After coming off an incredible performance in the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs scoring 12 points in 11 playoff games, the longest-tenured Maple Leaf, Morgan Rielly, is ready to carry that into his 11th season with Toronto.
The 29-year-old has had his ups and downs in arguably the biggest hockey market in the world but has always been looked at as an incredible leader inside that locker room and a fan favourite to most Maple Leafs fans on the ice.
Rielly is coming off a 2022-23 season where he played in 65 games, scoring just four goals and tallying 37 assists for 41 points, which marks the fourth time in his career that he has hit the 40-point mark in a season.
A 41-point season in just 65 games is still fairly good, considering it put him on pace to finish the season with 52 points over a full 82-game season.
However, the oddsmakers aren’t that very high on the Vancouver native heading into the 2023-24 season as they have him with some of the longest odds to win the 2024 Norris Trophy as the league’s best defenseman.
Our friends over at Betano currently have Morgan Rielly sitting with the second-longest odds at +9000 to win the Norris (tied with 12 other players) and only ahead of Filip Hronek who is sitting at +14900 to win.
2023-24 Norris Trophy odds:
Cale Makar: +190
Adam Fox: +500
Miro Heiskanen: +700
Erik Karlsson: +1000
Rasmus Dahlin: +1000
Roman Josi: +1400
The best odds for the Norris Trophy are pretty straightforward. You would expect those six names to highlight the top odds to win the trophy for the 2023-24 season.
Makar, Fox, Karlsson and Josi have all won the Norris before, and youngsters Dahlin and Heiskanen are continuing to improve every year and show why their names belong in the conversation as well going forward.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Norris Trophy race shapes up this coming season as there are a handful of defensemen who could easily win it this time around.
