Sportsnet's 2022 Athlete of the Year roundtable: Dominance all over the ice

There was no shortage of outstanding individual athletic performances in 2022. From young superstars redefining the way their sports are played to veterans delivering in the clutch yet again and underlining their names in the history books, those of us watching at home and in the stands were, let’s face it, spoiled.

And obviously that’s a good thing… unless you have the unenviable task of picking just one of those incredible performances to stand above all the rest.

That was the challenge we put to several of Sportsnet’s writers to close out 2022: give us your choice for athlete of the year. There answers may have varied, but taken together they highlight so many key moments we’ll remember for years, and so many reasons to get excited for what our favourite athletes and teams have to offer in 2023 and beyond.

Mike Johnston, Staff Writer: CONNOR McDAVID

Perhaps it’s boring or obvious or overly Canadian or all of the above, but I’m going with Connor McDavid as the top athlete of 2022, even though he’s not the reigning MVP of his league, didn’t make any championship appearances, and his individual accomplishments were split across two seasons.

This current generation of NHL players boasts the most dynamic collection of skills hockey fans have ever seen — you’ll frequently hear former greats speak about the elevated level of talent in today’s game compared to when they laced ‘em up — and McDavid is far and away the most skilled player in the NHL. Edmonton’s superstar can take over a game singlehandedly with more impact than anyone else in the league and his numbers this past calendar year back it up.

After Jan. 1 during 2021-22, McDavid accumulated 71 points (25G, 46A) in 49 regular-season games en route to his second consecutive Art Ross Trophy, his fourth scoring title in a six-year span. He was top-five in Hart Trophy voting for a sixth consecutive season, finishing second. McDavid also led the league in playoff points despite his team not advancing past the Western Conference final, notching 33 in just 16 games.

The Oilers captain didn’t cool off once the 2022-23 regular season began either. At the 37-game mark, McDavid is scoring at a 1.95-PPG pace and leads the league in both goals (32) and assists (40). The last player to do that over the course of an entire season was Mario Lemieux in 1995-96, before McDavid was alive. Wayne Gretzky did it five times, Lemieux and Gordie Howe twice each, and Phil Esposito once. The list ends there and McDavid, the odds-on frontrunner to win the 2023 Hart, was on pace to join it more than a third of the way through the ongoing season. No. 97 gets my vote.

Emily Sadler, Staff Writer: MARIE-PHILIP POULIN

More than a decade into her illustrious hockey career, Marie-Philip Poulin just keeps getting better. And in 2022, the first year the IIHF held a women’s world championship in an Olympic year, the Canadian women’s national team captain was at her best.

In February, Poulin added a third Olympic gold — her first as captain — to her collection when she led the Canadians to victory against Team USA, scoring twice in the final to reinstate Canada atop the hockey world after taking silver in 2018. Her first goal of the game wrote her name into hockey lore as the first player, male or female, to score in four Olympic gold medal games. Her second served as the game-winner, marking her third career golden goal on the Olympic stage and solidifying her status as Captain Clutch. (All three of Canada’s gold medals since her Olympic debut in 2010 have come courtesy of Poulin.)

Six months later, Poulin captained Canada to another gold over the Americans during the women’s world championship, where she tallied 10 points in seven games. The win marked the first time since 2004 Team Canada successfully defended their women’s worlds title.

This fall, in addition to her duties as a player development consultant with her hometown Montreal Canadiens — a role she accepted in June — Poulin embarked on another season with the PWHPA’s Secret Dream Gap Tour, where she currently leads her peers in points (eight goals and 12 points in eight games for Team Harvey’s). She’s also Canada’s scoring leader so far through three games of this year’s Canada-USA Rivalry Series.

Poulin’s highlight-filled year made her an obvious choice for the Northern Star Award, presented annually to Canada’s top athlete. She’s the first hockey player to win the award since Carey Price did so in 2015, and the first (but certainly not the last!) women’s hockey player to earn the honour.

She’s a must-watch every time she hits the ice, and no matter how you measure success in sport — individual stats, medal count, the clutchest of clutch performances — you won’t find a more dominant athlete than Poulin in 2022.

David Singh, Senior Writer: AARON JUDGE

By now, you’re familiar with the story: Aaron Judge bets on himself by turning down a seven-year, $213.5-million extension offer from the New York Yankees in the spring, then goes on to author one of the greatest offensive seasons in MLB history and sets the American League single-season home run record. You also know how the tale wraps up, but let’s stay here for a second, in the moments after Judge smashed No. 62.

Imagine having the guts to turn down that kind of money. One has to assume there were moments during the campaign when Judge bowed his head in silence and wondered if he’d done the right thing. (If there weren’t, then I’ve got even more respect for him.) He enjoyed a superb 2021, finishing fourth in MVP voting, and could have just played it safe and taken the Yankees’ offer. Everyone found it hard to believe a 30-year-old Judge could outdo himself and turn in a career year, and he was constantly reminded of that by the relentless New York media machine.

However, Judge showed nerves of steel on the field and exhibited pure class off of it, too — there were no negative soundbites that emerged from his interviews. Then, once the season concluded and he’d proved his point, Judge expertly navigated his negotiations with the Yankees, San Francisco Giants and San Diego Padres en route to netting the nine-year, $360-million deal from New York that makes him the highest-paid position player in history.

The entire thing is the stuff that makes Hollywood scripts shine. What more could you ask from your athlete of the year?

Sonny Sachdeva, Staff Writer: CALE MAKAR

If we’re talking 2022 dominance, the crown is Marie-Philip Poulin’s, for me. Two gold medals, yet another golden goal — build statues of MPP. But since Captain Clutch is already well-represented here, I’ll throw some shine on Cale Makar’s name.

It might get lost in the shuffle, this meteoric ascent we’re seeing from the young defenceman. The way the game has changed, it seems there’s a new young, dynamic talent around every corner; a new thriller who can make opponents look silly, who can take games over. But even in that new reality, Makar feels like something else, something just a slight step further.

In 2022, he showed us exactly why. Over the past calendar year, no other defender in the game has put more pucks in nets than the 24-year-old Colorado Avalanche standout. No defender has averaged more minutes on the ice. Only one other rearguard has collected more total points — 32-year-old veteran Roman Josi, in the best form of his life, has a handful more dating back to Jan. 1. The difference, of course, is that Makar’s production isn’t the culmination of a decade-plus honing his craft in the big leagues. He’s just getting started.

What clinches it for me, though, is what Makar did on the ice when it mattered most this year. After bagging the 2022 Norris Trophy, the Calgary native went on to pile up 29 points as he led his Avalanche to Stanley Cup glory, earning the Conny Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP for his troubles. In doing so, he became the first blue-liner in nearly 30 years to lead his team in scoring as they won the Cup. The last time that happened? Brian Leetch, in 1994.

Incidentally, that’s also the last time any NHL defenceman outscored Makar’s 29 playoff points.

Watch one clip of No. 8 doing his thing, and his impact on the game should be no mystery. Elite beyond his years at both ends of the sheet, he can skate, dangle, facilitate and defend with the best of them. He’s the sport’s new school embodied, already the top rearguard in the game with his peak miles off, and as worthy a choice as any for 2022’s best.

Ryan Dixon, Senior Writer: STEPHEN CURRY

Steph Curry isn’t the athlete of the year because 2022 was his best season. Curry is the athlete of the year because what he did in 2022 cemented the fact we’ll be talking about him for years and decades to come as one of the signature players in NBA history.

Sure, you could say the veteran Golden State Warrior had precious little left to prove; he’d already collected a museum’s worth of individual and team hardware during a 13-year run in which he changed the way players and front offices approach the game with his incredible three-point abilities. But Curry was four years removed from his last title in the spring of 2022. He was also just two years removed from missing basically the entire 2019-20 campaign with a broken hand. Yet there he was, back in the NBA Finals with a Warriors team that, prior to the 2022 post-season, had not contested a playoff series since losing the 2019 finals to the Toronto Raptors.

This was a Golden State outfit that did not feature the cheat code of prime-years Kevin Durant; that had Curry’s splash brother Klay Thompson still working back from his own injury woes, and emotional engine Draymond Green a far less dependable night-to-night force than he was a half-decade ago. When push came to shove and the Warriors — trailing the series 2-1 to the Boston Celtics — ostensibly had to win Game 4 on the road to keep their hopes alive, Curry came up with a 43-point performance to even the set. Golden State never lost again en route to a fourth title for the core of Curry, Green, Thompson and coach Steve Kerr. Curry claimed his first NBA Finals MVP award on the back of averaging 31.2 points over the six-game series.

It was the ultimate validation for a player who defined a generation — and showed he could still be the most unstoppable force in the game.