Denver Post sports writer Adrian Dater posts his Avs Mailbag each Monday during the 2005-06 NHL season on DenverPost.com.
To drop a question into the Mailbag or visit DenverPost.com’s .
Adrian, I’ve been looking at the players that are still on the Avs lineup, and there are many more than the required 22 or 23 men. Will the Avs be forced to make some difficult decisions, like sending Wojtek Wolski back to the juniors and/or cutting veteran Jason Krog? Thanks for your input, Adrian. You do a great job.
— Tyler, Parker
Thanks, Tyler.
Well, I think there will be a couple of tough choices for the Avs to make, but I doubt Wolski will be sent back to junior – at least at the start of the season. The injury to Milan Hejduk is one reason why, but Wolski has already shown enough for me to think he could play at this level already. He’s got good hands, has strength on the puck and is aggressive going to the net.
I think most of the cuts will be to the remaining rookie defensemen such as Jeff Finger (who looked good in ) and to a guy like Vitaly Kolesnik. I think Peter Budaj might have sewn up the backup goalie job with his play in Vegas. He played very well, and Kolesnik is only going to play in one of the three remaining preseason games. That obviously is a major hint that he won’t survive the cut.
Adrian – What effect does a shootout have on a goaltender’s goals-against average?
— Joe Miller, Centennial
Joe – Good question, and the answer is: none.
Officially, there will be no goals added to a player’s totals when he scores in a shootout, nor will any goals be added to a goalie’s GAA. And, even if a team scored, say, three goals in a shootout and won the game because of it, they will always win by a final margin of just one goal – not three.
Peter Forsberg, gone. Adam Foote, gone. Paul Kariya, gone. Vincent Damphousse never got here. Milan Hejduk already has a bad knee. Peter Budaj is the backup netminder. One extended injury to either Rob Blake or Joe Sakic, and this team might not even make the playoffs. (And let’s not even get into the Brad May signing!?) So tell me, why should an Avs fan be excited about this season’s outlook?
— Chris Wiedrich, Phoenix
Chris – O ye of little faith!
Yes, there certainly is the cynical side to things about the state of the Avalanche, and I’ve been there with you at times this summer. I’ve been on record that the Avs will sorely miss Forsberg at some point, probably when the games get bigger late in the year. I know he’s often injured, but I don’t care; he’s still irreplaceable in so many ways.
The other stuff won’t be as big a deal. Kariya gone could be addition by subtraction. The fact is, people didn’t like Kariya in his one year here. He was perceived as selfish, and he and Teemu Selanne were a disaster.
Damphousse? No biggie, he was done. Foote? Yes, a loss, but maybe not as big as first feared. At 34, he might have a little tougher time in this new league. Not that he was a big clutcher and grabber, but that was somewhat part of his game. He might be making a few more trips to the sin bin this season.
So, let’s see what happens at least to start the season before we carve up the Avs. With a new coach and some different chemistry in the dressing room that I’ve noticed so far – that is better than last season’s – maybe they’ll surprise us.
Who will pair with Rob Blake on first-line defense? Thanks.
— A. Stanton, Denver
A. – Last season (2003-04) it was mostly John-Michael Liles, and it’s been that way so far in the preseason, so there you go. It’s a pretty good pairing, although I wonder if a more stay-at-home type wouldn’t be better for either D-man to play with, considering they are both mobile and offensive minded.
Do you think that this season might be considered a rebuilding season for the Avalanche?
— Ron, Broomfield
Ron – Well, as I alluded to before, I think it’s still too early to pass any kind of judgment on this team. Sometimes a team that loses more big-name talent than it replaces can make up for it with more teamwork and chemistry.
That said, yes, I do think we’re in more of a “rebuilding” year than in any we’ve ever seen here before. I think one way the organization is rebuilding right now is in its farm system. All those trades for all those big names of recent years have taken a toll on the system, and I think the Avs have much more of a mindset in restocking it.
Hey, Adrian. What will happen if a team starts the season above the salary cap (as New Jersey could)?
— Alan Wemmenhove, Apeldoorn, Netherlands
Alan – Well, it can’t happen. I mean, if the league sees that Jersey or any team is above the cap number by opening night, that team will immediately have to cut salary to get under.
Even teams with injured players who make a lot of money cannot be over the cap with their replacements. Meaning, whoever is on the roster, injured or otherwise, the overall payroll must be at $39 million or below. It’s a harsh new world for the richer teams, that’s for sure.
Do you think that the legacy of the 1996-2003 teams, now sealed by the Forsberg/Foote departure, is “under-performance”? Why would a team that at various times had the best goalie and the best player in the game, along with (at various times) Sakic, Blake and Foote, win fewer Cups than Detroit and New Jersey? I realize that there are lots of teams that would have been
happy with two Cups, but they didn’t have this team’s talent. Is it will over skill?
— Adam Berger, Boston
Adam – That’s a question I’ve tackled before with others in coffee shops and barstools with various Avs people over the years, and I think the overall answer is no, it is not a record of underachievement.
The fact is, winning the Stanley Cup, I believe, is the hardest team title to win in sports. It takes an unbelievable amount of talent, hard work and luck. And if any one of the three is at all lacking, it won’t happen for a team. That the Avs have won two Cups in the last 10 years is by definition very successful.
That said, most longtime Avs watchers say the Cup they should have also won, the one that got away, was the 1999-2000 team. That was the “best team lost” team that Pierre Lacroix bemoaned after they lost to Dallas in a second straight seventh game.
Some will disagree, especially those from Dallas, but I think the Avs were, in fact, the best team in that series and in the entire league that year. They blew Detroit away in the second round and outplayed Dallas for the majority of the time in the Western final. But they were their own worst enemy at key times, and the fact is Patrick Roy wasn’t nearly the best goalie in the series. Ed Belfour was.
So, the Avs probably should have that third Stanley Cup. On the other hand, think of all the fortunate things that had to happen in both the years the Avs did win the Cup. Remember the no call on Jeremy Roenick in Game 4 of the ’96 series with Chicago. Without that gift from Andy Van Hellemond, the Avs probably lose that series. So, it works both ways.
I think what we can safely say about the Avs of the last 10 years is that they were a consistently excellent team that was the best in the world twice, along with a team that suffered a couple of disappointments along the way. Overall, though, there are lots of teams that would like to be considered an “underachiever” like the Avs might be to some.
Hi, Adrian. I would like to know where you think the Avs will finish in the standings this year.
— Shannon, Pincher Creek, Alberta
Shannon – I recently made my picks for a couple of national magazines, and I slotted them seventh in the West. We’ll see how time treats that pick.
Adrian Dater has covered the Colorado Avalanche since the team moved to Denver in 1995. To drop a question into his Mailbag or visit DenverPost.com’s .
