Colorado Avalanche Mailbag: Old guys, the future of the defense, and Mikhail Grigorenko's future

We’re back with another edition of the Colorado Avalanche Mailbag and we have a minor change as the venerable Casey Lucas is on vacation, forcing you to be stuck with little old me today. While we received the usual array of entertaining questions about Andreas Martinsen‘s tanning habits or firing unpopular players into the sun, this week we chose to act as a crystal ball as we received a fair number of questions about the future of this team.

As always, we love receiving the questions we do for the Mailbag! If you’d like to send one in for a future iteration, simply tweet at us (@BSNAvalanche on Twitter) with the hashtag #BSNMailbag or email us. Our email address is BSNAvalanche@gmail.com.

Thank you to everyone who submitted questions this week!

When will we start to see Iggy or Tangs as the nightly scratch? –@ceimbert

Ahhhh. This is a sentiment that’s beginning to crop up more and more as the team struggles to find a consistent second scoring line. Jarome Iginla has scored just one goal since November 10 and Alex Tanguay has just eight points in 20 games played. Beyond just their point totals, both players have struggled significantly in the defense zone and their fancy stats aren’t exactly sterling. Given their advanced age and combined salary cap hit of $8.83M, it’s fair to say the Avalanche and fans alike have expected a bit more.

Tackling the issue of scratching them, however, is a different animal altogether. They’re both veterans extremely well-respected in the locker room and both players are coming off seasons in which they were either the top scorer (Iginla) or tied for second (Tanguay). An underwhelming 31-game start isn’t going to undermine years of quality production in the NHL.

That said, Head Coach Patrick Roy has not been shy about sliding both down the totem pole from the start of the season. Iginla especially has begun to feel the sting of demotion as he has been moved off the top power play unit, taken away from the top line, and seen his minutes drop from the 18-19 range at the beginning of the season to 15-16, with an near-season low 11:18 versus Nashville this past weekend. Scratching them is still highly unlikely but it’s clear the shine is coming off the veteran duo just a bit in the eyes of their coach.

What do you think the Avs defense will look like opening night 2016-17? What about 2017-18, given who is in the system at the moment? –@refguy13

Obviously peering into the crystal ball and trying to predict the future can be a tricky proposition. Who would have figured the Anaheim Ducks would have valued Francois Beauchemin so little to as allow their veteran blueliner to walk after such an excellent season last year? Or that the Avalanche would have overvalued Brad Stuart so much after the 2013-14 season when it clear to so many others he was rapidly approaching the finish line?

Next year, however, the Avalanche are staring down the barrel of something they haven’t had much of on the blueline: graduation from the AHL. The obvious candidate here is Nikita Zadorov, who began the year in Denver this season before being demoted to be given big minutes every night for the San Antonio Rampage of the AHL. While Zadorov certainly has been impressive for the Rampage (and maybe playing with a little too much confidence…), it remains unclear when his return to Denver is expected.

Of the guys currently inhabiting Colorado’s blueline, Nate Guenin and Zach Redmond are both unrestricted free agents after the season and it would go down as a mild surprise if the organization brought either player back to the team. None of the other guys are expected to go anywhere and Brandon Gormley has grown increasingly proficient in his third-pairing role as the season has worn on.

I’m going to go with a conservative estimate for the 2016-17 defense and say it looks something like:

Francois Beauchemin – Erik Johnson
Brandon Gormley – Tyson Barrie
Nick Holden – Nikita Zadorov
Brad Stuart – Duncan Siemens

And for opening night in 2017, I’ll just replace Stuart with Chris Bigras. No bold predictions today!

What’s the ideal role and expectations for Grigorenko going forward? –@tigervixxen

Mikhail Grigorenko‘s progress so far this season has been nothing less than one of the most pleasant surprises of the season (at least to me, who had low expectations coming in). He’s steadily worked his way up the lineup and forced Patrick Roy to play him with higher quality linemates during the team’s recent injury-plagued stretch. Now with the forward group getting healthy again, he’s back to fourth line duty but it’s more of him being the victim of a numbers game than an indictment on Grigorenko’s play.

Moving forward, the rest of this season is going to be huge for how the team views him moving forward. John Mitchell, who has been excellent in his various roles this season, is still a better fit as a center of a depth line and not receiving more than about 13 minutes of playing time per night. If Grigorenko, whose defense has been consistently excellent, can continue to improve in the faceoff circle and gain confidence offensively, I think his ideal role is at the second line center going into next season.

With Carl Soderberg being cast in the “defensive stopper” role, the glaring lack of a true second scoring line has emerged as a problem for the Avalanche. Ideally, Grigorenko would find his offensive touch, become a 50-point threat, and spearhead a remade second line that includes Mikko Rantanen next season.

That’s it for the questions this week! Thank you again to everyone who submitted questions. If yours did not make this week’s edition, they might be saved for next week!