Trade Deadline: Colorado Outlook

By Richard Gonzalez

The NHL trade deadline ends Monday, February 26, 2018, at noon Pacific Time, 3 PM Eastern Time.  The Colorado Avalanche are currently outs of de a playoff spot and have 69 points. The Avalanche have surprised the hockey world and instead of being in the running for the draft lottery pick, they’re flirting with a spot in this year’s playoffs. 

The Avalanche were in a different situation last year. They were at the bottom of the standings and the season was over. The Avalanche were more seeing as sellers as all eyes were on Joe Sakic to trade anyone, expect Mikko Rantanen and Nathan MacKinnon. This included captain Gabriel Landeskog and former Avs’ forward Matt Duchene; however, due to the high asking price from Sakic, neither were traded at last year’s trade deadline. 

Last March, the first move the Avalanche made was trading forward Joe Whitney to the Arizona Coyotes for forward Brendan Ranford. The next trade was trading defensemen Cody Corbett to the Washington Capitals for goalie Joe Cannata. The Avalanche next traded forward Jarome Iginla traded to the Los Angeles Kings for a conditional fourth-round pick in the 2018 draft. The last trade the Avalanche made was with the Montreal Canadians, where we saw each team flip forwards Andreas Martinsen and Sven Andrighetto. 

This year, the Avalanche are in a position to make the playoffs. Some might not consider this team a Cup contender yet but some also thought the Avalanche would be at the bottom of the standings. This year’s deadline is tricky though. Obviously, the ultimate goal for each team, no matter where they are, is to better the team and to sucker a contending team to overpay on players that are on the block.

Adrian Dater of BSN previously reported that the Pittsburg Penguins had interest in forward Carl Soderberg; however, the Penguins recently acquired Derick Brassard from the Ottawa Senators, which Dater also mentioned in his tweet, so they are out on that.

The Avalanche have five unrestricted free agents, which are the following: Blake Comeau, Gabriel Bourque, Mark Barberio, Jonathan Bernier and Andrew Hammond. They also have restricted free agents in the following: Matt Nieto, Nail Yakupov, Patrick Nemeth and Siemens Duncan.

According to TSN’s trade bait list, Comeau and Tyson Barrie are the two Avalanche players listed. 

The Avalanche are the second youngest team in the league and I figure that is the route they will continue to go. Comeau has played well enough this season to maybe could get a fourth or maybe even a third-round pick. 

I really don’t think the Avalanche will make a big splash and trade Barrie by the deadline. If any deal involving Barrie would most likely occur during the offseason if they are even considering that. I haven’t seen a lot of rumors regarding Barrie though. I did read that Jeff Skinner, Max Domi, and Michael Grabner were potential players the Avalanche could consider picking up. Grabner recently got traded to New Jersey so we can scratch his name out. The other two players will most likely require Sakic to overpay which we all know how he won’t be willing to do. 

I think the biggest trade the Avalanche will make is moving Comeau if they even move him at all. I can’t really see the Avalanche making any big splashes this deadline. Maybe bring in some defensive help but not any big names that will be considered rental players. 

I will be live tweeting during the deadline so when or if anything goes down, I will be posting the accurate information as soon as it’s available.

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February 26th, 2018