Disgruntled Avalanche Blogger

Stoa's Time To Shine

2009-12-12T18:10:00.004-07:00

In the 2005 draft, the Avs had four 2nd round picks (of course, no 1st round picks).

They used their first one, 34th overall, on Ryan Stoa. That's one pick after Dallas took James Neal, and one pick before San Jose took Marc-Edouard Vlasic. It was also one 2nd round pick used before taking Paul Stastny with their second 2nd round pick, 44th overall.

There was alot of hype around Stoa before the season began, and I'll admit even I bought into it. Instead of filling a top 6 role with the Avalanche, he was sent down to Lake Erie where he's played mediocre on a piss poor team, scoring 7 goals and registering a -10 rating in 25 games.

But, let's not buy into those stats too much. None of the Avalanche's better wingers (Stewart, Jones, McLeod) were all that great in the AHL, but stuck once given a chance to play with quality players in the NHL.

I suspect Stoa is going to be around a while to prove his worth.

Jones is done for the year, Hejduk will probably be out a month after his knee gets cleaned up, and I'm suspecting Svatos might miss a few games after leaving last game in the 2nd period (though, he's becoming less and less relevant).

Hopefully Stoa can be yet another call-up (see: Ryan Wilson) who's able to keep the Avalanche afloat through this mass of injuries. In a year of surprises, one thing hasn't been a surprise: Colorado's inability to stay healthy.

Cut Peter Budaj some slack

2009-12-02T12:34:00.002-07:00

That's right, I'm going to defend Peter Budaj. Me. Really.

I've been seeing alot of fans and media (particularly Adrian Dater saying that Budaj might be down to his last chance) giving Peter Budaj alot of crap recently.

I'm baffled as to why.

I don't like Budaj's salary. I understand he's not skilled enough to be an NHL starter. And I'd prefer it if Weiman was given a shot at back-up next season.

But that doesn't mean I'm going to have blind hate for him. He's been given the chance to start two games out of 28, and went 1-1.

One really good game, one really bad game. But last time I checked, that's the trademark of an NHL back-up. If they were consistently good, they would be a starter on some team.

And considering how good Anderson has been, you may as well have had Jacques Cloutier as the back-up. It's his team now, and he'll be starting over 70 games this year (and hopefully next).

So again, why the hate? Are people bitter about last year? Or still fuming about Budaj's ugly loss to Edmonton?

Kobasew ends Jones's, Avalanche's season

2009-11-29T00:18:00.006-07:00

How things can change in one brief moment.

Yes, the Avalanche have been stinking it up lately. Yes, they continue to fall in the standings. Yes, some alot of the players are coming back down to earth.

Things happen. Teams go through tough stretches, and the good teams are able to come out of them.

With the loss of David Jones, I'm no longer convinced the Avalanche are a good team.

Other than Anderson, Stastny, Hannan, Quincey, and maybe Hejduk, Jones has been the Avalanche's best player this year. The man has been the perfect example of why rebuilding teams give their young players a chance.

Jones was on pace for 30 goals, and then bam! Colorado loses their most important winger for the rest of the season.

If I can dig up one positive out of this, it's that Chris Stewart should have an uncontested chance to prove to the Avalanche what skills he may or may not have. Does that outweigh the increased ice time Marek Svatos and Darcy Tucker will likely receive thanks to the Jones (and Hejduk...and possible Galiardi, don't know where he was tonight) injury?

Nope, but that's why I think Colorado will miss (or barely make) the playoffs this season.

I really feel terrible for David Jones. He was making the most of his opportunity, but now will likely be an after thought.

By the time next offseason rolls around, Jones will likely have missed the previous 55 games, so I doubt management is going to be saying to themselves "we don't need to sign a top line forward because we have that David Jones guy who was good for 20 games half a year ago."

Pseudo-GM Time: 36 reasons to Sign Miroslav Satan

2009-11-15T22:10:00.005-07:00

1/36: that's the Avalanche power play success rate over the last ten games.

That number is simply pathetic, and if it doesn't change, the Avalanche's success in the month of November won't change: a 2-3-1 record.

The power play was a big reason for the 10-1-1 start, but after Liles and Tucker went down, so did it. But the past is the past: we can't just wait around for Liles to get healthy, and Tucker still doesn't look 100% after returning.

Enter Miroslav Satan.

Yes, he's old. Yes, he's one-dimensional. Yes, signing him is an incredibly short sighted move.

But who cares?

His salary would be inexpensive. He has experience. He's proven that he has the hands to be both a good shooter and passer.

Something has to get the power play going, and something has to get Matt Duchene going. Putting him on a line with McLeod and Svatos every night has become the equivalent of beating one's head against a brick wall.

Because the only real player in jeopardy of being bumped down a line or scratched (Svatos) isn't a player the Avalanche have any long term plans for, there comes no risk with signing Satan.

At the very least, signing him would give Joe Sacco another competent top-six forward to work with.

They're not so bad, I guess

2009-11-12T16:47:00.002-07:00

Probably better than the home and away jerseys, at least. The Avs will wear them in 11 of the remaining 34 home games.

1 for 31

2009-11-12T00:50:00.003-07:00

That's the Avalanche power play success ratio over the past 9 games.

Get Preissing in there, Sacco.

And of course, the tune "we don't think it'll be anything long term" has turned into Liles being placed in the IR.

Here's the fact of life for the Avalanche: if Stastny can't score on the road, the power play has to. If it doesn't, you're going to lose games.

Can't wait to see the new jersey's that will be unveiled tomorrow. If they're anything like they're rumored to be, someone deserves to be shot.

Bad feeling about Liles

2009-11-07T01:30:00.008-07:00

I have a feeling we've seen the last of John-Michael Liles for a while.

When have you ever seen a player return quickly after what's happened to him? He missed two weeks with a shoulder injury, came back and played two pretty godawful games, and in game three re-injures the shoulder on an innocent looking play.

I still don't know what happened. With the way he fell down/the look of pain on his face, I thought he took a high stick.

But no, it was the shoulder.

Will he need surgery? Who knows, but this is wouldn't be the worst year for it to happen. The long Olympic break would allow alot of recovery time.

What if Tom Preissing comes in and plays like the 38 point, +40 player he was in 2007 for Ottawa? Could we have seen the last of JM Liles as an Avalanche?

That's certainly extreme, but it's just a thought.

Brett Clark is having a nice bounce back year. He's still gotten it from the fans (mostly unjustified), but take a look at this stat: 12 blocked shots tonight.

12 blocked shots in one game! A couple of them were huge, too, including the one off of the side of his head late in the 3rd.

-----

Not to say "I told you so," but...I told you so.

Prospal
Salary: 1.100
Games: 17
Points: 19

Svatos
Salary: 2.025
Games: 17
Points: 5

That's just to put things in perspective.

Yes, Prospal has been playing center on a line with Gaborik, but he's been good even during the games Gaborik has missed. And, he's had success at LW pretty much every team he's been on in his career.

Wouldn't he look alot better next to Duchene than the other people he's been paired with so far?

One month in the books

2009-10-31T23:46:00.003-06:00

If someone would have told me the 09/10 Colorado Avalanche would set a record in October, I would have believed them.

But I would have thought it would be for fewest points to start the season.

Right now, life is good. The Avs 10-2-2 record ties the most points ever in the month of October, and the schedule is about to get easier after playing the past 11 of 13 on the road.

One problem: EVERYONE is injured. Everyone.

For the third season in a row, the Avalanche players are having significant trouble staying healthy. I can't really blame the training staff because injuries have ranged anywhere from a cheap shot into the boards to the H1N1 flu.

How long can Colorado keep winning with all these players out, and what happens if MORE players get injured?

Tom Preissing still hasn't played a game, but right now healthy defensemen is low on Colorado's list of priorities. Even with Salei and Preissing on the IR, the solid play of Wilson still makes a log jam on the back end.

I hope McLeod is able to play when Colorado returns home after Sundays game against Vancouver. The organization has been pretty mum on his eye injury, so who knows?

What I do know is the team can't afford to have he or Tucker out for much longer. Hensick and Svatos have been inept offensively, and Willsie/Durno don't even have the skills to produce.

Colorado splits November 50/50, with seven games at home/on the road. That's a much lighter schedule than the ten road games they played last month, but eight of the games are against division rivals. It's going to be a big month, but I expect a winning record as long as Stastny/Anderson don't go down to injury.

No Fluke Here; Avalanche Win Again

2009-10-28T22:00:00.002-06:00

10-1-2; the best start in Avalanche history.

That's right, this Avalanche team has started the season better than any team icing names like Sakic, Forsberg, Roy, and Bourque (to name a few).

Hopefully now people will stop calling it a "fluke" and that the team has faced "no adversity". Wouldn't YOU call 8 injuries (including Galiardi tonight) and 9 roads games adversity?

Some notes:

- Joe Sacco for the Jack Adams.

That is all.

Wolski deserves to be benched or traded NOW

2009-10-21T23:15:00.002-06:00

If you've found yourself saying this, or similar things, chances are your head is far up a place it shouldn't be.

He leads the Avalanche in goals. He leads the Avalanche in points. And yet, some people are calling for him to be benched. A week ago these same people were calling for Sacco's head for sitting him down in the 3rd period against Detroit.

Every year people want more from him, and this year you're finally getting it. But of course, the boo birds are out.

Wolski's had a bad bounce on the penalty that led to the goal. Up until then, he was having a strong game which included an assist. Yet, this isolated incident is calling for people to bench and/or trade him (for a guy like Frolov, who was benched last game for the Kings).

The other thing pissing me off is how people are complaining about him missing the net on his shootout try. Sorry to clue you people in, but players miss the net all the time in a shoot-out, and it's not because they took a bad shot. There was likely a small hole there, and Wolski missed it. Don't lose too much sleep over it, the Avalanche are 6-1-2 despite being projected as the worst team in the West by many "experts".

Through all the moaning and groaning, somehow Paul Stastny's play has been left out of the "sky is falling" discussion.

The guy averages over 20 minutes a night, and yet had a whopping 2 points (no goals) on the seven game road trip. Don't worry, he's only making 6.6 million dollars.

O'Reilly to stay

2009-10-19T16:08:00.004-06:00

Raise your hand if you expected Colorado to ice two 18 year old forwards for 82 games.

This is the right decision. Both players have clearly shown they're ready, and have been a huge part of the Avalanche turn around.

After his first few games I questioned whether it would be best for O'Reilly to stay, but now I'm convinced. He's been playing ridiculous two-way hockey, especially last game against Detroit.

How did this guy slip by so many teams? TSN's Bob McKenzie had O'Reilly going at 27th overall, but he fell to #33 where Colorado snatched him.

Kinda ironic that Detroit (who traded for Tampa's 32nd overall draft choice) passed on him and he burned them in his first game against them (not a knock against them, Landon Ferraro is a great young prospect).

Straying off topic a little further, it's also interesting to note that Stefan Elliot looks to be a steal at 49th overall. Everyone calls him the Mike Green of the western hockey league, and McKenzie projected him to go 35th overall. I wonder if Colorado would have taken him at #32 if Detroit took O'Reilly.

Abel to Yzerman - Nothing in Between

2009-10-17T15:14:00.004-06:00

Well, there certainly seems to be a mass of Red Wings fans with varying negative (and cocky) comments, and I felt the need to address some of them.

But first, I'd like to laugh at the name Abel to Yzerman. Fair weather Red Wings fans need to be reminded of the Dead Wings era, where from 1967-1983 the team missed the playoffs 15 out of 17 seasons. As unfathomable as it may seem, playoff births will be alot harder to come by after Nick "We can win games with Osgood because of me" Lidstrom retires.

I was going to go into a whole tangent about some of the things written by a member named IwoCPO, but many of them have been edited out.

Most notably, the line "Colorado has beaten San Jose, Vancouver, and Boston so far. I'd like to see how they do against a real team." As I said, cocky, especially considering they had their asses handed to them by Buffalo earlier this week.

Anyway, it should be a good game tonight. I'm sure Chris Osgood will be in his usual 3.31 goals against average form.

Avs Jump to 1st in the West

2009-10-13T20:14:00.004-06:00

That's right. 6 games in and this team, which everyone expected to dueling it out with Phoenix for dead last, is first in the conference.

It's no time to break out the champagne, but at least we can be happy that the team is competitive this year - even if they miss the playoffs.

Anderson, again, was spectacular. Definitely a dark horse for the Vezina if he keeps it up. The only goal he let in - a Francois Beauchemin power play goal - shouldn't have taken place (in my opinion) because the "boarding" call on McLeod was incredibly weak.

Matt Duchene is frustrated with his lack of goal production, but he'll get going eventually. He's still picking up assists (3) and the team is winning.

Darcy Tucker has been excellent. Finally, he's playing like the Tucker management thought they were signing. 3 goals - 5 points in 6 games thus far.

Next game is Thursday against Montreal. Expect Liles to be out (along with Preissing and Salei - Ryan Wilson should draw in), and expect 'Boods' to be in goal.

Wolski benched? Avs lose 3-2

2009-10-08T20:29:00.003-06:00

That was a pretty bad game for Colorado.

I'm not sure what happened, but either Wolski was hurt, or was benched for a bad penalty (hooking). He stayed on the bench the entire game, but as far as I know didn't have a shift in the 3rd. I'd like to hope Sacco didn't bench him over a minor penalty.

Craig Anderson's season is going to be an endurance test if he keeps facing 35+ shots every game. He gave up alot of rebounds in the 3rd, but the loss can be attributed to the defense's inability to get the puck out of the zone.

The "bounce back player of the game" was clearly Kyle Cumiskey. His speed helped generate alot of Avalanche rushes (and believe me, there weren't many), and he was clearly a head and shoulders better than Foote and Salei...which brings me to the benching situation.

I don't think many people expected to see Brett Clark benched. Hoped? Sure. But not expected. I have a feeling he and Salei will be flip flopping next game, so don't you worry Brett Clark fan club. As bad as everyone likes to say Clark is, he had two assists and was a +1 in the first two games.

Salei tonight? He was a -1, with zero shots, and turned the puck over several times - including once about 5 feet in front of Anderson, forcing him to make a point blank save off of a slap shot.

T.J. Hensick also drew in the line-up. Considering he assisted on the then-go ahead goal, and Wolski may be hurt, I suspect we'll see him again. And as critical as I've been of him historically, he wasn't too bad tonight.

Well, except the part about him being the only -2 on the team.

I'm not sure why ANY line-up changes were made, considering the fact that Colorado dominated two good teams the first two games of the season.

Next game is Saturday in Chicago. The road trip is off to a great start...

Avs surprise again

2009-10-03T15:25:00.002-06:00

I don't think anyone saw a 2-0-0 start coming, especially when those first two games were against San Jose and Vancouver.

Craig Anderson again was phenomenal with a 35 save shutout, once again taking 1st star honors. I think the Avs have found themselves a real winner here. He's looked huge in the net, and the team looks confident playing around him.

Matt Duchene continues to impress. The fans are praising him as the messiah, and he was the 3rd star of the game (it SHOULD have been Wolski). Wolski has looked great the first two games, and has the points to go along with it - 3 goals in 2 games. He didn't have 3 goals until the 22 game mark last year.

I better say this now because it will be the last time in a while, if not ever, that I'll be able to say it: the Colorado Avalanche are first in the league.

Next game is (yikes) not until Thursday, when the Avs take on Nashville IN Nashville. I'm not going to make a prediction after my last debacle. But trust me, I wasn't rooting against the Avs: Craig Anderson got me a big fat shutout in my fantasy league.

(Goodbye, Joe) Avs harpoon Sharks 5-2

2009-10-01T22:31:00.012-06:00

I guess my 4-2 prediction wasn't so far off. Right away I have to say Craig Anderson was dominant. He was absolutely phenomenal, especially during the Sharks 5 on 3 power play. 38 saves on 40 shots made him the well deserved 1st star of the game.

I thought the team played excellent...for two periods. The flood gates really opened in the 3rd (out shot 19-1), but Anderson held the fort.

- Matt Duchene and Ryan O'Reilly both got their 1st NHL points tonight, and both were strong defensively. Duchene had some good offensive chances (and a screen that led to the Liles goal); it'll only be a matter of time before he gets his first NHL goal.

O'Reilly didn't stand out as much to me. I thought he was pretty good on the PK, but even then he was out shined by his partner T.J. Galiardi. One game is a small sample size, and we'll have to see how he does the next 2-8 games to see if he warrants staying in the NHL this season.

- I could really see Matt Hendricks becoming a key part of the team as things move forward. His positioning was great, and he stood out to me every time he was on the ice.

- Kyle Quincey brought exactly what I thought he would to the table. Many Avalanche fans complained when management traded Smyth for him...well, I didn't hear any complaining tonight! Clearly the team's best defenseman tonight, but I think Liles also had a great game.

- I must give credit where credit is due. Darcy "Darby" Tucker had a great game - even if you don't count the goal. I would go as far as to say tonight was his best night in an Avalanche jersey, and I for one am glad. He was always a quality player in Toronto, and he was god awful last year. Hopefully this game will be a turning point in his work ethic.

- Wolski looked good because he was finally driving the net. Hopefully he'll finally start to fulfill his potential this season. Then again, he's scored a goal on opening night every season of his career.

- I agree with the decision to bench a healthy Salei in favor of Cumiskey (even though he was pretty mediocre tonight). The Avs are rebuilding, and the choice is between a 22 year old or a 34 year old. Hmm.

As for Joe Sakic's ceremony- it was done well...except all those wrinkles in the banner. Like...really? Shouldn't they have made sure it was ironed or something?

-----

Next game is Saturday at 1 pm MDT (3 pm EST). I don't expect another win (3-1 loss), but hopefully I'm proved wrong.

Also, my 100th career blog is the one you just read. Because you care.

Final Thoughts, Expectations for 2010

2009-10-01T12:42:00.004-06:00

Going into the 2009-2010 season, the expectations are at an all time low. No longer is the Avalanche line-up graced with marquee names like Sakic, Smyth, Forsberg, or Blake; instead some of the players expected to step are Jones, Stewart, and Duchene - none of whom have played a full NHL season.

Everyone expects the Avalanche to finish bottom 3 in the league, and I have a hard time disagreeing. However, I could easily see Colorado doing what Toronto did last year, which is finish 12th in the conference. Yeah, big deal, 12th, but that's my prediction. As bad as the offense is, I think the defense and goaltending will be enough to the keep the Avalanche placing from last in the west again (I think the honors this year will go to Edmonton).

The two players that really need to step things up this year are Wolski and Stewart. Both need to show they can play like top 6 forwards every night. Stastny, too, has something to prove: that he can stay healthy. In goal, if Craig Anderson can play the way he did last year for 55+ games this year, things will start to look up as far as this teams playoff hopes go in the coming seasons.

At the deadline, GM Greg Sherman needs to try to move veterans for prospects; that includes Salei, Tucker, Clark, Svatos, and even possibly Hannan. Foote won't be traded because he came back to Colorado to retire, not to play for a mediocre Avs team and then get shipped to a borderline playoff team at the deadline.

The lines tonight are as follows, per Daters blog:

Wolski - Stastny - Hejduk
McLeod - Duchene - Svatos
Tucker - Galiardi - Stewart
Koci - ??? - Hensick

Quincey - Clark
Liles - Salei
Hannan - Foote

Anderson

The 4th line center spot is a decision between Hendricks and O'Reilly. Can someone tell me why O'Reilly wasn't sent back to the OHL right away is the plan was to bench him game 1?

Well, at least Svatos is on the 2nd line with quality line matE. I don't have as big a problem as some with McLeod being in a top 6 role, but why is he on a scoring line while Hensick is on a checking line? I'm not a Hensick fan, and I know Sacco doesn't have much to work with, but I just don't see the point.

My prediction for tonight's game: 4-2 Colorado. This seems like one of those weird games where they'll actually put up a fight, being Joe Sakic night and all. On the other end of the spectrum, the Sharks will lose and the media will once again question how good they are after losing opening night to a bottom feeder.

A final look at offseason signings, Jones hurt

2009-09-29T12:52:00.006-06:00

What a weird offseason. Following a summer where the likes of Wade Redden, Brian Campbell, and Christobal Huet were signed for over 5.5 million each, the salary cap finally came into effect. Patience wasn't a virtue for free agent players this summer; if you waited, you lost out.

Let's review how little some of the "big" available free agents ended up making:

G Martin Biron

2008-2009 Salary: 3.5 million
What he signed for: 1 year, 1.4 million
What similar players signed for in the first week of the offseason:

Nikolai Khabibulin: 4 years, 15 million
Dwayne Roloson: 2 years, 5 million

C Manny Malhotra

2008-2009 Salary: 1.2 million
What he signed for: 1 year, 700K
What similar players signed for in the first week of the offseason:

John Madden: 1 year, 2.75 million
Sammi Pahlsson: 3 years, 7.95 million

LW Alex Tanguay

2008-2009 Salary: 5.25 million
What he signed for: 1 year, 2.5 million
What similar players signed for in the first week of the offseason:

Brian Gionta: 5 years, 25 million
Martin Havlat: 6 years, 30 million

D Mathieu Schneider

2008-2009 Salary: 5.625 million
What he signed for: 1 year, 1.55 million
What similar players signed for in the first week of the offseason:

Jaroslav Spacek: 3 years, 11.5 million
Adrian Aucoin: 1 year, 2.25 million

-------------------------------------------------

David Jones is out indefinitely with a bruised chest. If you're keeping count, that's two Avalanche players injured before the start of the season.

Time to bust out the bubble wrap.

2009-2010 Colorado Avalanche Blogger Roundtable

2009-09-28T14:34:00.005-06:00

It's day 8 of the 2009-2010 Avalanche Blogger Roundtable, hosted by Mile High Hockey. My question to host is:

Who has the biggest make-or-break season?

"This season is Paul Stastny's to screw up. He is next in line to be captain, but another poor season could cost him the "face of the franchise" moniker with other superstar hopefuls starting this year. While it would be easy (and ideal) to see Stastny share the spotlight with a guy like Duchene, Colorado's picky fans are out of patience and will immediately latch on to the next big thing. In the end though, I really expect the motivation of new talent and an exiting captain to push Paul Stastny to the next level."

- Grant @ Hockeyism

"It's a toss up between Wolski or Svatos. It looks like Woski is going to see some time on the top line with Hedjuk and Stastny, so his excuses are going to be little to none. As for Svatos, for the first time in a while, they aren't going to put him on a grind line. The guy is too small to play on line three. So, with his promotion to line two, he has to prove that he is the scorer he can be."

- Matt @ Mile High Mayhem

"Wojtek Wolski. He continues to exhibit big-time skill but only offers mid-range production. His point-per-game rate has dropped in each of his 3 NHL seasons to date. He is electrifying in the shootout and he's improved so many things about his game, but he needs to start putting points up on the scoreboard."

- David @ Mile High Hockey

"Budaj. He's had an awful year and now he's the backup, slated to play about 30 games. If he doesn't show well, it could be his last contract in the NHL. Someone might take a flier on him after this year but if he doesn't perform, you can kiss the a zero good-bye on his next contract."

- Aaron @ Hockey Buzz

"Don't know if there's make or break seasons when the expectations for this team are so low, but I think Wojtek Wolski is beginning to move this direction. A solid all around season from him will solidify his place in the future of the franchise while another "blah" year with most of his success coming in the shootout will lead to that "how long is the organization going to wait for him to develop" scenario. I like Wolski, and it's time for him to define his identity as a player. Power forward or finesse and speed guy or rush the net and try and move me out of the way style; just pick one and do it well. Avs fans are waiting..."

- Jay @ The Avalanche Hockey Podcast

"Wolski. His numbers have continued to decrease as his role has increased. If he doesn't find consistency in his game, he'll be shown the door at the end of the season."

- Me.

I'd like to thank all those involved for inviting me to participate in this years round table.

Avs make final cuts

2009-09-27T14:31:00.003-06:00

Weiman, Durno, and Peltier are the final 3 cuts.

ROSTER

Forwards

Duchene
Galiardi
Hejduk
Hendricks
Hensick
Jones
Koci
McLeod
O'Reilly
Stastny
Stewart
Svatos
Tucker
Wolski

Defensemen

Clark
Cumiskey
Foote
Hannan
Liles
Quincey
Salei

Goaltenders

Anderson
Budaj

IR

Preissing

Avalanche Sign Ryan O'Reilly, Stoa and Wilson cut

2009-09-21T12:25:00.007-06:00

Today the Colorado Avalanche announced a signing and two cuts.

First, the signing: I think it's an indication that the 33rd overall pick in last years draft has made the team. He was expected by most to be sent back to the OHL, but this signing, coupled with strong play in the preseason has changed things. He could/may still get sent back to Erie of the OHL after 9 NHL games, however.

On the other spectrum, Stoa, who many expected to make the team, has been cut. Ryan Wilson is no surprise because the Avs have great depth at defense this season.

Of the remaining players, I think it's safe to assume Weiman and Durno will be cut. One of Peltier or Cumiskey might stick with the Avs as a 7th defenseman, but that all depends on the health of Tom Preissing, who hasn't played a preseason game due to a knee (?) injury.

My prediction for the opening night roster: (barring a trade)

Center: Duchene, Hendricks, O'Reilly, Stastny
Left Wing: Koci, McLeod, Tucker, Wolski
Right Wing: Hejduk, Hensick, Jones, Stewart
Defense: Clark, Foote, Hannan, Liles, Quincey, Salei
Goalie: Anderson, Budaj

I'm not sure if/where Galiardi fits in, but it'll probably be in place of Koci or Hensick if he makes the team.

EDIT: Yikes, forgot about Svatos completely. Hat tip to Matt for point that out.

Svatos presence on the team often slips my mind, which shows you how far he has fallen.

Avs singing the Blues + Random musings

2009-09-19T00:31:00.006-06:00

Sorry for the cliche title, I couldn't help it.

Avs lose 6-2 to the Blues tonight. Avs didn't have too many names in the line-up; Weiman got the start, and let in all 6 goals (on 36 shots). I expect him, along with two of Cumiskey/Montgomery/Skinner to be cut tomorrow. Weiman didn't have much of a chance to begin with, and that chance evaporated tonight.

Matt Duchene had a goal and an assist, and his line-mate Chris Stewart had a goal. Both players were the only "plus" players on the team. As I said in yesterday's blog, I expect Duchene to make the team, and tonight's stand out performance strengthens my belief.

KESSEL TRADED TO THE LEAFS

The Phil Kessel sags comes to an end, finally. He's being shipped to Toronto in exchange for two 1st round picks and a 2nd round pick. I think this is a pretty even trade: Leafs finally get another star player, and the Bruins get a plethora of good picks. If anything, Boston wins the trade. If Toronto doesn't significantly improve at least by the end of the 2011 season, then they just acquired two great picks from a crummy team.

Personally, I think the Avs should have given Kessel an offer sheet (which would have cost a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd round pick). It's true that Colorado's 1st round pick may be worth alot at this years draft, but there are no guarantee's in life. No guarantees in finishing last in the west, no guarantees that the player drafted won't be a bust. In giving Kessel an offer sheet, they would have acquired a great young sniper without losing any assets currently in the organization.

That's just me. I think the Avs should hang on to their 2010 1st rounder for dear life, but the Kessel situation - acquiring a former #5 overall pick, a 21 year old 36 goal scorer - for "potential" players would have been worth mulling over at the very least.

Avs Down Stars 3-1

2009-09-18T00:03:00.010-06:00

Colorado opened the preseason with a 3-1 win at home versus Dallas. Obviously, I (nor anyone not AT the game) wasn't able to watch it, but I can tell from the stats that Anderson was solid and apparently Duchene was good defensively.

I will say this: the preseason means very little. The Detroit Lions were 3-1 in the preseason this year, and followed it up be allowing 6 passing touchdowns last Sunday. Football is obviously alot different than hockey (though comparing the Lions to the Avalanche isn't a stretch these days), so let's take a look at Colorado's preseason stats from last year:

Team Record: 4-1-1

T.J. Hensick: 2 goals, 2 assists in 4 games
David Jones: 3 goals in 2 games
Darcy Tucker: 1 goal, 2 assists in 3 games

Peter Budaj: 3-0-0, 1.87 GAA, 0.936 SV%

Analysis: They don't mean much.

Ryan Stoa had a goal, but word on the street says he looked like a mess before scoring it. Adrian Dater has recently reported in his blogs that Stoa has looked "slow", and will have to shape up if he wants to make the team. So, the jury is still out on him.

What I don't think the jury is out on is the team's second line center role, though. Duchene had 16:28 ice time tonight, which was much more than the other candidates (Wolski: 14:46; Galiardi: 14:43) trying out for the job (Note: T.J. Hensick has been moved to RW). At this point, I'd be shocked if Duchene doesn't make the team. He simply brings too much to the table for a rebuilding team to send him back to the OHL.

Analyzing Craig Anderson's stats

2009-08-20T23:26:00.004-06:00

It's down time, and I haven't made a blog in a while, so I thought I'd make this one about Anderson's stats the past two seasons:

2008 Home: 5 GP, 1-2-0, .913 SV%
2009 Home: 11 GP, 3-3-3, .926 SV%, 1 SO

2008 Away: 12 GP, 7-4-1, .940 SV%, 2 SO
2009 Away: 20 GP: 12-4-2, .923 SV%, 2 SO

Now see why I made this blog (aside from the fact that I have no life and actually crunched all those numbers from a game log list)? This stat discrepancy can be looked at two ways:

a. He's able to go into other teams buildings and shut the door
b. There's alot less pressure on the road

Probably a little of both. Hopefully he shakes off his home "woes" so we don't have to see more than 20 games of Peter Budaj next season.

Fun Fact: In 40 starts over the past two seasons, Anderson has faced 40+ shots a whopping 13 times.

Forsberg Contemplating Comeback?

2009-08-08T21:41:00.003-06:00

It will likely fail, but even if it does it's still noteworthy that Peter Forsberg is trying one final comeback, the Denver Post reports.

If he comes back, he should take it easy; sit out all back to backs, and spend most of his ice time on the power pay. As broken down as he may be, he's still one of the best players in the world. The Avalanche were 8-1-0 in the 9 regular season games Forsberg played during the 2008 season, and Nashville was 10-4-3 in the 17 games he played with them in 2007; those aren't coincidences.

Now I know why the Avalanche don't have many Europen players

2009-07-30T14:57:00.007-06:00

Today, Sergei Zubov signed with the KHL. This is becoming a trend lately; alot of top European players, such as Radulov (NAS), Jagr (NYR), Hudler (DET), Fedorov (WAS), and now Zubov (DAL) have been lured over to this new league.

Remember when European players used to be taken in the 3rd-5th round because no one knew if they'd play in the NHL? Well, those days may soon be returning. Dmitri Kulikov, slated to go as high as 6th in this years draft, fell all the way to 14th because of the turmoil surrounding Russians leaving for the KHL.

I can't really blame older players, like Zubov, who just want to cash out while they can still play, but it's crummy when these young players leave to go over there. Jiri Hudler is a complete idiot, and not only has tarnished his reputation, but may still be "stuck" playing in North America. He filed for arbitration, which shows an intent to play in the NHL next season, but when and signed with the KHL. You can't do that, and looking at the situation, the NHL should win any hearing that takes place.

I've been hoping the Avalanche acquire Nikolai Zherdev, but it's probably not a good idea now that I think about it. He's had off ice issues in the past, and is currently wants more money than his team is willing to pay him. If he becomes a free agent (which will be the case if the Rangers lose the arbitration hearing and decide not to pay Zherdev the awarded amount), I could see him bolting for the KHL as well.

A new signing option appears

2009-07-28T14:27:00.003-06:00

Today Vaclav Prospal was bought out by the Tampa Bay Lightning. Brilliant move - I know.

After scoring 45 points in the first year of a 4 year, 14 million dollar deal, it's highly likely that Prospal will have to settle for 2.5 million or less if he intends to stay in the NHL.

I think, if Tanguay is too rich for managements blood, they should target Prospal. He's a quality LW, and judging by his stats, next year is his "on" year:

2002: 55 pts
2003: 79 pts
2004: 54 pts
2006: 80 pts
2007: 55 pts
2008: 71 pts
2009: 45 pts
2010: ______

The Hatred towards Pierre Lacroix (Part 3)

2009-07-25T23:52:00.021-06:00

Welcome to the final installment of "The Hatred" trilogy of blogs. In this part I'll cover signings he made his last three years, and answer the question at hand.

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2002 Offseason:

No notable UFA signings

Lacroix was never known for his big UFA splashes, and the 2002 offseason is representative of that. A healthy Forsberg for 2003 would be like adding a new player to the team - as it turns out, the best player in the NHL.

2003 Offseason:

Signed UFA's Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne

The signing off these two superstars are the only blockbuster signings in Lacroix's entire tenure as GM. Unfortunately for all of us, they backfired due to injuries. Still, the team was awesome the first 30 games. The first game of the season, a 5-0 shut-out of Chicago, was about as perfect as it gets; Kariya scored the first goal of the season (assisted by Selanne) and added two assists. Sakic had a goal and two assists, Forsberg had three assists, and Aebischer registered a shutout. Good times.

2004 & 2005 Offseason

Vincent Damphousse
Ian Laperriere
Antti Laaksonen
Brett McLean

Andrew Brunette
Patrice Brisebois
Brad May
Pierre Turgeon

With the whole lockout business, it's no surprise at the number of UFA's Lacroix signed. The times had changes, so his signing habits changed too.

Before I cover the trades, it must be pointed out that Lacroix made a horrible move by giving Rob Blake and Joe Sakic huge signing bonuses. Both players made over 6.3 million, a ridiculous figure considering the cap for the 2005-2006 NHL season was only 39 million dollars.

Now on to the actual signings: On a whole, he did a bang up job. Laperriere and McLean both exceeded everyone expectations, especially offensively because they both scored 40+ points. Laperriere was, and still is, a huge fan favorite among Avalanche fans for his character play; you could say he was a great signing. Laaksonen was an okay signing; 34 points is pretty good production for a guy who was on the 3rd or 4th line most nights.

As you'll probably notice, Vincent Damphousse was signed as well, but never played a game for the Avalanche. The reason for this is that he signed at the end of the 2004 season, but opted to retire during the lockout.

Moving on to the signings that took place during the 2005 non-season, Brunette obviously stands out as great value. He signed for peanuts and ended up being the top LW for three seasons. Turgeon was a pretty good signing, too. His shoulder was tore up in the playoffs (and towards the end of the 2007 season), but you can't really fault the guy when he was healthy. 46 points in 62 games is solid production for a guy who had scored only 40 in 76 games the previous season.

I'm sure I'll get some (alot) crap for this next statement, but the Brisebois signing was a good one. Sure, his defense was atrocious at times, but he scored his career high in points (38) with us, and having a guy like him on the 3rd defense pairing (although it was 2nd alot of the time...) was a good thing because he moves the puck well. I also seem to remember our power play being pretty good back then; yeah, I'm not blind enough to think he was the "key" to it all, but having he and Clark on the point for the 2nd pp unit helped (as they combined for 30 pp points).

For a letter grade, I'll give him a B+. Would have been an A- if not for those bonuses.

__________________________________________________________________________

Over the last three blogs I've laid it all on the table, but what does it all mean? Okay, so he traded Drury for Morris. Who cares? The record is what's most important, and his record over the final three seasons as GM was: 125-71-26-24.

That's a good record. In fact, the only teams with a better record in the same span were the Detroit Red Wings, New Jersey Devils, Dallas Stars, Ottawa Senators and Philadelphia Flyers.

Does a good record dating back 3 years ago mean he's qualified to be President and having an active role in player management? Yes, yes, infinitely yes.

Sure, his tight lipped godfather like persona can get a tad annoying at times. But a style of business shouldn't have any weight on the quality of the business man if his business is successful. For 10 years, no one was more successful that Pierre Lacroix.

There are two very common knocks on Pierre Lacroix:

a. His success is from the Lindros trade and acquiring a team that had just gone through a rebuild.

This is a fair statement. Lacroix was given a team with Sakic, Forsberg, Nolan, Deadmarsh, Foote, and more. He had a load of talent to work with.

Lacroix was given the tools, but he made the tool box himself. In other words, he was given a good team and made it into a great team. His trades for Roy, Lemieux, and Ozolinsh reshaped the team, and he did it once more half a decade later by trading for Ray Bourque and Rob Blake.

Not anyone can take a bunch of talent and turn it into a winner. Proof of that is the San Jose Sharks, or the Nashville Predators and Buffalo Sabres a few years ago. Things are a little different in a salary cap world, but back in 1996 the Avalanche weren't exactly rolling around in dough.

b. He sticks withing the organization too much (aka his "inner circle").

True again. I'm not sure he has once hired someone for a managing position outside of the organization.

I disagree that this is con, though. The Colorado Avalanche are a business. In business, you work hard and pay your dues with the hopes of moving up some day. Therefore, Lacroix promotes from within "the Avalanche family". The hiring of GM Giguere back fired badly, but he's had lots of success promoting from within - most obviously coming in the form of Hartley and Crawford, both AHL coaches who led the Avalanche to the Stanley Cup.

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Those are my thoughts on the situation. If you disagree, cool - just remember to tell me why (without insulting my intelligence, please).

Hopefully that wasn't too long of a read, but it's looking like it's quite lengthy at first glance.

The Salary Cap at it's finest

2009-07-25T05:08:00.006-06:00

A little over two weeks ago I posted a blog with my all free agent team. 17 days later, that team hasn't changed much:

Tanguay - Lang - Sykora
Malhotra - Moore - Bertuzzi
Betts - Comrie - Williams
Niedermayer - Peca - Grier

Seidenberg - Schneider
Sydor - Bergeron
Backman - Numminen

Fernandez
Kolzig

The bolded are the changes. I'm not longer 100% sure Zubov will re-sign in Dallas, so I may as well have put him on there.

If I were Avalanche GM, I'd be looking to see how much Alex Tanguay's asking price had dropped. If Biron settled for 1.4 million, it's possible Tanguay may sign somewhere in the 2.5 range. I don't say to bring Tanguay back because he's a former Av, but rather that he's far and away the best free agent left. Plus, last time I checked, Colorado could use a left wing.

And oh yeah, how about signing Blair Betts? Nearly a month has gone by and management, despite my stressing (because they read this blog), hasn't fixed a very affordable problem: a checking line/penalty killing center. Yet, someone decided signing a 4th line fighter was a high priority because they only wasted hours signing Koci.

The Hatred towards Pierre Lacroix (Part 2)

2009-07-23T19:12:00.005-06:00

In part one I talked about Lacroix's trading over his last three seasons. I gave him a C+; almost all of his trades were good, except the big ones (which all backfired).

In part two, we're going to look at his last three drafts. DISCLAIMER: This will be a little different than looking at trades because there weren't hardly (I believe one) any trades in the 2005 non-season, but there was a draft. Also, even though Lacroix was the GM of the 2005-2006 Colorado Avalanche, Francois Giguere took over before the 2006 draft. Thus, we'll be evaluating Lacroix performance at the 2003, 2004, and 2005 NHL Entry drafts. An "X" denotes the player became a bust.

2003:

2 - X
4 - X
5 - X
5 - C Brad Richardson (45 points in 167 career NHL games)
7 - X
7 - X
8 - X
9 - RW David Jones (19 points in 67 career NHL games)

Sweet Maria. One of the deepest drafts of all time, which had a first round including the names Staal, Getzlaf, Richards, Carter, Vanek, and Fleury was also a year Colorado didn't have a 1st round pick. The 2nd round also had loads of talent, which included Loui Eriksson, Patrice Bergeron, and Shea Weber. However, Colorado busted and became one of the only teams (ironically, along with Detroit) not to pick up a star player in this draft.

The only players to become semi-NHLers are Brad Richardson and David Jones. Richardson has since left the organization (to the dismay of many fans, who felt he deserved more ice time), but Jones has remained and is a key part of the future. Jones possesses the size and speed to be a good 3rd line RW, but has potential to be a 2nd line scorer.

All in all, this draft was a massive failure. It was loaded with talent, and the only thing Lacroix nabbed was a (for all intensive purposes) 3rd line RW.

2004:

1 - LW Wojtek Wolski (146 points in 240 career NHL games)
2 - X
3 - LW Denis Parshin (Russia)
5 - X
6 - D Derek Peltier (0 pts in 11 career NHL games)
7 - X
8 - RW Brandon Yip (NCAA)
8 - X
9 - X

Lacroix managed to redeem himself somewhat with a strong 2004 draft in a (for the most part) weak crop. Drafting Wolski with the Avalanche's 1st round pick was a good move. Over half of the 1st round busted, but the Avs nabbed themselves a solid player at #21 (although it would have been nice if Travis Zajac, drafted 20th, would have fallen one more spot).

Dennis Parshin, who is currently in a court battle so he can leave Russia for North America, has top 6 potential and may turn out to be a good sleeper pick by Lacroix. His stock fell because of his small size (5'9").

Derek Peltier got his feet wet last year for the Avalanche, and has an outside chance of becoming a bottom pairing defenseman in the NHL (hey, it's better than being a bust). Brandon Yip was a nice sleeper pick, and you can read my feelings about his potential in the blog I posted yesterday.

We can call 2004 a pretty good draft. Not the best, but not the worst either.

2005:

2 - LW Ryan Stoa (NCAA)
2 - C Paul Stastny (185 points in 195 NHL games)
2 - LW Tom Fritche (AHL)
2 - X
3 - C T.J. Hensick (32 points in 92 career NHL games)
4 - D Ray Macias (1 point in 6 career NHL games)
6 - X
6 - LW Justin Mercier (NCAA)
7 - D Kyle Cumiskey (7 points in 53 career NHL games)

As you can pretty much tell, this was a great draft for the Avalanche. Paul Stastny has established himself as an NHL star, while Hensick and Cumiskey may soon become regulars.

Stoa and Mercier, both who have played in the NCAA the last four years, both look to be bright parts of the Avalanche's future on the left side. Stoa should fill a top 6 role (as early as next season), while Mercier should fill a 3rd line checking role.

Macias, much like Peltier, has an outside chance of becoming a bottom pairing NHL defenseman. Fritche also still has a chance to make something of himself, but needs to stay consistently healthy if he wants to do so.

Overall, the 2005 draft was a major success. Drafting a goalie (like Quick) would have made it better, but beggars can't be choosers.

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Lacroix's all draft team:

Wolski - Stastny - Jones
Stoa - Hensick - Parshin
Mercier - Richardson - Yip
Fritche

Cumiskey - Peltier
Macias

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I'll give Lacroix's drafting a B. He really flubbed up that 2003 draft by trading the 1st round pick away, but made up for it by following with two solid drafts.

There will be a part 3, which will touch on free agent signings and answer the initial question: does Lacroix still have what it takes?

Avalanche sign RW Yip to entry level contract

2009-07-22T18:04:00.004-06:00

Tonight Colorado signed another of it's college prospects, 24 year old Brandon Yip. Yip was one of many of the Avalanche's players to win the NCAA Championship with Boston University last season (along with Cohen, Millan, and Shattenkirk).

Yip has an outside chance to make the team next season, but it is a chance. He's already 24 years old, and we're talking about a team short on forwards who are expected to finish near the bottom of the conference. It's likely Yip will play in the AHL, however.

I'd say Yip's ceiling is a 2nd line RW, but that's a stretch. Most think he's a 4th/3rd line guy, but I think he has the offensive tools to be one of those 20 goal-30 point grinding RW's. Over the last two seasons at BU, Yip compiled 31 goals, 66 points, and 146 penalty minutes in 82 games played.

Islanders sign Biron for 1.4 million!

2009-07-22T16:07:00.005-06:00

Seriously? And I thought the Craig Anderson signing was a deal!

I can't blame the Avs because I'm sure his demands were much higher on July 1st, but it hurts to know that a Biron (1.4)/Budaj (1.2) tandem would have been cheaper and probably more efficient. Or heck, how about a Biron (1.4)/Anderson (1.8) tandem? I don't think anyone would associate Colorado and bad goaltending anymore if that were the case.

And what about the Flyers? They let Biron walk because they thought they couldn't afford him, but it turns out he'll actually make LESS money than the 1.5 million they'll be paying head case Ray Emery this season.

As far as the Isles are concerned, this screams the end for Dipietro. There were some rumors on various message boards that he was seen having trouble walking recently, a sign that he may have had yet another knee surgery. How many players have multiple surgeries and continue their careers? Not many.

The Hatred towards Pierre Lacroix (Part 1)

2009-07-19T23:02:00.011-06:00

This one should be fun. Tonight, I'm going to analyze just what is so wrong with Pierre Lacroix that makes alot of fans hate him. Now that he's openly back in a managerial position, let's see if recent history says he should be there.

There seems to be the conception that Lacroix had lost his touch before stepping down, so lets look at his managing wizardry in his final three seasons as GM (2003-2006). First, the relevant trades:

2003:

Bates Battaglia (Radim Vrbata)
Derek Morris, Jeff Shantz and Dean McAmmond (Chris Drury and Stephane Yelle)
Andrei Nikolishin (4th round pick 2004)
Karlis Skrastins (3rd round pick 2004)

2004:

Keith Ballard (Steve Reinprecht)
Peter Worrell and a 2nd round pick in 2004 (Eric Messier and Vaclav Nedorost)
Steve Konowalchuk and a 3rd round pick in 2004 (Bates Battaglia and Jonas Johansson)
Kurt Sauer and a 4th round pick in 2005 (Martin Skoula)
Tommy Salo and a 6th round pick in 2005 (Tom Gilbert)
Chris Gratton, Ossi Vaananen and a 2nd round pick in 2005 (Derek Morris and Keith Ballard)

2006:

Jose Theodore (David Aebischer)
Jim Dowd (4th round pick in 2006)

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Boy, is that a bad lot of trades. Wow. The smaller ones (like Skrastins for a 3rd) aren't so bad, and in many cases are actually steals. However, those aren't enough to overpower the bad ones: the Gilbert trade, the Drury/Yelle trade, the Morris for Gratton trade, and the Theodore trade.

I'll admit, the there's no defending the Theodore trade. Lacroix took a gamble, and lost. I can defend one trade and put a positive spin on the other two, though:

The Drury for Morris trade at the time was fair. Lacroix saw something in Morris, and it paid off at first: he scored 11 goals and 48 points in his first season with Colorado. However, Jacques Cloutier had his usual effect on defensemen and Morris has since become a 2nd pairing guy who's bounced around the league (Phoenix - New York - UFA).

The Gilbert trade looks real bad right now. Luckily, there's a chance it may pay off in the near future because the 6th round pick was used to draft Miami University standout Justin Mercier, a player who will hopefully crack the Avalanche line-up in the near future. Just something to think about if he ends up being a great checking line player for us.

The Gratton/Morris trade has a similar result as the Gilbert trade, except this time in the form of Paul Stastny. Basically, Lacroix redeemed himself (and then some) but drafting Stastny after essentially trading Chris Drury for Chris Gratton. So all in all, this was a good trade. Unless of course you'd rather have Chris Drury at 7 million a year, or Ballard and Morris instead of Stastny. It can be argued that the Avalanche would have drafted Stastny anyway, but the fact remains the pick came from this trade.

All in all, let's give his trading a C+. Yes, there were some huge blunders, but the majority of trades benefited the team.

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Part 2 will cover Lacroix's drafting over the 2003-2006 drafts.

Avs Trade Nigel Williams to Rangers

2009-07-16T17:48:00.003-06:00

for Brian Fahey.

Colorado just traded stand out defensive prospect Nigel Williams to the Rangers for a near 30 year old career AHL defenseman.

This is a horrible, horrible, horrible trade by Colorado. Even if Williams demanded a trade, he should have been packaged with another defenseman in an upcoming trade where we trade one (which will happen).

Not this. I'd rather have gotten nothing; that's how useless Fahey is.

Avs Ink Duchene

2009-07-16T13:17:00.003-06:00

3.2 million cap hit per year (according to the Denver Post, but 3.4 accoring to nhlnumbers.com). Hedman and Tavares both have a cap hit of 3.75 million, which is interesting because Duchene easily could have gone 1st overall, but because he went 3rd has a salary involving less bonuses.

Hopefully Duchene plays the full 82, and isn't sent back to Brampton.

Lacroix opens up about plans/My thoughts on the goalie situation

2009-07-13T00:50:00.004-06:00

Shockingly, Pierre Lacroix opened up about everything in a recent Woody Paige article. The only problem with the article is the part where Paige compared LW Ryan Stoa to former Avalanche defenseman Uwe Krupp.

Other than that, the article is great. Lacroix blames himself for the situation the team is in, and reveals he plans to rebuild the team the same way he did before: two top centers (hello, Stastny and Duchene...hopefully) and a top goalie. Obviously, Colorado doesn't have a top goalie, but Lacroix seems to have faith in Anderson and two unnamed goalies (assumed to be Kieran Millan, 19, and Trevor Cann, 20).

Personally, I think Lacroix has the right idea. Where Colorado will get the goalie, I don't know. Could it be Anderson? I'm not going to bet on it, but I don't think it's all that much of a long shot either. The skill is there, but it needs to be translated over 55-60 games.

Of the other two young goalies, both have shown some promise. I tend to think Millan is the product of the team around him, but he still went 29-2-3. You have to be good to do that. Cann, on the other hand, has gotten a bad wrap for his inconsistent play (and subsequent benching) during the 3rd round of the OHL playoffs last year (though, it's rumored he had the flu). Other than that series, he stood on his head, going 30-10-1 in the regular season (with London) and going 9-4 (9-1-3) in the playoffs last season.

Also, it needs to be noted the previous starter in London, 3rd round draft pick of the Columbus Blue Jackets Steve Mason. Hopefully Colorado will get a lucky repeat with Cann, but I'm not holding my breath.

Pierre Lacroix Story

2009-07-09T21:51:00.003-06:00

Made my day. More proof of Joe Sakic's great character.

You can watch it, along with the rest of the ceremony here if you want to re-watch it:

http://avalanche.nhl.tv/team/console.jsp?

Many quality UFA's still avaliable

2009-07-08T23:34:00.006-06:00

As of early morning July 9th, here's my All UFA team of the remaining players without contracts:

Tanguay - Lang - Sykora
Malhotra - Moore - Bertuzzi
Betts - Comrie - Williams
Niedermayer - Peca - Grier

Seidenberg - Schneider
Mara - Morris
Backman - Alberts

Biron
Fernandez

Other notables: Bonk, Satan, Afinogenov, Kotalik; M.A. Bergeron, Sydor; Legace, Kolzig.

I left off Sundin because he's expected to retire. Zubov is expected to re-sign with Dallas.

I'm sure I forgot someone big. Regardless, still a strong crop of players left. It's my hope that Colorado targets one of Malhotra or Betts to be the 3rd line shutdown center next season.

Sayonara, Joe Sakic

2009-07-07T20:26:00.005-06:00

You know you're getting old when you get to the point in your life when it's time for Joe Sakic to retire.

The truth is that he should have retired last summer. It would have been perfect if the Sakic-Forsberg-Foote combination could have carried Lord Stanley one last time, but injuries erased any chance of that. Instead, Sakic's last game was a meaningless 2-1 loss to the Phoenix Coyotes, a game in which Sakic's total ice time was only 28 seconds because he was forced to leave due to back problems.

Sakic left no stone unturned in his career. His accolades include:

- A Hart Trophy as league MVP (2001)

- A Conn Smythe Trophy as MVP of the playoffs (1996)

- 625 goals (14th all-time), 1016 assists (11th all-time), and 1641 points (8th all-time) in 1378 games (35th all-time)

- 84 playoff goals (7th all-time) and 188 playoff points (7th all-time)

- 8 playoff overtime goals (an NHL record)

- NHL All-Star Game MVP (2004)

- An Olympic Gold Medal (2002)

- Olympic MVP honors (2002)

- Two Stanley Cup Championships (1996, 2001)

One of my favorite Joe Sakic memories is when he handed the Cup off to Ray Bourque. It's the best Stanley Cup presentation moment in NHL history, and it took place because of the character of Joe Sakic.

The presser to announce the retirement is Thursday. Knowing humble Joe, I doubt it'll do his career any sort of justice.

Joe Sakic set to retire

2009-07-07T15:03:00.002-06:00

Multiple sources are reporting this. Denver post originally reported he was just going to announce his decision, but changed their story to say he's going to announce his retirement.

More later.

Avs sign 6, Nucks sign Raycroft, Preissing

2009-07-06T12:50:00.008-06:00

The Avalanche have agreed to terms with forwards David Jones, Brian Willsie, Chris Durno, Matt Hendricks, Darren Haydar (new!), and goaltender Tyler Weiman.

Of the 6, the only player who likely has a 1-way contract is Jones. Last season, Jones was on pace for a 16 goal year (having scored 8 in 40). He had started to pick things up, too; after scoring only 1 goal in the first 18 games of the season, he scored 7 in the next 22 games. I have high hopes for him this season, and believe he can produce an 18-20 goal year.

Lake Erie should get a boost with the addition of Darren Haydar. Haydar, 29, has consistently been the AHL's top forward the last four years (scoring 92, 122, 58, and 80 points, respectively). In his only decent NHL stint (16 games for Atlanta in 2008), Haydar scored 8 points (1+7). I'd be surprised if he doesn't get a chance with the Avalanche this year considering the group of forwards currently on the roster.

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Apparently, the Vancouver Canucks have signed Andrew Raycroft. Good luck to 'Rayzor' as Luongo's back-up. He may not have been great here, but I think he was better than most people gave him credit for.

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Tom Preissing will have a good season next year. That's my bold prediction. Alot of fans (who've no doubt never watched him play) are ripping the crap out of this guy for his play last year.

Well, his play last year was not bad. The reason he only played 22 games was due to illness and feuding with the coaching staff. When he was in the line-up consistently at the beginning of the season, despite only averaging 16:44 in ice time (7th among Kings defensemen), he was their best puck mover. Preissing's 3 goals came in the first 9 games of the season, and the mystery remains what happened between he and Terry Murray to make him a regular scratch. I'm doubting it was his defensive play, seeing as his -7 is excellent compared to Johnson's -18, Doughty's -17, Harrold's -13, and Gauthier's -11.

So, assuming he has a clean bill of health, I expect him to be a top 4 defenseman next year. His puck moving ability and right handed slap shot from the point should help two of the teams biggest problems from last year: the power play and transition game.

What the rest of the offseason should look like for Colorado

2009-07-04T12:30:00.009-06:00

Now that the dust has settled from the Smyth trade, it looks as though Colorado needs to make more trades.

As said in yesterdays blog, one defender is going to be traded. In all likelihood, it's going to be Scott Hannan because he makes the most salary and the team is in cost-cutting mode. A possible suitor could be the Tampa Bay Lightning because they have the cap space and need defense (signing Ohlund and Walker doesn't fix the league's worst defense).

In return, a affordable forward must be sent to Colorado. The Avalanche still need a checking line center (which I continue to become less optimistic about them getting as the days pass) and at least another top 6 forward (which may come in the form of Sakic and/or Duchene). If Sakic and/or Duchene do end up playing this season, Wolski would probably return to LW. But if they don't, Colorado is in some serious LW trouble as the depth chart looks like this:

McLeod (1.033)
Tucker (2.25)
Koci (0.525)

Stoa plays LW, but there's no certainty he'll make the team. Even if he does, he won't be able to cover up the crappiness of the left side by himself.

---

To bullet point everything:

- Sign a checking line center. This is a must; even though the team is in "retooling" mode, improving the penalty kill would make the Avalanche a much better team. The best remaining free agent options are Blair Betts, Manny Malhotra, and Eric Perrin. Betts would fill this role best, seeing as the Rangers penalty kill was #1 in the NHL, and he led the team in shorthanded ice time.

- Move a high salary defenseman not named John Michael Liles. I wish Brett Clark were the defenseman being traded because he's the most overpaid, but he's too much of an unknown for that to happen. I don't expect Foote to be traded, either, as he'll likely finish out his career (this season) as a member of the Colorado Avalanche.

- Sign or acquire at least one top 6 forward. This may be Sakic, Duchene, or an affordable UFA (which includes Tanguay, Kotalik, and Sykora). Trading for or signing an RFA another team may have trouble signing (cough, Versteeg, cough) should be considered as well.

Avs trade Smyth

2009-07-04T00:30:00.002-06:00

Let's break down the trade:

LA gets: LW Ryan Smyth (6.250 @ 3 years)
Age: 33, 08-09: 77GP: 26 G - 33 A = 59 pts, -15

Colorado gets: D Kyle Quincey (0.525 @ 1 year)
Age: 23, 08-09: 72GP: 4 G - 34 A = 38 pts, -5

D Tom Preissing (2.75 @ 2 years)
Age: 30, 08-09: 22GP: 3 G - 4 A = 7 pts, -7

5th round pick

-----

Obviously, it looks like the Avalanche have embraced the rebuild by adding a 23 year old defenseman who's a great power play anchor (27 PP points last year). Tom Preissing was just a throw in, but hopefully he can re-discover his game in Colorado. It's tough to see Smyth go, but the return was good and Smyth's contract was slightly bloated.

After this deal, the Avalanche save 2.975 in cap space (have 45.471 committed), and now currently have 18 players under contract for next season:

Stastny (6.60)
Hejduk (3.90)
Wolski (2.80)
Tucker (2.250)
Svatos (2.050)
McLeod (1.033)
Hensick (0.850)
Stewart (0.850)
Koci (0.575)

Hannan (4.50)
Liles (4.20)
Clark (3.50)
Salei (3.050)
Foote (3.00)
Preissing (2.750)
Quincey (0.525)

Anderson (1.812)
Budaj (1.250)

Expect Hannan, Salei, or Clark to be shipped out soon for a forward. There's no way Colorado goes into next season with 21.5 million dollars committed to 7 defenseman (not even counting the soon to be signed Kyle Cumiskey).

Now that things have quieted down for a bit...

2009-07-01T18:04:00.004-06:00

Let's review what the Avalanche's signings:

- G Craig Anderson, 2 years @ 1.812 million per season. I still think Biron would have been the better choice, but there's no arguing with the price of 1.8 million. It's dirt; even if he bombs as a starter, his cap hit is so small that he can easily be afforded as the back-up in 2010-2011. He sounds happy to be joining the organization, and hopefully he can backstop this team into the playoffs. Apparently Ty Conklin was waiting for an Avalanche phone call that never came, and am I glad it didn't.

- LW/D David Koci, 1 year @ 575k. This is just a throw away signing. I'm sure Koci will be in and out of the line-up all season, but when he's in the line-up should provide some fighting (notice I didn't say toughness). God help us if he ever has to play defense.

---

Other relevant signings:

- G Nikolai Khabibulin, 4 years @ 3.75 per season with the Edmonton Oilers. So wait, you're telling me the starting goaltenders in the division are Khabibulin, Luongo, Backstrom, Kipprusoff, and....Craig Anderson? Yikes! Anderson better translate that high SV% over 60 games next season, or I have a feeling the Avalanche's northwest division record isn't going to be so good.

---

That's all for now, more soon.

Avs sign Craig Anderson

2009-07-01T11:53:00.001-06:00

2 years, 1.8 per season

More later.

Bad News! (UPDATE)

2009-06-30T20:57:00.003-06:00

Bad news all around in what appears to be my second blog of the night:

- First, the Flames signed Jay-Bo. Yeah, it was a given at this point, but still disheartening.

- The previous tid bit was followed up by news that Danny Heatley is on the verge of being traded to the Edmonton Oilers in exchange for Andrew Cogliano, Dustin Penner and Ladislav Smid. Wait, so now you're telling me Bouwmeester AND Heatley are being added to the division? Have mercy, the Avalanche would have had a tough enough time without those two.

- Moments ago, Adrian Dater posted a blog saying the Avs may try to get their salary as low as 43 million dollars and hinted at the names Smyth, Clark, Liles, Salei, Tucker, Hannan, and Foote all on the chopping block. Unless AD has been misinformed (a strong possibility), we may see Colorado to do nothing substantial tomorrow (i.e. no upgrade in goal).

All we can do now is wait.

UPDATE: Apparently Heatley wouldn't have his no-trade clause to go to Edmonton, and the deal is dead. Who can blame him for not wanting to go to Edmonton? (I kid, I kid)

Final Thoughts and Rumors before July 1st

2009-06-30T17:18:00.009-06:00

I know it says "Final Thoughts", but I'll post more tonight if something major happens. Any who, here are a collaboration of my thoughts and predictions about what will happen tomorrow:

- Tyler Arnason, Ben Guite, Ian Laperriere, and Andrew Raycroft will not be offered contracts, the Denver Post reports. I think Guite should have been retained, but I won't lose sleep over it. As for the other three, nothing too shocking.

- Colorado needs to sign at least one center tomorrow; even more so now that Guite is no longer a part of the team. Another checking line option is Marcel Goc; TSN reports he didn't receive a qualifying offer from the Sharks, and will hit the free agent market. Goc, a former 1st round draft pick of the Sharks, has almost no offensive upside (11 points in 55 games), but is great defensively and sported a 58.2 faceoff percentage this year. And if you think faceoffs don't matter all that much, consider this: the top two faceoff teams in the league last season were Detroit (55.1%) and San Jose (53.8%). The bottom two were Phoenix (44.8%) and the New York Islanders (45.7%). Colorado was not far behind with the fourth worst faceoff winning percentage (47.8) in the NHL (tied with Dallas).

- Jonas "The Monster" Gustavsson won't make his decision until after tomorrow, TSN reports. At this point, scratch Colorado off his list. Aside from Edmonton, there are no other NHL teams with vacant goalie spots; yet, there are at least 5 free agent goalies (Khabibulin, Roloson, Biron, Anderson, Conklin) looking to be NHL starters somewhere. 5 =/= 2. Hopefully the competition between the goalies will lead to pay deduction.

- In other goalie news, the Edmonton Journal reports Marty Biron and Dwayne Roloson, both players who share the same agent, will be lobbying for the starting job in Colorado tomorrow. As long as the Avs don't sign Ty Conklin or Manny Legace as the starter, I should be fine.

- David Jones and Kyle Cumiskey were offered qualifying offers by the Avs. No mention of Michael Vernace, which is unsettling.

- For those of you living in a cave, Scott Gomez (+ prospects Pyatt and Busto) was traded to the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for Chris Higgins and Doug Janik (+ prospects Valentenko and McDonagh). Habs needed a center, but this is a bad deal. Not only do they pick up Gomez's horrid contract, but they give up the best prospect (Ryan McDonagh) in the deal. Now that the Rangers have some free cap space, expect them to sign some more players to horrible contracts (or trade for Heatley).

- I don't think Colorado will be able to sign a top 6 forward this summer based on lack of money, and the strong possibility that Duchene and/or Sakic will be on the roster this fall. That said, don't be surprised to see Colorado sign Chris Neil. Just a hunch; let's all hope I'm wrong. I know it makes no sense to sign a RW, but how much sense did it make to sign Darcy Tucker last year?

Avs Re-Sign Budaj (1 year, 1.25 million)

2009-06-29T21:04:00.007-06:00

The title says it all...except my dismay. Budaj is a great back-up and spot starter. But for a team strapped for cash (cap space) like Colorado, paying back-up goaltenders 1.25 million is not logical. Also, why did he get a raise (800K last season) after posting a 2.86 GAA and 0.899 SV% (both numbers the worst of his career)?

By my calculations, Colorado has 46.058 million committed to 15 players next year:

Stastny (6.60)
Smyth (6.250)
Hejduk (3.90)
Wolski (2.80)
Tucker (2.25)
Svatos (2.050)
McLeod (1.033)
Hensick (0.850)
Stewart (0.850)

Hannan (4.50)
Liles (4.20)
Clark (3.50)
Salei (3.025)
Foote (3.00)

Budaj (1.25)

With a salary cap of 56.8 million next season, that only leaves 10.8 million to spend on 5 players (3 forwards, 1 defenseman, 1 goalie). And that's assuming there are no healthy scratches (which there will be). In addition, you'll notice that list doesn't include David Jones (who was offered a qualifying offer), Matt Duchene (who's cap hit with bonuses will surely be over 2.5 million), and Joe Sakic (who I doubt will play for under 4 million dollars...assuming he doesn't retire).

This, folks, is a sign of bad management. I like the idea of keeping Budaj as a back-up, but unless Tucker is bought out (only one day left) or some other salary is moved, it's going to be quite hard to sign quality free agents. Such as a starting goalie. After this signing, it looks as though Colorado might go the Ty Conklin route: having another bargain goaltender and Budaj battle it out for the starting job.

Again.

Gustavsson DOESN'T turn down Avs...yet

2009-06-28T13:07:00.006-06:00

About the Gustavsson/Aftonbladet report: I just connected with my good pal, the Swedish journalist Anders Ronmark, and he just had a phone conversation with Gustavsson. Here’s Jonas’ words, concerning the report that Colorado is off his list:
“I’m reading the paper right now, and I don’t know where they
got that from. I did an interview with Aftonbladet just the other day and
I told them that all four clubs were still on my list. That’s still true
today” said Gustavsson. “Colorado is still an interesting option for me,
and I can’t say I’ve gotten any closer to a decision. Denver seems like a
really nice city and it’s a club with great people and a strong tradition,
but all four clubs made strong presentations.”

Gustavsson TURNS DOWN Colorado/Budaj Update

2009-06-28T02:18:00.004-06:00

"Now Jonas Gustavsson tentatively decided to reject Colorado, allegedly from (?) Sportbladet. The reason for Gustavsson saying no thank you to Colorado is that his gut was not really there when he visited Denver, and that much is uncertain in Colorado right now with the new management."

Well, that's that. Screw it, I'll just repost the Biron picture, seeing as he's Colorado's only hope now.

---

Also, it appears Budaj may be brought back. Luckily, he should be getting paid back-up money again (850K), and is a very serviceable back-up.

Draft Analysis, more UFA thoughts/rumors.

2009-06-27T21:34:00.004-06:00

The draft is all said and done, and I think the Avalanche did themselves well. Based on Bob McKenzie's draft prediction (in which he got an amazing 27/30 of the 1st round picks right), Ryan O'Reilly was ranked 26th (Avs took him 33rd) and Stephan Elliot was ranked 35th (Avs took him 49th), so first indications appear the Avs were able to draft some players who may be better than their draft overall makes them out to be.

I'm iffy on the 5th round choice, Boston University goalie Kieran Millan. His stats are amazing - 29-2-3, 1.94 GAA, .921 SV% - but he was playing with a great team in front of him. He was very shaky towards the end of the tournament, and nearly cost BU the championship in the final against Miami. Also, he was drafted before Olivier Roy, a goalie considered by many to be one of the top 5 in this draft. In the end, I'll come back to this point - Millan won those games, regardless of everything else. Also, he's only 19 and still has time to improve off of his tremendous rookie season last year.

---

In other goalie news, rumors has it Marty Biron has made Colorado his first option as a team he'd like to sign with this summer. Not earth shattering news, seeing as the only two teams with no goalie are Colorado and Edmonton.

With the Gustavsson front quiet, it's looking like Biron is the best available option. He's the only UFA goalie who's won 29+ games in each of the last two seasons, and also the only goalie who's started 50 games or more to have posted a .915+ SV% in each of the last two seasons.

Anderson is still a pretty good option, but I'm lobbying for Biron at this point (again, if we don't sign 'The Monster').

Avs draft Matt Duchene

2009-06-26T19:14:00.003-06:00

It's official: Colorado has drafted Matt Duchene with the 3rd overall pick. Barring a trade, Colorado doesn't draft until tomorrow at #33.

Pittsburgh Wins!/ Avs Thoughts

2009-06-12T20:57:00.004-06:00

This is not what I wanted to happen for many reasons, but I can be happy that older players like Gonchar and Satan finally won the cup after narrow misses earlier in their careers. Hossa and Conklin look like dopes right now, but at least Conklin can say he couldn't do much more.

---

To shift to other NHL news, the Flyers announced they have signed Ray Emery (and possibly Robert Esche soon). Obviously, the Flyers felt they didn't have the cap space to sign Biron to the 3.5+ million he'll want, so they signed Emery to a cap friendly 1.5 million. Honestly, this is a good move; Emery's off ice troubles came as a result of playing in a hockey hungry Canada. In Philadelphia, it will be more lax, and Emery's off ice misfortunes should be overshadowed by whichever Flyers player is being suspended on a given week. It's a match made in heaven in my opinion.

Now, with Biron heading for the free agent market, I'd predict the Avs are one of the teams he may sign with. The only teams in the league with big holes in net are Colorado and Edmonton (and Washington, but they're screwed), so I suspect they'll be in the running for his services.

That is, if the Avs fail to sign highly coveted free agent goalie Jonas Gustavsson. In a radio interview, Gustavsson's agent said he'll be visiting San Jose, Colorado, Dallas, and Toronto next week. Each team offers up a different intangible:

- Colorado has a huge vacancy in net. If he signs there, he'll be the starter no questions asked (partially due to cap constraints).

- Toronto just signed a great goalie coach in Francois Allaire, a person Gustavsson has worked with before. Notice I didn't say great history; the Leafs haven't even made the Stanley Cup finals post expansion, so that franchise doesn't scream "win" to me.

- San Jose offers a strong supporting cast and one of the best defenses in the league.

- Dallas offers an good environment where highly coveted Swedish forward Fabian Brunnstrom had a good rookie season this season (still this season until midnight!).

Where he goes, no one knows. My next blog will be the day of his signing, barring some huge news.

Sacco Coach, Sherman GM =)

2009-06-04T14:55:00.003-06:00

What can I say other than "haven't we seen this before?" The Avs hired another accountant as GM and unproven coach for the second time in recent history.

I'm not going to put any negative comments in this blog (aside from that last paragraph). Let's look at the positives of these hirings, partially because I'm too pessimistic, and also because listing the negatives would take too long:

- We've got a new GM. Perhaps he has fresh ideas about how this team should be built.

- Granato and Cloutier are GONE. No more giving Clark 22+ minutes a game (Granato), and no more destroying our defensive prospects/softening our physical defensemen. (Cloutier).

- The defensemen who were called up last year looked more competent than some of our regulars. This is relevant because Joe Sacco was the coach of Colorado's AHL affiliate last season.

Well, I knew this was going to be a short one when I started it. If the names Sacco and Sherman were replaced by Laviolette and Feaster, I'd be feeling pretty optimistic right now. But I'm not, so it looks like we'll have to rely on the "Shermanator" to save this team.

I'll be back.

(with another blog at some point)

Offseason Needs (Part 5)

2009-06-01T00:30:00.015-06:00

Welcome to Offseason Needs part 5. Not sure if there will be a part 6 at some point, but for now we'll say this is the last part.

GOALTENDING

As you can see, I saved the most important part for last. I did a blog like this before, but things have changed a bit (Gustavsson factor).

The Avalanche need a goaltender like Tampa Bay needs a new GM. Not getting a legit starter very soon is just not an option. And the bad news is the free agent market doesn't provide any proven goalies.

Right now, the hot commodity is Swedish prospect Jonas Gustavsson. He's fresh off backstopping Farjestads to a Championship in the Swedish Elite League, and now is NHL bound. The teams interested are Dallas, San Jose, Toronto, and Colorado. Frankly, I like the Avs chances considering all of the other teams have a goalie making big bucks next season (Turco, Nabokov, Toskala).

I also think he's the best available option because the only season in risk is the next season. Because Gustavsson is 24, he's one year too young to get anything more than the rookie maximum. Thus, he'll only be signing a one year (3.7 million with bonuses) contract with whoever he signs with, that way he can cash out next summer. Thus, if he shows he's not an NHL caliber goalie, the only season down the toilet is 2009-2010.

The positive side of signing him is he has franchise potential. Nothing he's done shows he's not capable of thriving in the NHL, and whichever team signs this guy may be getting a goalie who will be a mainstay with their team for years to come.

If Gustavsson opts to sign elsewhere than Colorado, the next best option is probably Florida back-up goalie Craig Anderson. He was third in the NHL in save percentage, but he played 20 games less than both goalies who were ahead of him (Tim Thomas and teammate Thomas Vokoun). The positives with Anderson is he has had a very high SV% the last three seasons, is relatively young (28), and will probably be affordable (I estimate Anderson receiving a 2.5 million a year deal).

The negatives with Anderson is at age 28 he's never even started 30 games in a season, has no playoff experience, and will likely receive a 2-3 year deal. So, wouldn't adding Anderson be just another gap stop instead of finding Colorado a real starting goalie? Possibly, and not much can be done about it. Biron is likely to re-sign with the Flyers, Roloson and Khabibulin are too old (39,36), Harding is unlikely to be traded to a division rival, and even if Lehtonen isn't re-signed by Atlanta (which I suspect he will be), I don't see him coming to Colorado.

Scott Clemmensen and Ty Conklin remain options which we'll classify in the category of "Better than Peter Budaj". Both goalies had 25 wins this year, but both played for great defensive teams; possibly the two best in the league. Also, both are in their 30's and haven't accomplished squat prior to this season.

Still, both are better than Budaj, and neither will make more than 2 million dollars next season (assuming they opt for free agency). If I had to choose one, I'd say Clemmensen because he was playing great hockey all season until Brodeur came back. With Conklin, it was more of a case of him being put in every other game and being adequate enough for Detroit to get the win.

On the back-up front, the Avs need to conserve money. Re-signing Weiman and Bacashihua (to 2-way contracts) and making one of them the back up would be a good option. Both were solid in the AHL this season, and neither will receive a contract more than 550K. Also, it would create competition for the back-up spot in training camp between these two and recently signed Trevor Cann. Marc Denis and Kevin Weekes would both be decent back-up options, too.

---

After 5 long blogs, we've come to this point: the final team (with cap hits).

Smyth (6.25) - Stastny (6.60) - Hejduk (3.90)
********(See Part 4)******** - Stewart (0.850)
Stoa (0.850) - Reasoner (1.50*) - Jones (0.900*)
McLeod (1.00*) - Guite (0.600*) - Yip (0.850)
(30.6, 30.0)

Liles (4.20) - Hannan (4.50)
Salei (3.025) - Foote (3.00)
Clark (3.50) - Cumiskey (0.850*)
(19.075)

Gustavsson (3.70*)/Anderson (2.50*)
Weiman (0.550*)
(4.25, 3.05)

Scratches: Tucker (2.25)
TRADE: Svatos (2.050)

Assuming Colorado signs Gustavsson + Sakic/Tanguay: 56.175 million
Assuming Colorado signs Gustavsson + Duchene: 55.575 million
Assuming Colorado signs Anderson + Tanguay/Sakic: 54.975 million
Assuming Colorado signs Anderson + Duchene: 54.375 million

Notes:

- Svatos needs to be traded. With this team in cap hell, and Tucker being untradable, Svatos HAS to go. A 2nd or 3rd round pick on draft day would be preferable.

- You'll notice T.J. Hensick isn't on the roster. There's a reason for that: he sucks. He's only useful in a top 6 role, and he's not good enough to deserve one. Start him off with Lake Erie (yet again) and hope he gets his act together.

- I know the Gustavsson + Sakic/Tanguay option looks very tight against the cap, but at this point who cares? You can't not sign Gustavsson because one year of cap problems, and you also can't go into another season without changing your top 6 forwards around following a year in which your team was the 30th ranked offense. It's better to have a little cap trouble for one year than it is to knowingly going into a season with a horrible team.

Final Thoughts: I know it's nice to have those numbers "all pretty and nice", but the fact of the matter is I think I've just proven that some very minor changes (checking line center, goalie better than Peter Budaj) can drastically make this team a hell of alot better than it was in 2008-2009. I'm nothing more than a blogger, but I can guarantee you whoever is hired as Avalanche GM will not have the sense to sign a guy like Reasoner, and will instead opt to go with someone useless like Kyle Calder.

God, do I hope I'm wrong. Maybe it's just bad memories of Giguere fresh in my mind, but I don't have a heck of alot of confidence in this clubs management right now. Hopefully in the future we can look back at this blog and see how wrong I was.

Fin.

Offseason Needs (Part 4)

2009-05-31T14:01:00.003-06:00

Welcome back for Offseason needs part 4.

SCORING FORWARDS

The 2008-2009 version of the Colorado Avalanche finished dead last in scoring in the NHL with 190 goals, 8 less than the New York Islanders. Most of this can be attributed to injuries; with Stastny, Smyth, and Sakic shut down for the year, the Avs were shut out 4 times in their final 7 games.

So right away, the goal should be to stay healthy. Whether that means getting a new medical staff, or reducing Paul Stastny's penalty kill time (so he isn't out there blocking slap shots with his forearm), something must be done. No team has had the key injuries Colorado has had the last two seasons, and that has to change for this team to be competitive.

When dealing with scoring forwards, there are alot of questions we must ask. Will Joe Sakic return? Will Matt Duchene play in the NHL (if Colorado drafts him)? Should Wojtek Wolski play center?

To counter this, I'm going to make three versions of the Avs top two lines (again, lines fluctuate).

LINES 1

Smyth (6.25) - Stastny (6.60) - Hejduk (3.90)
Tanguay (4.50*) - Wolski (2.80) - Stewart (0.850)/Svatos (2.050)

This line combination is assuming Sakic retires and Duchene either isn't drafted by Colorado or stays in the OHL. They key addition here is Tanguay, who I think could realistically sign for 4.5 million. And honestly, it wouldn't surprise me if it happened, especially if Lacroix is still running the show on July 1st.

Also, I'm not a fan of Svatos at all. He's bound to get hurt again and is too streaky. I think it would be in the Avs best interest to try to trade him for a 2nd round pick at this years NHL Entry draft.

This first top 6 forward collaboration would put the Avs at 51.275 million, still working with the number we established in Offseason Needs 3.

LINES 2

Smyth (6.25) - Stastny (6.60) - Hejduk (3.90)
Wolski (2.80) - Sakic (4.50*) - Stewart (0.850)/Svatos (2.050)

Basically, flip Tanguay out for Sakic. Same cap hit as with LINES 1.

I know alot of Avalanche fans would like to see Wolski stay at center, but let's face it: he scores more playing LW with Sakic;

2006-2007: 22 G, 55 pts
2007-2008 playoffs: 2 G, 5 pts in 7 GP

2007-2008: 18 G, 48 pts (didn't play much with Sakic due to Sakic's injury)
2008-2009: 14 G, 42 pts (centering Smyth and Hejduk, two solid 1st line wingers)

LINES 3

Smyth (6.25) - Stastny (6.60) - Hejduk (3.90)
Wolski (2.80) - Duchene (3.90*) - Stewart (0.850)/Svatos (2.050)

Basically, all three of these combinations are just flipping centers around. Duchene's cap hit should be somewhere around 3.7-3.9 million, so for the sake of this blog let's expect the worst.

I honestly don't believe Duchene will play in the NHL if Sakic returns for another season, so I'm not going to deal with that scenario. The cap hit in this scenario would be 50.675 million.

Stay tuned for the 5th and final part, which will deal with (drum roll) goalies.

Offseason Needs (Part 3)

2009-05-29T21:10:00.006-06:00

Welcome back to part 3 of the Avs offseason needs going into this summer.

DEFENSE

With Hannan, Liles, Foote, Clark, and Salei all signed next year for a combined (atrocious) 18.225 million, the Avs have little need to sign someone else. So, future GM of the Avalanche, I implore you: don't sign Daniel Tjarnqvist v.2. Please. No Jassen Cullimore, no Cory Murphy, no Josef Melichar. Signing a 6/7 defenseman is POINTLESS.

Kyle Cumiskey's development has been seriously hindered because he was stuck in the press box watching Daniel Tjarnqvist play last year. There's no point in singing a washed up bum to take time away from the young guys. I'm so adamant about this because I'm pretty sure the July 1st free agent signing ticker is going to say something like "Avalanche sign D Brett Hedican".

Kyle Cumiskey has been playing in the NHL since January 2007; give the kid a chance to prove he can stay in the line-up for once. Mike Vernace averaged 20 minutes a game last season, and he didn't even get any power play time. More importantly, he looked like he belonged; and that was when he was given top minutes. I see no reason why he can't be a #6 defenseman next year. Derek Peltier, while not a top choice, is good enough to play on the bottom pair if this team is ravaged with defensive injuries next season.

The Avs have two other guys who may be ready to make the NHL jump, too. The first is Nigel Williams, the Avs most promising defenseman currently playing in the AHL. He's big, skates well, and has a good shot. His game isn't polished yet, but I'd be surprised if we didn't see him given some NHL time next season.

The next player is Cameron Gaunce. This kid was drafted last year and already has himself an NHL contract after winning OHL defenseman of the year. Playing for Mississauga in the OHL, Gaunce racked up 64 points in 67 games, along with 10 points in 11 playoff games. If he gets cut in training camp, he'll be sent back to the OHL. There's also an outside (VERY outside) chance top defensive prospect Kevin Shattenkirk will be signed. If he's signed, then he's a lock to make the team.

What the defense should look like next year:

Liles (4.20) - Hannan (4.50)
Salei (3.025) - Foote (3.00)
Clark (3.50) - Cumiskey/Gaunce (0.850*)

I recommend keeping only 6 defenseman called up because keeping Vernace/Peltier in the press box does no good for them. I know it's "safe" to keep 7 defensemen with the big club, but it's not worth an additional 850K for a washed up gap stop (see above).

*estimated

This scenario would make "our" cap hit at 46.775 on 16 players.

Part 4 coming soon.

Offseason Needs (Part 2)

2009-05-29T15:39:00.007-06:00

Welcome to part 2 of the Avs offseason needs going into this summer.

CHECKING LINE FORWARDS:

Sad to say, the Avs haven't had a real shutdown center since Chris Gratton left...in 2004. This area NEEDS to be addressed. If Colorado goes into next season with a "checking line" of Tucker - Hensick - Svatos, this team will almost certainly miss the playoffs again. Having a shutdown line is THAT important.

POSSIBLE CHECKING LINE PLAYERS:

Free Agent Market: (2008 salaries noted)

Todd Marchant (2.5118)
Rob Niedermayer (2.00)
Marty Reasoner (1.00)
Eric Perrin (0.750)
Stephane Yelle (0.750)
Radek Bonk (1.475)
Travis Moen (0.912)
Mike Grier (1.775)
Radek Dvorak (1.550)

Within the Organization:

Ben Guite (0.475)[UFA]
David Jones (0.522) [RFA]
Ian Laperriere (1.150) [UFA]
Cody McLeod (0.522) [RFA]
Justin Mercier (TBD)
Ryan Stoa (0.850)
Darcy Tucker (2.250)
Brandon Yip (Unknown)

I'd say Colorado needs to sign at least one of the players from the "Free Agent" list, and definitely re-sign both Guite and Jones from the "Organization" list. If I were GM (which I'm not...yet), I would make my bottom two lines look like this:

Stoa (0.850) - Reasoner (1.50*) - Jones (0.900*)
McLeod (1.00) - Guite (0.600*) - Yip (0.850)/Tucker (2.250)

*estimated

I know lines fluctuate, but you get the point. There's no reason for Guite not to return as the 4th line center; he was actually a + player last year, so he deserves to be there. I also think putting Jones on the 3rd line is a smart move; he's the quickest player on the team and hits hard. He'd also add a dimension of scoring to the 3rd line along with Stoa. Add in Reasoner, who had an outstanding 52.8 faceoff % this season, and I think we're cooking.

Seeing as the GM likely won't buy out Tucker, I see no other place for him than 4th line RW, occasionally a scratch for hard working forward Brandon Yip.

I think Laperriere needs to be let go. He's been good for this organization, but I get the feeling he's looking for more than 1.5 million, and that it's worth it for this rebuilding franchise. He's too old, too slow, and doesn't produce offensively.

Making the lines like this would add 3.85 million to the Avalanche's cap hit, putting them at 45.925 million spent on 15 players.

Part 3 coming shortly.

Offseason Needs (Part 1)

2009-05-29T02:13:00.008-06:00

This is how the Avs offseason needs to go.

DRAFT: Emphasis on forwards.

Look, if Hedman is still around at number 3, he has to be taken obviously. But other than that, the Avs first three picks should all be used to draft forwards. Colorado's defensive depth is one of the best in the league, but forward depth is one of the worst. That could change by drafting Matt Duchene and perhaps a player like Drew Shore early in the 2nd round. There are a few good goalie options likely to be available early in the 2nd round (such as Olivier Roy), but the Avs have drafted a 2nd round goalie two years in a row; let's see if one of them (them being Cann and Delmas) pan out before drafting another goalie over a good forward (like Oscar Moller, who Cann was taken before).

Some notable forwards drafted early in the 2nd round over the last 5 drafts are James Neal (33rd overall, 2005), Dave Bolland (32nd overall, 2004), Loui Eriksson (33rd overall, 2003), Patrice Bergeron (45th overall, 2003), and of course Paul Stastny (44th overall, 2005).

The only notable goalies drafted early in the 2nd round over the last 5 drafts is Ondrej Pavelec (41st overall, 2005). This is why I think it's a waste to draft a goalie in the 2nd round; only one guy has even made a name for himself and he only has 6 career NHL wins. Scouts rave about him, so it remains to be seen how good he is.

I think the Avs may want to think about drafting a 6th or 7th round goalie. At that point, the draft becomes a crap shoot, and some of the best goalies in the league today have been drafted late in drafts. That list includes:

Khabibulin (204th overall, 1992)
Turco (124th overall, 1994)
Thomas (217th overall, 1994)
Nabokov (219th overall, 1994)
Vokoun (226th overall, 1994)
Toskala (90th overall, 1995)
Kipprusoff (116th overall, 1995)
C. Mason (122nd overall, 1995)
Miller (138th overall, 1999)
Lundqvist (205th overall, 2000)
Smith (161st overall, 2001)
Huet (214th overall, 2001)
Gerber (232nd overall, 2001)
Rinne (258th overall, 2004)

That's insane. It's safe to say almost all (the exceptions being Gerber and possibly Huet) of those goalies are starters, and my list has 14 goalies on it. To say that over a 3rd of the starters in the league today are guys who essentially came out of no where is a little hard to process, but it's reality. That list also leave out some other starting goalies who weren't even drafted: Dwayne Roloson, Niklas Backstrom, and Jonas Hiller. So, Avalanche executives...you know that seemingly useless 8th round draft pick you have? Yeah...might want to consider using it on a goalie.

Part two (Free Agency) coming soon.

P-A-T-H-E-T-I-C

2009-05-27T20:50:00.003-06:00

This organization is pathetic. Over the last week, the media has been swarming around this team like seagulls over a dead carcass. When the dust settled, Patrick Roy did not become head coach, nor did he become GM. Colorado still has no GM with the draft only a month away.

I'm pretty sure this debacle is going to screw up any chance of signing Swedish goalie prospect Jonas Gustavsson. With Roy as coach/GM, he'd have pretty good incentive to sign here (as would other UFA's). Because he's not, the Avs are going into next season with the same horrible players and horrible coaching staff. The last person Tony Granato swayed into coming to the team was Darcy "16 points" Tucker.

Last Ten 3rd Overall Picks

2009-04-15T11:32:00.004-06:00

1999: C Henrik Sedin

10 years later, Sedin has established himself as a star player. Sedin has scored 109 goals and 460 points in 646 career games. He's coming off his best season having scored 22 goals and 82 points in 82 games during the 2008-2009 campaign.

Analysis: The Canucks got the player they were hoping for when they drafted Henrik Sedin. Bonus points for drafting him in a bad draft year (1st overall Patrick Stephan).

2000: RW Marian Gaborik

Gaborik is a superstar in every sense of the word. If he weren't injured so much, he may be a top 5 player in the league.

Analysis: Although he's always injured (only played 17 games during the 2008-2009 season), the Wild still obtained the skill they were hoping for (13 goals, 23 points in those 17 games). Gaborik has 219 goals and 437 points in 502 career games.

2001: C Alexandr Svitov

13 goals, 37 points in 179 career gamers. Probably not the production the Lightning were looking for when they took Svitov while Komisarek, Hemsky, and M. Koivu were still on the board.

Analysis: Complete bust. Wasn't even worth taking in the 5th round, let alone 3rd overall.

2002: D Jay Bouwmeester

Likely to become the most sought after free agent this summer, Bouwmeester has been/was the rock on defense Florida had hoped for when drafting him. He lead the league in ice time during the 2007-2008 season, and scores more goals than the average defenseman (42 in the last three seasons). Bouwmeester has 53 goals and 203 points in 471 games.

Analysis: Bouwmeester was a successful pick. However, he hasn't played a single post season game and is opting for free agency instead of re-signing with Florida. If only they had surrounded him with more talent...

2003: RW Nathan Horton

Despite playing on a non-playoff team, Horton has found goal scoring success. At age 25, he already has 122 goals to his name. He had a bit of an off year this season (45 points in 67 games), and hasn't really established himself as an elite forward yet. Horton has 122 goals and 238 points in 357 games.

Analysis: A bit of a disappointment. Horton was drafted 3rd overall in one of the deepest drafts of all time; a draft that saw Zach Parise go 17th, Ryan Getzlaf go 19th, and Mike Richards go 24th. If Florida could draft again, perhaps they would have opted to go with Thomas Vanek (who went 5th) or Dion Phaneuf (who went 9th).

In a first round that included Nikolia Zherdev, Corey Perry, Jeff Carter, Dustin Brown, Ryan Suter, and several other star players, Horton at 3rd overall can't not be seen as a bust. That said, I think if he gets better line mates in the future, he may establish himself as a premier forward in the NHL.

2004: D Cam Barker After a slow start to his career, Barker seems to have established himself as a power play dynamo having scored 29 of his 40 points on the power play this season.

Analysis: It's never easy going 3rd overall when the players selected before you are Alexander Ovechkin and Evgeni Malkin, but Barker is still a successful pick, especially when considering some of the people who followed him (Ladd 4th, Montoya 6th, Olesz 7th, Picard 8th). Mike Green was taken 29th overall that draft, but he was a suprise pick which shouldn't be held against Chicago.

2005: D Jack Johnson

It's early in his career, but one has to consider Johnson a major bust. Carolina drafted him, traded him, and he's accomplished nothing in his time with LA. An offensive defenseman at the University of Michigan, Johnson has only scored 9 goals in 120 career games, along with an abysmal -42 rating.

Analysis: This is mostly LA's fault. Johnson doesn't have much defensive game to speak of, but that's been the focus of LA's development of him. Johnson seldom gets power play time, and has only been able to show his offensive prowess during shootouts (where he's scored a couple beauty's). Maybe Johnson will get traded of given power play time at some point, but if not then he'll never turn things around.

2006: C Jonathan Toews

There isn't much to say that hasn't already been said about Toews. He's the youngest captain in the league and is nearly a ppg player. Along with Kane, he's lead the Blackhawks back into the playoff picture after an absence of 7 seasons.

Analysis: I have a feeling Pittsburgh wouldn't have drafted Jordan Staal 2nd overall knowing what they know now.

2008 & 2009: C Kyle Turris and D Zach Bogosian

I combined these guys because the jury is still out on them. Bogosian had a great rookie season for Atlanta this year (47 gp, 9 goals, +11), while Turris had a mediocre first season with Phoenix (63 gp, 8 goals, -15).

Islanders win Lottery, Avs Stand Pat at 3rd.

2009-04-14T18:21:00.007-06:00

Looks like Matt Duchene is likely to become a member of the Avalanche, barring a trade moving the Avalanche up or down at the draft.

1. New York
2. Tampa Bay
3. Colorado
4. Atlanta
5. Los Angeles

Today, Bob McKenzie reported:

From Jassi Bedi: As it stands, the Avalanche are slated to draft Matt Duchene. What do the scouts think of him?

Bob McKenzie: Jassi, the scouts love everything about Duchene. They like his size, strength, speed, skill and smarts. They see him as a character player, as someone who can score goals, make plays and work as hard without the puck as with it. There’s nothing not to like about the Brampton Battalion forward. Tavares and Hedman are heavy favorites to go one-two in this draft, but if there’s one player who could upset that scenario, it’s probably Duchene. Not to give it away just yet, but when we release a revised Top 15 draft ranking tonight on the NHL Draft Lottery show on TSN at 8 p.m. eastern, Duchene will be a rock-solid No. 3 but at least one of the 10 scouts we surveyed had him at No. 2, ahead of Hedman.

So, there's also a slim chance that Victor Hedman may still be around at #3. Very slim. It's rumored that Tampa Bay might be interested in trading the 2nd overall pick, and I believe it would take trading the 2nd overall to a team heavy with defense prospects (LA Kings) for Hedman to still be on the baord when Colorado drafts. Tampa has enough offense and needs to draft a top level defenseman, which is good for them because they're slated to draft one.

But with Brian Lawton and company, logic doesn't apply.

GM Giguere Fired

2009-04-13T10:45:00.002-06:00

Well, it finally happened. I don't think anyone is too surprised; in three seasons as GM, Giguere complied a mediocre 120-107-19 record, missing the playoffs twice.

Right now Pierre Lacroix is GM, and I hope it stays that way. PL has a flare for the dramatic, so he might be able to pull some deals out to fix this team for next season. And as long as he doesn't trade our 1st round pick, Stewart, or Stastny, there's no way he can screw things up worse than they are currently.

Season Over, Random Thoughts

2009-04-12T21:33:00.011-06:00

Finally, we're granted death after being tortured for 82 games straight. For the second year in a row the team dealt with a mass of injuries, but unlike last year couldn't overcome them.

Peter Forsberg did not ride in on his white horse to lead this team to the playoffs. Joe Sakic did not make a late season return from injury. Familiar faces did not return at the trade deadline to help with a playoff push.

Instead, we were treated with the worst finish of any team in the league. Over the final two months of the season, the Avalanche compiled a pathetic 4-11-4 record. Even more pathetic is the record since the start of 2009: 13-28-4.

---

Tony Granato has got to go. I understand how injured and unskilled this team is, but his coaching only enhances the problem. I hate Darcy Tucker with a passion, but I can't believe that he could go from scoring 18 goals one season to scoring only 16 points the next based solely on career decline.

There's no way Granato will still be around next season if Francois Giguere cherishes his job (which he should). Don't be surprised if "coach G" is laid off this week.

A Tucker buyout also wouldn't shock me. He's the player that has stood out as horrible this year (aside from Arnason, who isn't signed), and I believe management might cut the cord. I don't think buying out Tucker is a great idea because it means we'll still be paying for him during the 2011 season.

---

The NHL lottery draft is Tuesday, April 14th. If the Avs win, they jump from drafting 3rd overall to 1st overall, where it'll be likely that they draft London Knights superstar John Tavares.

If they Avalanche draft 3rd or 4th (which could happen if a 24-27 ranked team wins the lottery), they will likely be draft either speedy center Matt Duchene, power forward Evander Kane, flashy winger Magnus Svensson-Paajari, or hulking defenseman Jared Cowen.

I think any chance of Colorado drafting Victor Hedman is down the tubes. It's incredibly unlikely he'll still be on the board if the Avs draft 3rd; if they win the lottery and draft 1st, I can say with 95% certainty they'll take John Tavares.

---

Next year is going to be brutal. The Avs are in cap hell, and NEED to re-sign RFA's Jones, McLeod, Cumiskey, and Vernace. Other players who it may be in their interest to re-sign are Ian Laperriere, Cody McCormick, Daniel Tjarnqvist, and Ben Guite. Oh, and some bum named Joe Sakic, should he choose to play.

Doing this is going to be nearly impossible; all four noted RFA's will likely double their salaries from this season. If Joe Sakic does indeed decide to play, I'm not sure how he can be signed for anything more than 3 million.

Also, this team doesn't have a single goalie signed for next season. Tyler Weiman may deserve a look as one of the goalies next year; he only had 21 wins for the Monsters this year, but 8 of them came by shutout.

Avs prospect Trevor Cann (London Knights, OHL) may also get a look as back-up, or starter given cap constraints. Right now Cann is finishing off an impressive regular season (30-10-1, 2.51 GAA, 0.917 SV%) with an even more impressive playoff run (8-1, 2.23 GAA, 0.927 SV%). I think it would be very interesting to see teammates Tavares and Cann both playing for the Avalanche next season.

An interesting fact to add to that is that Columbus Calder shoe-in Steve Mason was London's starting goalie last year. So could it be possible that there's a repeat in the form of Trevor Cann? Doubt it, but at least we can hope. Plus anything is better than Budaj and Raycroft at this point.

---

Rumors are swirling that Granato and Giguere will be replaced by Patrick Roy and Eric Lacroix, respectively. I'd be thrilled with Roy; I think he is a guy who can fire some passion into his players, which is something Granato is incapable of.

But as for Lacroix...it would be every Avalanche fans nightmare come true. He was widely hated as a player, and to my knowledge has no experience in a general managers role at any level of hockey.

I'd be fine if Pierre came back, but the thought of Eric Lacroix as the new GM makes me cringe; I don't hate the guy like some do, I just don't think he's a good choice. Or at least, he should be given an assistant GM role to his father before taking on the full time role.

---

Finally, congrats to Avs prospects Brandon Yip, Colby Cohen, and Kevin Shattenkirk for winning the national championship with Boston University. Cohen had the overtime winner, assisted by Shattenkirk:

The streak is over.

2009-04-05T22:20:00.004-06:00

All good things come to an end, as they say.

With a surprising win over Vancouver tonight, the Avs have now jumped up to 28th in the league (tiebreaker). If the season ended today, the Avs would likely be drafting Matt Duchene. He's a speedy center who has had a great season with the Brampton Battalion of the OHL, totaling 31 goals and 48 assists in 57 games.

There's a picture in this video (0:45) of him wearing an Avs jersey, so apparently he's a fan. But who wasn't 10 years ago?

If the Avs draft him, then we should be set at the center position for the next decade, with Duchene as the #1 guy and Stastny as the #2 or "1A" guy. This scenario would make Wolski expendable if he's dead set at playing center.

-----

Peter Budaj won his 20th game of the season tonight. Color me surprised.

-----

T.J. Galiardi look like he's got a bright future ahead of him. He's now potted himself 3 goals in 7 career NHL games. Compare that to Hensick who has 4 goals in 56 games this year.

Galiardi didn't exactly light the AHL up this season (66gp, 10-17-27, -10), but playing with Hejduk seems to have lit a fire underneath him. If he adds a little weight, he could be a mainstay on the Avs (second line LW?) in the coming years.

Giguere: Draft Hedman over Tavares.

2009-04-03T23:34:00.007-06:00

Two months ago, I would think the above statement was insane. But now, I can't justify drafting Tavares over Hedman. Yes, Tavares has unbelievable scoring ability. I think he'll be as good, or better, than Crosby and Malkin in a few years.

But I don't think that ability is more desirable than to have a 6'5" defenseman who'll be a rock on defense the next decade plus. You can always find people who can put the puck in the net, but hulking franchise defenseman don't exist outside of Pronger, Chara, and Bouwmeester - all of whom are superstars.

The Avs have a very respectable collection of defensive prospects as it is. Kevin Shattenkirk is a great prospect, and would be the ultimate compliment to Hedman for the next decade (very similar to the Lidstrom/Rafalski duo...and I'm not just saying that because Hedman is Swedish and Shattenkirk is American).

Kyle Cumiskey, Nigel Williams, Colby Cohen, and Cameron Gaunce all look like they're bound to be NHLers at some point, so a couple of them could be 2nd or 3rd pair defenseman for the Avalanche down the road. That's not mentioning Michael Vernace and Derek Peltier, neither of whom have looked out of place in their short stints with the Avs this season.

However, none of them are #1 defensemen. If you draft Victor Hedman, you have one of the best #1 defensemen for years to come in addition to all of those good complimentary defensemen.

He's to hoping we draft 2nd overall.

---

Tampa Bay lost in overtime tonight. If they get another point, it all but guarantees the Avs will finish the season 29th. Despite the tough schedule and massive injuries, there's no telling if the Avs can somehow pull a win out. But there's no way they'll get 3 more points, which is the edge Tampa will have on them if they lose another overtime game.

I like the odds of that happening, seeing as they've lost an NHL best (or worst) 18 overtime games.

---

I'm impressed with the hard workers the Avs should have the next few years. Mercier, Yip, McLeod, Jones, Stewart, and Stoa are all players who work their tail off, so even if the team still sucks three years from now we'll at least see that there are some players who actually try.

Avs Sign Two

2009-03-27T16:31:00.004-06:00

Today the Avalanche signed forwards Ryan Stoa and Cedric Lalonde-McNicoll to entry level contracts.

Stoa was taken 34th overall in the 2005 draft. He's a big guy at 6-3 200lbs, and was the captain of Gophers (NCAA) up until today. Hopefully he'll fill the Avs need for a 3rd line center next season (although he also plays LW. EDIT: He hasn't played center in a while, so the search continues for a checking center). Stoa had 24 goals and 22 assist in 36 games with the Gophers this season.

McNicoll is a guy who was never drafted. The Avs took notice that he was lighting up the QMJHL (38-66-104 in 65 pg) and signed him. Chances are he'll start next season with Lake Erie of the AHL. I'm not sure if he'll ever turn into an NHLer, but I think he was worth taking a chance on given his stats.

29th Overall

2009-03-26T23:00:00.007-06:00

With a Tampa Bay overtime loss tonight, the Avalanche fell to 29th overall in the NHL with only 8 games left in the regular season. Who'd have thought that this team would go from being one of the final 8 teams in the 2008 playoffs to being the second worst team in the NHL in only one season?

Something similar happened to the Flyers a few seasons ago. All the players that made them a powerhouse over the last decade had moved on (Recchi, LeClair) or retired (Primeau, Desjardins), and they fell apart. But after a few key trades, a big free agent signing, and prospects coming into their own, the Flyers went from last one year to the Eastern Conference Finals the next.

Welcome to the salary cap era, ladies and gentlemen. So, if you think the Avs can't follow up this season with a good one...well, you're right. The reason the Flyers were able to do so is Jeff Carter and Mike Richards came into their own. The Briere signing has turned out to be a step backwards, and the Flyers are likely stuck with him (unless he stay's healthy and productive next season).

Also, they were able to make four huge trades:

- A 2nd round pick for Marty Biron
- Forsberg for Upshall, Parent, NSH 1st and 3rd round picks.
- Nashville's 1st round pick back to Nashville for Hartnell and Timonen.
- Pitkanen and Sanderson for Lupul and Smith.

The moves are just brilliant. It's mind boggling to me how Paul Holmgren, only months into his tenure as Flyers GM, pulled off four trades that improved the team greatly. And they haven't even seen what James Van Riemsdyk, who they took with the 2nd overall pick of the 2007 draft, can do. They're going to be good for years to come.

That said, Francois Giguere, or whoever the Avalanche GM is, will not be able to do that. This team has a ton of money invested in mediocre players, such as Tucker (2.25), Clark (3.50), and Salei (3.025). They're stuck with them. Look forward to the 2011 season, people, where the Avs will have plenty of room to make themselves good because only Stastny, Smyth, Liles, and Hannan are signed through that season.

Stastny Has Broken Bone In Foot

2009-03-25T11:08:00.006-06:00

According to this Adrian Dater blog, Stastny will be out the next 2-4 weeks with a broken bone in his foot. Or in other words, he's done for the season.

Is anyone else a little worried that our franchise player, who'll make 6.6 million the next 5 seasons (more than both Mike Richards and Jeff Carter), might be a tad injury prone? Ignoring the appendectomy (which I've had, and has nothing to do with being injured on ice), Stastny's been very injury prone these last 12 months: he had the knee injury last year in the playoffs, broke his forearm this season, and now has broken a bone in his foot.

Hopefully these injuries are just a result of Stastny breaking a mirror, or walking under a ladder. If not, we may be in for a longer rebuild than it appears (assuming that's possible).

On another note, it looks like Sakic will return at some point; probably around like 4 games from now. This probably will be the last season of his career, so if you need a reason to continue to watch this train wreck of a team, I just gave you one hundred.

Coach R?

2009-03-24T20:02:00.009-06:00

Brian Thompson of the Examiner ponders the idea of Patrick Roy becoming the next head coach of the Colorado Avalanche.

I think Roy should become the next head coach.

This season we've been shown that Granato's passive style isn't cutting it. If it wasn't bad enough that we have watched our beloved Avalanche get slaughtered all the time, we have to hear Tony Granato tell us "the bounces didn't go our way" all the time.

The whole coaching staff needs to go; no Dave Barr, no Jacques Cloutier, no Tony Granato to start next season. Who actually believes a team with Ryan Smyth, Hejduk, Wolski, Stastny, Hannan, Liles, Foote, and Salei is bad enough to be tied for the second fewest points in the entire NHL (64)?

The article cites Roy's erratic behavior over the years as making him a gamble of a coach. That's a gamble I'm willing to take. Roy hates to lose. At the very least, we'd never hear him praising the play of Darcy Tucker, who's making 2.25 million this season and has a whole 8 goals. Roy can bring some much needed personality back to the franchise; Granato is a drone and Giguere hides in the shadows all season. Even if (when) the Avs are stinking it up again next season, the games will at least be worth watching for Roy's antics.

This organization needs a coach who can fire the team up, not a bunch of 'yes' men. We need someone who will motivate the players. We need someone who's a proven winner.

We need Roy.

(I'd like to note that I retract my Joseph comments from the previous post; he stood on his head late in the 3rd tonight. Budaj couldn't have done that!)

09/10 Goaltending

2009-03-24T15:04:00.008-06:00

Adrian Dater recently posted a blog about Peter Budaj, which got me to thinking about who the man between the pipes will be next year. Realistically, the Avs have three options:

1. Re-sign Budaj and hope he finally finds his "potential". Honestly, this sounds like an awful idea (and don't get me wrong, it is), but seeing as the Avs have 44 million committed to next seasons team (none of which is being spent on a goalie), they may not have much choice. Better to spend chump change on Budaj, who may actually get a little better, than to spend chump change on a has-been (Joseph, Legace) or nobody (Tellqvist, Sanford).

This choice would likely result in another year out of the playoffs, but that may be a good thing for this rebuilding team because the 2010 draft is expected to be a deep one.

2. Use Weiman and Bacashihua. Both have been pretty good in the minors this season, and now would be the perfect time to see if either are NHL caliber goalies. Bacashihua is a former 1st round draft choice of the Dallas Stars, and it may be worth it to see if he's salvaged any of his perceived potential.

Chances are the Avs would be getting Taylor Hall (projected 1st overall choice in the 2010 draft) if they go with this tandem. I somehow doubt fans will be complaining if that's the case.

3. Make a trade. As I've noted, the Avs have alot of money locked up next year, so they won't be able to go on a shopping spree and sign a top UFA goalie (which there are very few of). So, making a trade seems to be the only option to get the Avs a #1 goalie. The top three candidates who may be available are:

- Josh Harding, MIN.

Make no mistake, Harding, an RFA (restricted free agent), WILL be moved at the draft. The only question is to which team, and for what. Despite the fact that both team's play in the same division, I could realistically see the Wild dealing him to Colorado. Other teams who may have interest are Philadelphia, Washington, and St. Louis.

His 2-9-1 record this season is mediocre, but Harding will still get a decent return. He's a very good goalie, and his numbers (2.15 GAA, 0.932 SV%) are amazing (apparently not amazing enough to win 3 games, though!).

- Jonas Hiller/J.S. Giguere, ANA.

The Ducks have a log jam in goal; Giguere (18-17-5) and Hiller (17-14-1) have split the goaltending duties this season. Because they make a combined 7.3 million next season, I think it'll be in the Ducks best interest to move one of them.

And I think they'll move 26 year old Jonas Hiller. Giguere has really struggled this season (partly because his father passed away), but I still don't see the Ducks trading him only 2 seasons after he led them to a Stanley Cup. Hiller, on the other hand, only has two seasons of NHL experience.

Whether he can handle playing every night is a mystery, but so far he's established himself as a top notch back-up, posting a career 27-21-1 record with a 2.21 GAA and .923 SV%.

- Kari Lehtonen, ATL.

Thrashers co-owner Bruce Levenson recently said that the team is committed to keeping Lehtonen, but I don't buy it. At some point, they're going to have to trade either Lehtonen or Pavelec; based on the brilliant moves he's made in the past, my money says Thrasher's GM Don Waddell moves Lehtonen. It could be this summer, seeing as he's an RFA.

The buying price will be a steep one, however. Lehtonen has consistently posted a top notch SV% (currently .913) playing behind one of the worst teams in the league, so GM's know that inserting this 24 year old into their team solidifies their goaltending for years to come.

I honestly believe the Flyers will get him. He'd be the perfect fit there, and they have so much offensive depth that they'd be able to part with some good players to get him. From an Avalanche perspective, it would probably cost a pick (2nd or 3rd round), Svatos, and a decent prospect (such as Hensick, Williams, or Cumiskey).

Shatternkirk Interview

2009-03-24T14:48:00.005-06:00

This was sent to me a while ago, but I didn't get a chance to post it until now. Check it out here.

Back From The Dead.

2009-02-25T17:14:00.010-07:00

For some reason, despite my last post being in November, this blog is picking up traffic and more than one person emailed me about it. What's sadder, the fact that this blog is more popular when I ignore it, or that Peter Budaj has only picked up ten wins since my last post (Nov. 18th)?

First I need to mention an interview with Wojtek Wolski which can be found here. Check it out, it's a pretty good read. And while I'm in shilling mode, check out this site too.

Wolski mentions his roommate on the road is Jordan Leopold. Not to be the bearer of bad news, but you might need a new roomie pretty soon, Wojtek. With the trade deadline just around the corner, I'm going to go through where some notable Avalanche players might end up.

(In alphabetical order)

Tyler Arnason: Will any team be desperate enough to take a chance on ol' Arny? I seriously doubt it, but no one expected Detroit to trade for Kyle Calder during deadline day '07.

Destination: Colorado :(

Brett Clark: This guys popularity with Avalanche fans is about the same as former President Bush's approval rating was when he left office. Never the less, he is serviceable and is second in the league in blocked shots. A team might think he can rediscover his offensive touch if put in the right environment.

The big problem with Clark is he'll stand to make 3.5 million dollars next year, a gross overpayment for a #4 defenseman who's scored 12 points in 60+ games.

Destination: LA Kings. It looks like the Kings are going to make a push for the playoffs, and could probably use an extra defenseman with Preissing out. With Gauthier and O'Donnell likely both departing via free agency, and 12+ million in cap space, the Kings can afford to take on Clark's salary next season.

Ian Laperriere: It's rumored that contract talks aren't going so well, which leads me to believe #14 is on his way out the door. Not to mention he's 35 on a team that's rebuilding. Or at least soon will be.

Destination: LA Kings. He's got roots there and they could really use his leadership if they're making a playoff push.

Jordan Leopold: I think Leo is most likely to be moved. He's a cheap, mobile puck mover who's an impending UFA. He could really help a team lacking offense from the point on their second power play unit. Plus, he has extensive playoff experience from having gone to game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals with Calgary in 2004.

Destination: Columbus. Yes, Boston is the answer everyone says, but I really won't be surprised if he goes to Columbus. Fedor Tyutin is having himself a nice little year, but who's kidding who here? They need more production from the blue line. My hypothesis (aka guess) is strengthened by the fact that Colorado and Columbus made a trade last season (which Columbus fans seem to forget).

Ryan Smyth: If he were in the final year of his deal, he'd be the hottest commodity this deadline. But the fact remains he has three years left with a cap hit of 6.25 million a season.

Destination: Colorado. No one can afford the guy. If, and I mean if, he were moved, I bet it would be to Pittsburgh in a big deal involving Ryan Whitney. The Penguins have less money locked up than people think, and Ray Shero may see Smyth as the winger Crosby has so desperately needed (don't get me started).

Darcy Tucker: He sucks, and on top of that he's having a bad year. For some reason, both coach Granato and GM Giguere seem to like his work ethic, so I'm not sure he's even being shopped. But here's to hoping.

Destination: Colorado. I can't see anyone taking this guy off our hands.

McKeon

2008-11-18T15:32:00.003-07:00

What is this guy talking about in his latest power rankings?

We were going to suggest Paul Stastny even before he signed a five-year contract extension Monday. The clever winger is off to a slow start in goals this season, but he has a nose for the net.

That Was An Enjoyable One

2008-11-12T22:13:00.002-07:00

I haven't made one of these in a while, so this is going to be long.

This game was one of those rarities where both teams play the ideal game. You can't really fault either team for not doing something. Maybe you could point out the crappy power plays executed by both teams, but the goaltending was just so good.

Budaj had back to back highlight reel saves in the third on one of the Sedin brothers (what do I look like, their mother? I can't tell them apart and neither can you). At the other end, Luongo saved the game at least three times late in the third, most notably a pad save on Wolski with 1.9 seconds left.

In the end, Luongo's misfortunes against the Avs continued. He's 5-14-3 or something horrible like that against Colorado. It's just one of those things, like Arnason against Edmonton.

It was good to see Svatos score in the shootout....seeing as, ya know, he makes 2 million dollars and has all of one goal in 14 games. If you pay me 2 million dollars and give me 15 minutes of ice time a night, I could bang one home at some time or another. In his defense, he's coming off of the surgery, but I think that's secondary. He looks like the same invisible Svatos as always. Sometimes he scores, and sometimes he doesn't. Right now it's the latter.

- I have a feeling Sakic won't be back until the trip is over. Just a hunch. All I know is I'm beginning to get that injury bug feeling with Sakic and Guite both hurt.

- Who knows how long Guite will be out for. What Granato called "out of breath" has turned out to be a rib injury. Did anyone honestly expect him to tell the truth? I guess that explains why he keeps saying "we have faith in Budaj".

- Kyle Wellwood hasn't taken a penalty since the 2005-2006 season. He's either incredibly lucky or incredibly disciplined. Probably both. You'd think he'd accidentally high stick someone at some point, but I guess not.

- Forsberg had another foot surgery. Yikes. If he's this determined to play, then he should just go for it after he's healed up. Wake up Peter, your foot isn't going to get any better, so either play through the injuries you'll receive because of it or retire. It's that simple.

He says he will only return to Colorado, but return to what? He'll help the team alot, but Francois Giguere will have to swing a trade for a goalie, probably a two-way center, and a scoring winger before anyone starts thinking this team actually has a shot at the cup (which I assume is the only reason he'd want to return).

- Thanks to a little blog posted by Adrian Dater, Avs fans have be riled up over the prospect of Colorado dealing Brett Clark to Montreal for Jaroslav Halak.

Now, aside from the fact that the numbers don't even come close to working, this trade would likely never happen. Gainey, Montreal's GM, is thinking cup, and I kinda doubt Brett Clark is the final piece to the puzzle. Not to mention the uproar that would come from Montreal fans if Gainey traded a young prospect for an unknown.

That said, the fact that Dater thinks Clark is on the move says something. He'll probably be on the move at some point, which I don't think is a smart decision.
Sure, he makes alot of money, but he shows up every night. A cheaper version of Scott Hannan, if you will.

Okay, that's it for now. Hopefully there are no typo's because I'm too tired to check right now.

It's Time To Fire The GM

2008-11-07T08:17:00.001-07:00

It's been time for a while, but I feel the need to reiterate it after reading this. Apparently, this GM thinks he can low ball people when attempting to resign them, and if they decide to leave it doesn't matter because Peter Budaj and David Jones can do the same things for less money.

This is why he needs to be fired. Since taking over in 2007, he's made one logical move, which was the Skrastins for Salei trade. But even that move wasn't great; it was simply Florida and Colorado trading their overpaid defensemen for one another.

Other than that, everything has been a bust. Chris Stewart, drafted 19th overall in 2006, looks like he'll amount to nothing. Even with all of the injuries last year, Stewart has yet to play an NHL game. His AHL numbers are average at best.

And there lies another problem: he can't decide whether this team is rebuilding or not. Outside observes who follow the Avs will jump to the conclusion that the team is indeed rebuilding, but they couldn't be more wrong. They probably should be rebuilding, but aren't. Instead, old players that were bought out by their former team were signed, and expectations put on two rookies who will amount to nothing more than 2nd line players (if they're lucky). A 1st round draft pick was traded for Adam Foote, a 36 year old defenseman who was heading to free agency in the summer.
That pick was then traded by Columbus to Philadelphia for R.J. Umberger, a young center who will only get better. The player who was eventually drafted with the pick was Luca Sbisa, a defenseman who in his first 12 NHL games currently has 6 assists, a number greater than any Avalanche defenseman thus far.

Now let's look at this summer. Clearly, he had money to spend, and still has that money. Sakic's career being up in the air is completely irrelevant because there was more than enough dough to resign everyone and Sakic. Instead, Theodore, who stole the first playoff series leaves because of a low ball offer, despite telling Colorado that if they matched the Washington offer he'd re-sign. I still think Theodore should have taken the lesser offer simply because of how much he made while warming the bench, but hockey's a business, and Giguere shouldn't have been penny pinching.

Then, he lets the leading goal scorer in the playoffs, a guy who didn't miss a game in three seasons, and the team's assistant captain Andrew Brunette walk away. According to the article, Giguere offered Brunette a lousy one year deal worth less money than he had made previously. I can see the logic in not signing Brunette, given his age and Wolski emerging as a solid LW....BUT, I can only see the logic in not signing him if the plan is to go out and get a younger scoring winger to play with Sakic. And by younger, I do not mean only two years younger; and by scoring, I sure as hell do not mean Darcy Tucker.

After being swept by Detroit, Colorado appeared to be a team a couple tweaks away from being a serious contender this year. They beat 3rd seeded Minnesota, and were only swept by Detroit because of injuries (I'm not saying they would have won, but does anyone honestly believe that Colorado gets swept if they're not missing 6 of their top 9 forwards?).

So, everyone had the mentality that Sakic is old, and Hejduk is getting up there; time to make a run at the cup, right? After all, the 1st rounder was just sent away for someone in the final stretch of their career, so the GM must be thinking "time to stack our line-up and deliver the cup"....right?

It's time to pull the plug on his GMing life. I say this not only as a pissed off fan, but also as an observer with common sense. General managing needs to involve common sense, and moves should be made for a logic, sensible reason. This GM lacks logic, and appears to not have a plan. It's only a matter of time.

I Overrated G's Coaching Ability

2008-11-03T20:51:00.005-07:00

A team that came flying out of the gate early this season has slowly turned into a team who can't score non-fluke goals.

Colorado hasn't been in this bad of shape since the early 2007 season, and that's a pretty bold statement when taking into the consideration that this team is only four games removed from a five game winning streak.

I'm going to start a new segment to make my blogs interesting (as if they aren't already). It's called "who showed up". Well, who showed up tonight? Smyth, Hejduk, Guite, McCormick, Wolski, and Clark. I was even going to say Budaj until he let that 6th one get by...

That's not very many players though, and it's on the coaching staff to get the team going. The team was dominated tonight, couldn't do anything on the power play, and simply looked slow.

I'd also like to note that Joe Sakic has been quite crappy lately. I don't pull any punches, no matter who the player is. Sakic has been invisible, and doesn't have a goal since the Oilers game.

Hopefully we can all look forward to a new Adrian Dater blog ripping the team apart. And oh yeah, at least I'm now 1 for 2 with my predictions.

Not Surprising

2008-11-02T19:59:00.007-07:00

The Avs dropped tonight's game, and who's surprised? Not me, even though I clearly have tonight's game as a "W" in my previous blog. I thought maybe the boys in burgundy and blue could pull one out, but I was sadly mistaken.

Tonight was a pretty clear example of how crappy this team is, or at least how crappy they can be. It wasn't a horrible, or even bad performance, but it's a pretty clear indicator of why Colorado won't be winning the cup this year unless some pretty significant changes are made.

Granato must have realized that he wasn't getting enough balanced offense, so he put Sakic with Smyth and Hejduk, bumping Stastny down to a line with Svatos and Wolski. Those six forwards have scored a combined 18 goals. The trouble is that 14 of those goals have come from the Smyth-Stastny-Hejduk trio. Wolski hasn't scored since opening night, and that goal arguably shouldn't have counted.

Budaj still needs to be much better. Some nights I think to myself "wow, he looks as good as anyone out there tonight". Other nights I think "wow, I could have got a blocker on that!". It's his job to stop pucks, and he'll be out of a job if he continues to play like this over the next 20-30 games.

The first goal was horrible, and so was the last goal. The Altitude announcers can water it down all they want, talking about things like bad bounces and such. But it's their job to be a little biased, not mine. A real shoddy goaltending performance yet again from Peter Budaj.

If I were GM (which most of you know I'm not), I'd be dumping the salaries of Svatos and Arnason right about now. A combined 3.7 million dollars in salary has only translated to 3 goals from the duo over the first 11 games. Not only that, but they're a combined -3, so they haven't exactly been Madden and Pandolfo out there.

That's all I've got to say. Actually, one other thing: Nabokov is overrated. He's going to have to play a heck of alot better if the Sharks planning on going deep this year in the playoffs.

Impressions After The First Ten Games

2008-10-31T10:54:00.009-06:00

Well, here we are. Ten games into the season, the Avalanche find themselves 5-5-0, grasping on the the 8th seed in the conference with their finger tips (of course, there are 72 more games). Anyhow, I'm here to break down what the team is doing right and what they're doing wrong.

- Let's start with the penalty kill: it's bad. Very bad. Only the Oilers and Bruins have a worse penalty kill. One major reason is the inability to get the puck out of the zone. Things have been getting better in that regard lately, but still not good enough. Also, this team has no penalty killing specialists in the line-up. None. Guite has been a healthy scratch for five of the last seven games (for reasons unknown), and he's the only guy who is a legit PK man. And even he shouldn't be relied on to anchor the number one unit.

As a result, McLeod, McCormick, Jones, Wolski, Sakic, and Smyth (guys who normally don't kill penalties) have done the deed. That's translated into a 73.4 kill %, and that isn't cutting it.

- On the other hand, the power play is much improved, currently ranking 11th (19.2 success rate) compared to last years 29th. I think there's still alot of room for improvement, but at least it's not a weak point.

- The defense, as expected, has been a strong point. Salei hasn't been so good thus far, but he's still a +1 and creates chances with his hard shot (which he's had trouble getting through to the net this year). However, if at any point a defender is move this season, he'll be your guy. I've commented on this before: he's making too much money as a 6th defender. He's only average defensively to begin with, and 2 assists in ten games isn't good enough offensive production.

- The third line has been horrid. They're a combined -9, and have only combined for 4 goals. I think Svatos will probably end up scoring 20 goals throughout the course of the season, but he hasn't really bee impressive. He's been mentioned in trade rumors, and he's another guy who's departure would not surprise me.

- On offense, the four horsemen (Smyth, Sakic, Stastny, Hejduk) need another sniper to play with. They're burnt out right now in my opinion, and Sakic could use a better right wing than the two guys who always find themselves there: Tucker and Jones.

- Peter Budaj has been good- lately. I have no problem admitting it. Lately, he's been solid in goal. However, if this team's going to go anywhere, he's going to need to string his good play together. His play in the first three games was so bad that even after receiving the NHL's 2nd star last week, his SV% is still well below .900.

Andrew Raycroft is probably playing his last NHL season. He has some good qualities, but his glove hand is terrible, and he let's in too many bad goals.

- Brian Willsie has been great. Too bad he's in the AHL. I'm not sure what more he's got to do to get called up; he had 2 goals in 4 preseason games, and currently has 6 goals (9 points) in 8 games for the Monsters.

Predictions For The Next Ten Games: These will probably be completely wrong, but I'm going to predict what the Avs record is over the next 10 games will be.

San Jose- W
@ Chicago- L
Minnesota - OTL
Nashville - W
@ Vancouver - W
@ Edmonton - W
@ Calgary - L
Calgary - W
@ Los Angeles - W
@ Anaheim - OTL

Wow, did I just predict 6-2-2? That's pretty optimistic of me. We'll see how wrong I am starting Sunday night at the Pepsi Center.

P.S. Happy Halloween.

That Was Ugly

2008-10-30T21:18:00.004-06:00

Well I'm glad Arnason and Svatos chose to show up. The trouble is no one else did. Maybe Tucker and Hannan too, but aside from them, a very weak effort. Everyone looked like they were just going through the motions, and Raycroft could stop a beach ball tonight.

On paper, this game would have appeared to be the easiest match up so far this season (especially with LeCaire hurt for Columbus), but that was not the case tonight. It's also a little disturbing that the Avs have only scored 3 goals in the last three games. Before that they were averaging 4 per game. This team is suddenly looking very mediocre.

Another thing that needs to be mentioned is Joe Sakic's wingers. To put it simply, he needs new ones. Well, new one. Wolski and he work well together, but they need a finisher badly. Joe's shot is not what it once was, and Wolski is known for his playmaking skills. Shanahan is now considering all offers, but isn't this team old enough? Not to mention he's a former Red Wing (gag).

Paul Stastny Is A Bad Actor

2008-10-28T21:52:00.007-06:00

Did anyone else see that commercial for laser eye vision? His performance was laughably bad, but the commercial played things off as serious. Maybe he should've taken lessons from the Pittsburgh Penguins.

On to the game: There goes the winning streak. I think some of this loss can be blamed on Arnason. On the first goal he couldn't contain Moss behind the net, who would go on to make the centering pass to Glencross. After that, Budaj let in a stinker, followed by the Cammalleri goal and that was all she wrote.

There's a perfect example of why Colorado needs a checking line center. If Glen Metropolit or Stephane Yelle are in the same position, the game would have remained 0-0. Or heck, even Guite, who was a healthy scratch for the third time this season.

Arnason should be out of the line-up next game. And heck, Svatos too. I'm dubbing them "the wonder twins". They both look like they're capable of doing good things, but never get anything done. They combined for two shots (both by Arnason) and a +/- rating of -2.

Budaj was pretty good until the soft Bourque goal. But as I've preached before, Budaj has trouble coming up with big saves late in games. I'm still going to blame this loss on a lack of a defensive third line center, though.

That's all I've got for now. My spidey senses are telling me Raycroft will be starting next game against Columbus, and rightfully so. He's 2-0, and Budaj took over in the middle of his win streak.

5 Games Strong.

2008-10-25T21:39:00.009-06:00

I thought the win streak was over, but a lucky bounce off a sabre helmet and some spectacular shootout goals (ironically, it was the goal that probably should have been stopped that won it) extended Colorado's winning streak to 5 games.

Budaj has really been strong these past two games. But history has shown us that Budaj plays well for stretches, then bad for stretches. So far this season it's played out the same way, but hopefully he can keep things going strong.

One thing which I found particularly dirtbagish (is that even a word?) was how on two occasions Sabres players looked like they were ready to fight, but refused to drop the gloves after the Avalanche player had dropped his. Ironically, Don Cherry talked about this very thing tonight. Well, Buffalo ended up losing the game anyway, so the joke is on them.

Marek Svatos is having a crummy start with only one goal in the first seven games. I know his ice time is low, but what has he done to show he deserves more? Both tonight and last game against Edmonton I've seen Wolski dropped to the Arnason line in an attempt to recreate the success they had last year when Sakic, Stastny, and Smyth were all out of the line-up. Right now, it's not happening.

Out of town thought: Wow, the Islanders, with a top scoring line of Bergenheim, Weight, and Guerin somehow muster 60 shots on Cam Ward but still lose the game. I'm confused; I thought the offense was supposed to be the weak point, and DiPietro was supposed to be the strong point?

Looks Like I Can Eat My Words.

2008-10-23T21:33:00.004-06:00

About Budaj. For now, that is. He didn't have to make alot of difficult saves, but I'm not going to sit here and make excuses for why he played well. It was a good performance, and could have been a shut out if not for the bad play by Foote.

And wow, another 4 goal game by Colorado. Maybe these guys really are Gretzky's Oilers in disguise....but then who was coaching Phoenix tonight?

Ben Guite was in the line-up for the sick David Jones; he had 2 assists, a shot on goal, was a +2, and received the 3rd star of the game. A strong performance, and good for him. Granato will be hard pressed to figure out who he's going to scratch next game.

Speaking of which, Arnason may be the odd man out next game. I can tell they're trying to get him going, but it's just not happening right now. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that 90% of Avalanche fans despise him.

Yesterday on the versus network Eddie Olczyk called the Avalanche the funnest team to watch in the NHL, and he seems to know his stuff. Then again, he's the same guy who drove the Penguins to the NHL's cellar a couple years ago, despite having Lemieux, Crosby, Palffy, Malone, Gonchar, Whitney, LeClair, Recchi....yeah I know, some of those guys retired/bad goaltending.

But to get back on topic, 28 goals in 7 games is alot of rubber being put in the back of the net. I thought tonight would be the night where things cooled down, but I was wrong. Guys like McLeod keep finding ways to score, and Colorado now has 16 players with at least a goal (leads the NHL). Only Foote, Salei, and Hannan have yet to find the back of the net.

That's it for now. The winning streak will be put to the test Saturday against Buffalo...and if any team can score goals, it's Buffalo.

Ben Guite Anyone?

2008-10-23T14:35:00.008-06:00

Am I the only one who hasn't forgot about this guy? The Denver Post has had no articles on him (except for this non-related article), and the Rocky Mountain news has merely a short blog stating "The Avalanche scratched center Ben Guite for the third game in a row tonight."

I know McCormick has played well. I know the record with Guite out of the line-up is 3-0-0. The fact of the matter is that this team hasn't been playing any differently, but has gotten slightly better goaltending over the last three games. Colorado's penalty kill, however, remains dead last with only a 70.4% success rate.

Going into the season, my, and I trust most observers, mentality was "Well, the Avs didn't get a penalty killer, but at least they still have Guite." But now even that's not true! I've seen everyone from Sakic to David Jones killing penalties; no wonder it's in last place!

Don't get me wrong, I'm not under the impression that Guite is the second coming of Kris Draper or John Madden, but he's better than anyone else in the line-up. He had one goal in the three games he played, along with a team best 56.5 face off percentage.

I don't know if he'll be dressed tonight, but I think he should be. Just my two cents on a hard working guy currently getting the short end of the stick.

Budaj Back In Net.

2008-10-22T15:02:00.003-06:00

Peter Budaj will start tomorrow against Edmonton.

Can't say I agree with this move. Clearly, Colorado needs another goalie, so why not use logic when choosing a starter? Budaj's best game was against LA, and he still let in 3 goals on 29 shots. Not to mention that he completely blew the first game against Edmonton not two weeks ago.

I expect a loss, or a goal fest win tomorrow night. Colorado leads the league in goals for with 24 in 6 games, but is 26th in goals against, so far allowing 22. Honestly, when the season started I expected the team to be good and Budaj to be bad, but I thought it wouldn't be so out of control; I thought Colorado would be solid enough with Budaj, but eventually trade for a goalie...instead, they're scoring like Gretzky's Oilers, but Budaj is playing like Dan Cloutier was a couple years ago.

I guess we'll see what happens.

Ryan Smyth Should Play LA Every Night.

2008-10-20T22:58:00.003-06:00

Ryan Smyth led the way tonight with another two goal performance against the Kings; he now has 9 goals in the last 6 games against them.

That said, Colorado was heavily outplayed, and out shot 29-16. Budaj registered his 1st win of the season in easily his best outing. He let in one horrible goal to Oscar Moller, but was solid for the most part.

Stastny and Hejduk continued to light things up as well. In fact, that line is currently the best scoring line in hockey. Colorado doesn't get much attention in the hockey lime light, but people better start taking note of this trio;

Smyth (4 G, 2 A, +0) - Stastny (1 G, 9 A, +3) - Hejduk (6 G, 2 A, +3)

All-Star like numbers 6 games into the season- but it's only 6 games. Last year Mike Cammalleri was the first player to score 10 goals, but only finished with 19 on the entire season.

On another note, Darcy Tucker was injured near the 17:00 mark of the 3rd period. I'm not sure how serious it is, but hopefully he's alright. It's way too early for injuries to start rolling in, especially with this team. I hold my breath every time Smyth or Svatos has the puck.

The next game is...read the end of the previous blog. I totally botched that one.

Avs Hang On To Win 5-4.

2008-10-18T14:36:00.008-06:00

I think the Avs can thank Stars captain Brenden Morrow for being able to hold on at the end of this one. After having his goal called back, Morrow took two penalties- unsportsmanlike conduct and slashing- in the final 6 minutes of play allowing Colorado to hang on to the lead.

Raycroft was...decent. None of the goals were really his fault, but a couple of those could have been stopped. He really broke down in the third, allowing Dallas to get within one goal after trailing 5-2 heading into the period. Nevertheless, he's 2-0-0 now, which is great for him because he only won two games all last season.

Raycroft's brother in blue Darcy Tucker netted his first goal with the Avalanche on a great play by Wolski to create the 2-on-1 leading to the goal.

Also in the game, Stastny's 3 assists tied him for the NHL point lead with Minnesota's Mikko Koivu (9 points each). Not far behind is Avs Captain Joe Sakic (2 assists today), who's in a four way tie for the second most points in the league with 8. EDIT: I guess they gave that goal back to Smyth, so Stastny only has 8 points.

Even though this was a victory, it's still very apparent that at some point Colorado will have to trade for a goalie. Neither guy can come up with big saves, and Colorado's record should be higher than 2-3-0 when considering they lead the NHL in goals per game (4.0).

In other news, Scott 'The Sheriff' Parker cleared waivers and was demoted to Lake Erie. Not sure if this move is to make room for a call-up, but if that were the case, Willsie would be the prime candidate. His demotion during the preseason was a bit of a shock, and he currently leads the Monsters in both goals (3) and points (4).

That's all I've got for now. The Avs play next Thursday as they host the undefeated Oilers. Puck drops a 7:30 MDT.

Avs Wipe Out Flyers.

2008-10-16T21:44:00.002-06:00

There's not much to comment on here because the Avalanche were as dominant as they have been all season, but got some steady goaltending, and thus an easy victory.

Raycroft didn't have alot of work, but he didn't give up any junk goals either. Both goals- a Gagne penalty shot and Richards 5-on-3 power play goal- were almost unstoppable. Hopefully he gets the start Saturday in Dallas.

The power play looked better, connecting three times. The trouble is Colorado had 11 chances.

I'm extremely tired, so I'll leave it at that until tomorrow. All in all a great game.

Raycroft's Value

2008-10-16T12:24:00.002-06:00

As everyone already knows, Raycroft is starting tonight against the Flyers.

I'm going to make this short and sweet: if Raycroft can find his game some how, it'll be the sleeper signing of the summer.

He's got everything going for him. All he has to do is win tonight, and Granato will be hard pressed to start Budaj next game.

I'll comment more after the game, of course.

Re: This one’s on management

2008-10-15T08:12:00.016-06:00

Adrian Dater posted a blog late last night and I thought I'd comment on it.

All in all, I agree with it. The offseason was horrible. Colorado clearly had money to spend, but let a good goalie and a consistent winger walk, signed an aging oft-injured winger, and four other free agents that might not have been signed had Colorado not done it (Tjarnqvist, Raycroft, Willsie, Ledin).

In fact, Colorado's offseason was a laughing stock. Where's the logic of signing two guys that Toronto, a team in crisis, doesn't even want? Why couldn't management sign Markus Naslund, who makes an average of 4 million dollars over the next two seasons, instead of signing the mentioned players to a combined salary of nearly 5 million?

I won't jump all over the Tucker move. I'm fine with it; he's a good team guy. But all the other moves make very little sense. Cumiskey played nearly 40 games last season; was signing a player like Tjarnqvist to a one way contract necessary?

Couldn't some of the money have been used on one of the other free agent goalies, like Conklin, Kolzig, or even Curtis Joseph? I'll take any of those guys before I take Budaj, especially the first two. I was very hopeful Kolzig, who finished out last season 19-10-4 after Bruce Boudreau took over, would end up in an Avalanche jersey. Instead, fans watched in horror as Colorado bolstered it's shaky goaltending by adding a guy with the worst record in the NHL last season.

Pierre Lacroix needs to do something. Yes, the current president and former GM needs to work his magic once again. Do you, the reader, really think PL would have gone into this season with Peter Budaj as his starting goalie? I sure as heck don't!

And I haven't even got to talking about the penalty kill, which finished 22nd last year, and is currently dead last. Stephane Yelle wasn't signed until a month after the free agency period began, and only ended up signing for 750 K. If Avs management is willing to pay Willsie 800 K (not knocking him; he's decent in his own right), then where's the logic in not signing a player like Yelle? Willsie (when he gets called up...) will only see 4th line minutes, but Yelle could have helped Colorado get it's PK out of the gutter, at least making it somewhat respectable.

It's really been painful to watch. This team has a defense corps as good as anyone's, and the same can be said about it's top 6 forwards. The 4th line isn't too bad either. But a 3rd line lacking an identity and league worst goaltending have caused this team an 0-3 start.

If I were named GM of Colorado this second, here's the two simple moves I would make over the next week:

- Trade for Khabibulin. Clearly, he can still stop the puck. It doesn't matter how expensive he is; it's better to overpay and get a guy who can stop the puck than it is to underpay (Budaj) and get an 0-3 start to the season. Clearly Francois Giguere didn't follow that logic, deciding the penny pinch in the Theodore negotiations. I'd try to offer up Arnason, Salei, and Budaj.

Chicago probably doesn't want Arnason back, but everyone knows they need a center. Patrick Sharp should be playing the wing on the top line, not centering the 2nd line.

As for Salei, no offense to the guy, but he's overpaid, and this team doesn't need a #6 defenseman making over 3 million dollars. In Chicago, however, he'd be a #4 or #5 defenseman, and they could use a guy like Salei with their weak third defense pair (not to mention the 0-2-1 start). In the end, this move would cost Colorado around 1.5 million of it's current CAP space, leaving roughly 4 million to make moves with down the road.

If Chicago didn't want Arnason, I'd replace him with Svatos in the trade. I'd have no problem with that; Svatos is a one dimensional player who probably won't be in the league much longer with his injury problems and inconsistent play.

- Sign Yanic Perreault. He's not the best penalty killer, but he IS the best faceoff man, probably ever. He would easily fill Arnason role; especially considering he only had one goal less than Arnason last year, despite playing 20 less games.

This team needs to swing a trade. If any team has ever needed to swing a trade 3 games into the season, this is the team. The problems will not fix themselves; Smyth, Stastny, Hejduk, and Sakic won't be able to combine for 6 goals a game, which appears to be the only way Colorado can win with Budaj between the pipes.

Third Time Not A Charm

2008-10-14T21:59:00.002-06:00

If you don't feel like reading this blog, simply listen to a broken record. It will surely convey the same effect.

Colorado has scored 10 goals in the 1st three games, but are still winless.

Either the defense isn't doing it's job or the goalie isn't. If you've read any of my previous blogs, what I'm about to say will come as no suprise to you: Budaj sucks. He's horrible, terrible, bad. Say it anyway you want to.

The shots for are now 101; the shots against 74. This team should not be 0-3. I won't say they outplayed Calgary tonight, but that doesn't matter. They scored four times. Rarely should any team lose when it scores four times, let alone twice in three games.

Budaj has only stopped 82% of pucks he's faced, and I can honestly say I haven't seen a goaltender play this bad over a three game span in my life (well, maybe Cloutier in '07 while with LA, but he was playing hurt and with a bad team in front of him).

I wish my blogs didn't have to revolve around Peter Budaj, but they're going to everytime he blows the game. Both Bertuzzi goals should not have gone in, especially the 1st one. Pathetic.

Other things I noticed:

- McCormick was great. He was noticeable on every shift; not only for his size, but his speed. Svatos was a late scratch, and I'm glad. Svatos clearly isn't in game shape yet, and needs a rest.

- Wolski and Jones were both invisible tonight. Not a good sign for Jones, who's in the line-up for his fore checking ability and work in the dirty areas.

- Darcy Tucker's hair coming out the back of his helmet is 'sweet' looking. Shut up, you know it's awesome.

- Expect Raycroft to get the start against Philadelphia. That article, plus the fact that Budaj's GAA is 4.39. It's the perfect time for Andrew to win Avalanche fans over; all he has to do is let in less than 5 goals for his goaltending to be an upgrade over Budaj's.

Game 4 is Thursday in Denver. Puck drops at 7pm (9 pm est).

Time to give Raycroft a start?

2008-10-12T20:41:00.005-06:00

Once again, the Avalanche completely outplayed their opponent, but lost thanks to shoddy goaltending. Even the RDS announcer called it "a nasty victory" for Edmonton.

Budaj has never been able to come up with the big saves, and that fact hasn't changed so far this season. The first Penner goal was crap; I don't care what it hit off of, his pad should have been flat on the ice. It wasn't, and the puck went under his knee.

And naturally, with 5 seconds left he lets in another goal. I'm not saying it was his fault, but if his stick is flat on the ice I'm not sure the puck goes in.

Simply disappointing; Colorado should not have lost after out shooting the Oilers 33-19.

As for the rest of the team, no one particularly stuck out as bad aside from maybe Svatos and Salei; Svatos couldn't control the puck and had some pretty bad pass receptions, where as Salei made some very questionable defensive choices.

A player that stuck out to me was Leopold. Hopefully he can stay healthy this season.

That's it I guess. What else can you say? Colorado has outplayed both of their opponents (both good teams expected to push for the playoffs), but lost thanks to Budaj.

Hopefully Andrew Raycroft is in net next game, but don't be suprised if were treated to Peter Budaj yet again.

Theodore Pulled

2008-10-10T21:29:00.008-06:00

Former Av Jose Theodore was pulled after allowing 4 goals on 17 shots, as Washington dropped it's season opener in Atlanta 7-4. Theodore completely stiffed the Avs, rejecting a very fair two year deal which would have paid him 3.5 million per season , opting to sign a two year, 9 million dollar deal in Washington.

Maybe I was wrong in my blog yesterday about Theodore being better than Budaj. Nah, he is. But if karma exists, this is it. He left for more money, even though he'd be playing in Russia right now had Francois Giguere not signed goalie coach Jeff Hackett (a former teammate of Theodore) specifically to work with him.

Well, I'll finish off this cynical mini-blog by saying: Theo, worst of luck to you.

Pathetic, Peter Budaj.

2008-10-09T22:46:00.005-06:00

Budaj: Absolutely pathetic. Colorado's offense played a puck possession type game from start to finish, and peppered Thomas (who stood on his head) with 39 shots, including 20 in the first period.

Budaj faced 20 shots, stopping only 15....5 of which came off of Bergeron's stick. Arguably, you can't really look at one of the 5 goals and question why it wasn't stopped.

But that's the problem, and that's the reason Budaj isn't a quality starting goalie in this league: he can't come up with the big saves. He had a couple big ones on Bergeron, but that's only two saves in the entire game. Thomas had that many in single sequences.

You could argue the fact that this is only the 1st game of the season, and that Boston's offense is arguably better than it was last year, but I won't accept that argument. I wish I could; I wish I could say "wow, the defense really blew it out there tonight", but I can't.

Budaj has always been like this, and he always will be. Even if the Avs would have tied the game, I doubt they would have won. It was just a matter of time before Boston got in the zone again, and that would have meant another goal against Budaj. I have to believe that if Theodore, Huet, Khabibulin, Kolzig, or even Raycroft were in goal tonight, the Avs would have a 1-0 record.

The Offense: It was great. It reminded me of the old days, honestly. There were a few turn overs, yes, but overall a good job. Puck control was superb, and they looked like the Avalanche of '99 in the 1st period.

It's also looking like coach G is going to ride the first two lines until the tires fall off. Sakic played a whopping 22:36, and even David Jones played over 16 minutes.

Ryan Smyth, who logged 0 points, was easily the best Avalanche forward tonight. He was fast, did all the right things with the puck, and simply played Ryan Smyth hockey. Avs fans haven't been able to see much of that because of all the major injuries he sustained last season.

The Defense: Also very good. Liles looked like crap defensively (blame the Ryder goal on his laziness), but as a unit it was a great effort. The turn overs came from the forwards (as noted above), not the defense.

Brett Clark really jumped up in the offense tonight. This is the first time in his career that he's playing the left side, and I guess that means he'll be jumping into the play more.

Overall: They looked like a team that could have beat anyone had Budaj stopped more than 75% of the shots directed his way. A painful loss.

This blogger is not impressed.

2008-10-07T14:56:00.004-06:00

Ledin, Willsie, and Hensick were sent down to the minors today. Wow.

Hensick I can live with, seeing as it was set in stone once Joe Sakic returned that he, along with Stastny, Guite, and Arnason would be the top four centers.

Now to Willsie. This guy couldn't have played a better preseason, and all signs pointed to him not being cut. He killed penalties, did all the right things on the ice, and even scored 2 goals in 4 games. What else can you ask of the guy? You got me, but apparently Tony Granato thinks there is something in McLeod's, McCormick's, and Parker's game that isn't present in Willsie's. Maybe it's taking bad penalties.

Now on to Ledin. This guy is coming off a championship in Sweden, where in the tournament he started a healthy scratch but finished on the top line. In other words, the guy's a hard worker. He's McLeod and then some. And he got cut, after moving his family to Denver. Such a warm welcome.

This whole situation is a joke. Horrible, horrible moves. The Ledin move especially. In no bizarre universe should Cody McCormick have bumped Ledin for a roster spot. No way.

Impressive Preseason

2008-10-05T20:49:00.005-06:00

Well, the preseason is over, and like all of you I wasn't able to watch a single second of it. The good news is the Avs have done well, and finished 4-1-1 with an overtime victory over Chicago.

4 more players still need to be cut. I'm going to go ahead and say Willsie isn't one of them. According to the media outlets he's been good role player, and has two goals to go along with that reputation. I'm also doubting Jones is one, seeing as he has 3 goals in 2 games.

Of the two Cody's, McLeod will be the one to stay. I'm saying that based off of last season. He may not be as strong, but he's quicker and better offensively. Definitely more of a pest.

I can't comment on the other forwards, but I'm betting Ledin and Parker stick around.

Ryan Smyth, statistically, has had a great preseason. 5 goals and 2 assists in 4 games; it doesn't get much better than that. Of course, the preseason doesn't necessarily translate into the regular season. Tucker has also scored alot so far, spending most of his time on a line with Sakic (which doesn't surprise me), notching 2 goals an an assist in 3 games.

Overall, I must say the success of the preseason makes me think this team may be capable of doing something similar to what Montreal did last year, but there are still many questions:

- Can Budaj hold things down in goal?
- Can Colorado get things together on the PK and PP?
- Will Arnason show the same consistency he had in 2007?

and yes, I'll go there,

- Will Peter Forsberg return.*

Only time will tell. The season opens Thursday night at 8 pm (10 pm EST) as the Avs host Boston at the Pepsi Center.

*(Don't put too much stock into that silly rumor on hockeybuzz suggesting Sundin and Forsberg are planning a joint come back to Colorado. In fact, don't put too much stock into anything you read on that site.)

Random Thought.

2008-09-27T22:58:00.002-06:00

Like I said, the Hannan thing was just a rumor. He was fine tonight and played.

However, McLeod left the game early, and Liles apparently got a cut on the eye tonight Avs defeated the Kings in Vegas 4-3 in a shootout.

Injury Bug.

2008-09-26T19:40:00.005-06:00

Well, it looks like things haven't changed much from the end of last season. Here are all the latest casualties:

Hejduk - Back (unlikely to play Saturday vs. LA)

Jones - Groin
Svatos - Knee Surgery
Tucker - Ankle
Wolski - Foot

And not to spread a rumor, but Hannan was rumored to be injured during the rookie practice skate, and has since not played in a preseason game.

So, instead of having the tough decision of which 10 players to cut, the Avalanche will have to hope there are 23 healthy players to start the season.

More On Claude Lemieux

2008-09-25T14:47:00.005-06:00

I'm going to follow this closely; mostly because it's stunning to me, but also because I think it would be the coolest thing if he did make it back to the NHL- with Colorado, that is.

Lemieux has been working out with a fitness trainer for around the last 10 weeks trying to get his aging body back into shape. Also, he's been quoted (see above link) as saying he'd have no problem working his way up from the minors, and apparently has strong interest in returning to Colorado.

Now that's a confident man. To reiterate, I say sign him. He's inexpensive, he'll put people in the seats, he provides good leadership, and has 4 Stanley Cups to his name. That's a heck of alot more than can be said about some of the other Avalanche signings this summer.

Dater also speculates that Lemieux may be able to talk former Avalanche GM, and current president, Pierre Lacroix into signing him, and I think he's probably right.

Guess we'll have to wait and see. I'll comment more on this later.

Claude Lemieux wants back in?

2008-09-23T17:33:00.005-06:00

My french is a little rusty (damn near rusted completely), so I'll take the word on the street, which is that this article says "Lemiuex has been training intensely for 10 weeks." and other various things.

He wants back in.

The now 43 year old wants back in the NHL. Right. His last season in the NHL was in 2003, in which he split time between Dallas and Phoenix, scoring 20 points in 68 games. His last season of professional hockey was in 2004, where he played 7 games for Zug of the Swiss league (scoring 5 points).

Now, here's the real question: does Colorado, and it's fans, want this old man on their team? My answer is hell yeah!

There's no way he's worse than Detroit's Darren McCarty, so why not sign him to a 450K contract?

----

Roster cuts per Denver Post.

C Codey Burki ... Lake Erie (AHL)
G Trevor Cann ... Peterborough (OHL)
D Joel Chouinard ... Victoriaville (QMJHL)
LW Jack Combs ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C J.D. Corbin ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D J.P. Cote ... Released
G Peter Delmas ... Lewiston (QMJHL)
RW Rob Drummond ... Lake Erie (AHL)
LW Chris Durno ... Lake Erie (AHL)
LW Tom Fritsche ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C T.J. Galiardi ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D Cameron Gaunce ... Mississauga St. Michael's (OHL)
G Ian Keserich ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D Ray Macias ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C Bryan Marshall ... Lake Erie (AHL)
RW Mark McCutcheon ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C Chris Mueller ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D Wes O'Neill ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D Derek Peltier ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C Marty Sertich ... Lake Erie (AHL)
C Kelsey Tessier ... Quebec (QMJHL)
G Tyler Weiman ... Lake Erie (AHL)
D Nigel Williams ... Lake Erie (AHL)