The NHL’s annual awards season often comes with controversy. Still, this year’s Norris Trophy voting (which Cale Makar won) triggered a particularly pointed conversation when NHL insider Elliotte Friedman joined Matt Marchese and Mike Futa on The FAN Hockey Show to discuss the odd Norris Trophy voting. Specifically, seven voters left Vancouver Canucks defenseman Quinn Hughes — a Norris finalist who finished third overall — completely off their ballots.
Related: Canucks 2025 NHL Draft Target: Roger McQueen
The conversation began when Marchese didn’t hold back. “They should have their votes taken away,” he said. “That means you just didn’t watch.”
It’s not the first time a ballot has sparked debate. A few years ago, a voter left Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews off a Hart Trophy ballot. These are not fringe players — they are generational stars. Leaving them off entirely doesn’t just challenge consensus; it questions whether the voter is even engaging with the league seriously.
For Friedman, who revealed he had Zach Werenski, Cale Makar, and Hughes as his top three, the idea that anyone would omit Hughes — the NHL’s highest-scoring defenseman — seemed wrong-minded. While he found it nearly indefensible, Friedman was more measured than his host.
The Key Question in This Voting Discussion
The key question discussed in the segment is: Should NHL award voters be held accountable — or even lose their voting privileges — when their ballots appear to ignore prominent top performers like Hughes?
Related: Canucks’ Captain Quinn Hughes: Young, Humble & Smart
This leads to deeper sub-questions: What separates a bad vote from an irresponsible or self-serving one? Should ballots be judged based on their reasoning, or is voter freedom paramount? Finally, where is the line between honest dissent and voting for attention? Friedman dealt with each of these questions in his conversation.
Friedman wrestles with these tensions. While he’s critical of Hughes’s exclusion from some ballots, he ultimately believes the integrity of the process depends not on punishing unpopular opinions but on voters’ ability to explain their choices credibly.
There Are Bad Votes & Irresponsible Ones
But then, Friedman pulled the critique of ballot negligence into a more nuanced discussion about the line between a bad vote and an unethical one. “I’m torn on this,” he admitted. “I think people should be allowed to vote as they please… but I would want to say to someone: ‘What were you thinking here?’” In his view, it’s one thing to disagree with the majority and another entirely to submit a ballot that seems detached from reality.
Related: Fixing Elias Pettersson: Is the Canucks Star Forward About to Hit the Market?
He distinguished reasoned dissent and self-promotional outliers. Friedman recalled a moment from NBA history when one lone MVP vote went to Allen Iverson instead of Shaquille O’Neal — a move that made headlines not because of its logic but because it stood out so starkly. “If you want to vote for Iverson over Shaq, that’s fine,” Friedman says. “But if you want to promote yourself over it — that I don’t like.”
(The Hockey Writers)
To him, that’s where voters cross the line. It’s not about falling out of step with public consensus. It’s about casting votes that can’t be defended by any reasonable standard — or worse, votes meant to get attention rather than reflect actual hockey analysis. That, for him, crosses the line.
What Quinn Hughes Represents as a Worthy Defenseman
Friedman argued that the Hughes case isn’t one of opinion. It’s one of the basic observations. Hughes led all NHL defensemen in scoring, quarterbacked one of the league’s top power plays, and drove play at both ends of the ice. Leaving him off a Norris ballot isn’t simply a matter of taste — it’s ignoring the season he had. “To me,” Friedman says, “if you don’t have Hughes in your top five, I disagree.”
Related: Goalie Arturs Silovs Gives Canucks Some Hope During Retool
Still, Friedman stopped short of advocating for a voting overhaul. He acknowledged the subjectivity in awards voting — and even embraced it. Some voters will favour shutdown defenders. Others will weigh offensive impact more heavily. But at the very least, voters should be able to explain their choices. If you can’t defend your ballot beyond “I felt like it,” that’s when the process loses credibility.
In the end, Friedman landed in the middle. He believes voters should be free to make bold or unpopular picks — but they must be held to a standard of logic and seriousness. “If you’re trying to do an honest ballot, people’s votes shouldn’t be taken away,” he concluded. “If you’re doing it for other reasons — to be funny or to get attention — then I have a problem with that.”
