possible scenario to succeed on every shift. Makar’s best traits are in the offensive zone. That’s why the Avalanche are starting his shift close to 65% of the time in the offensive zone according to Natural Stat Trick.
That’s exactly what the Devils need to do with Smith next season. Throw him on a line with P.K. Subban and let them eat in the offensive zone. Subban doesn’t have the agility like he used to, but he still has enough straight-line speed to make up on 2-on-1s. If Smith makes mistakes in the offensive zone, Subban can do his best to make up for it.
However, we feel if he gets to play in the offensive zone as often as Avalanche put Makar there, he’ll have a great offensive season. This is also what John Hynes did with Will Butcher. Since they’ve came off that theory, he hasn’t been the same since. If they allow Smith to ease into the NHL the same way, he has the skill set to make up for it when he’s pulled off that type of workload later in his career. Therefore, we wouldn’t be worried he’d have a Butcher-like fall from grace.
Smith could even be a Calder Trophy candidate if they use him like the Avs used Makar this season. Put him on the first power play, then have Subban and Butcher on the second unit. He could eat up points, build up confidence, and give the Devils a legitimate scoring option they so desperately need.