In the wake of a season that saw the Colorado Avalanche fail to live up to expectations, missing the playoffs for the second straight year, team brass was justifiably upset. In fact, they implied that changes may be coming.
“We’re not going to look for a quick fix, but we’ll have to explore options via trade, or whatever avenue to try to improve the club,” said Sakic in April.
Now, it seems that those changes might not just be tinkering around the edges, adding or subtracting a piece here or there. Instead, they might be the type that alter the very fabric of the franchise.
On Tuesday, TSN’s Hockey Insider Darren Dreger joined TSN 1040 in Vancouver to talk about, amongst other things, what he’s been hearing about the Avalanche’s potential offseason plans.
“The sense is that they’re willing to move just about anyone outside of Nathan MacKinnon,” said Dreger. “I find that to be a bit hard to believe, but Joe Sakic and the Colorado Avalanche are big-game hunting. They know that they’ve got to do something fairly significant to turn this organization around, and the only way you can do that is by being bold and making some moves.”
Now, for the purposes of this article, we will assume that Dreger’s sources are correct. That the only untouchable of Colorado’s roster is MacKinnon. Other than him, (almost) nobody is safe (more on that later). We will now look at the major players they are most likely to move.
Other deals may be made. I am sure the Avalanche would love to move Reto Berra or the contract of Brad Stuart. This article is not about those type of moves. This is about the big boys. Will all of the players listed be traded? God, I hope not. However, at least one likely will.
Without any further ado, here are five major players that might be moved, in order of their likelihood:
