For most of the last decade, the best-player-in-the-world question came with a default answer and a lot of people ready to defend it. That is a healthy argument to have, and last season it got a clear answer, one the data does not leave much room to dispute. Nathan MacKinnon did not just have the best year in hockey. He had it by a margin wide enough to make the debate feel settled, and he did it in the way that matters most.
| Metric | Number | The read |
|---|---|---|
| Points | 127 | Led the league |
| Goals | 53 | Beat expected by twelve - elite finishing |
| On-ice xGF% (all situations) | 65% | Colorado owned the game with him on the ice |
| On/off swing | +15 | The Avalanche were a different team without him |
The counting stats alone are staggering. One hundred and twenty-seven points and 53 goals, and the goals were not a percentage illusion: he scored 53 on 40.6 expected, beating his shot quality by twelve, the mark of a finisher operating at the peak of the position. But points can flatter a player on a great team, so go to the number that cannot be faked. With MacKinnon on the ice across all situations, Colorado controlled 65 percent of the expected goals. Without him, that fell to 50. A fifteen-point on-ice swing, on a team that was already the best in the league, is the fingerprint of a player who is not riding his roster but powering it.
The case against the usual answer
The reflex is to hand this title to Connor McDavid, and in most seasons that is defensible. Last season it was not. Edmonton slid to a 52 percent expected-goals team and a 93-point season, a good-not-great year in which McDavid remained brilliant but his team stopped dominating around him. MacKinnon, meanwhile, was the engine of the best team in hockey, leading the league in scoring while driving play at a rate that turned an already elite roster into a juggernaut. Greatness is partly about production and partly about impact, and last season MacKinnon won both categories against the man who usually owns them.
The honest counter
Two things are worth saying plainly. First, MacKinnon plays alongside the best offensive defenceman of his generation, and some of his on-ice dominance is Cale Makar as much as MacKinnon; the two inflate each other, and untangling them precisely is impossible. Fair. But the off-ice number cuts the other way too: even a 50 percent share without him means Colorado was merely good in his absence and overwhelming with him, and a player does not post plus-fifteen on a great team by accident. Second, one season is one season; McDavid at his peak may reclaim the title next year, and would probably be the favourite to. Best in the world is a rolling title, not a permanent one.
Why it still matters
Because the point of a debate is to be resolved by evidence when the evidence is clear, and last season it was. MacKinnon led the league in scoring, finished at an elite rate, and drove the best team in hockey to control nearly two-thirds of the chances whenever he played. That is not a narrow, argue-it-both-ways case. It is the most complete season any player produced, and pretending otherwise out of habit is exactly the kind of reputation-lag this site exists to correct. The crown moves around. Last season it sat, clearly and a little boringly, in Denver.