Lessons learned from the Matt Duchene trade were on display in Colorado's selection of Justin Barron

Adversity often teaches us the most important lessons of how to navigate the unpredictability of life. Riding the emotional roller coaster through the fires of hell and back to the top of the mountain creates a natural learning environment.

What we take from those lessons often go on to define many of the decisions we make later on when presented with now-familiar obstacles.

Watching the Colorado Avalanche ignore the temptation to trade back or take the safe option at forward, the selection of Halifax defenseman Justin Barron was a lesson learned from the painful Matt Duchene departure.

When Matt Duchene requested a trade out of Denver, Joe Sakic told him he’d do his best to do right by him and get him somewhere that could compete but he wouldn’t compromise on his pricetag from other teams.

It took 11 months of shopping Duchene, who was the most sought-after center during those 11 months, but Sakic found two buyers willing to make a creative deal that would reshape the future of the Avalanche.

Little did we know back then that it would also help shape how Sakic built this club. You see, Sakic learned the hard way that the most expensive asset in the NHL is a cost-controlled young defenseman with top-four upside.

It’s so hard to find NHL-caliber defenders in the first place but getting them young and before they cost both top money and term for their inevitable decline is nearly impossible. Getting one of those players was a line in the sand for Sakic during the Duchene negotiations. He succeeded in prying Sam Girard from Nashville.

While Girard has been very good in his time in Denver, he’s hardly the kind of talent that changes a franchise. The struggles to get even Girard in the Duchene deal no doubt had a hand in Colorado’s decision to use their top two draft picks in June of 2017, six months before the Duchene deal, on defensemen.

Sakic had come to realize that if you wanted a quality young defender, you drafted them. You don’t go out and get them because teams simply don’t move them. Within six months, the Avs had added Cale Makar, Conor Timmins and Girard, as well as a first-round pick from Ottawa.

The Avs lucked out when Ottawa fell apart and tanked. They got lucky a second time when the Senators chose to use their pick in 2018, taking Brady Tkachuk and giving Colorado their 2019 selection.

Bowen Byram ended up the pick there as the Avs once again prioritized defense over forward as they eschewed the opportunity to take center Alex Turcotte, who went to Los Angeles with the very next pick.

Defense, defense, defense.

Now you look at tonight, where Sakic and the Avalanche coveted a number of defensemen. The forward class was strong but the Avs had eyes for two WHL defenders, Kaiden Guhle and Braden Schneider. They might have even talked about trading up for either player when they fell a little lower than expected as Guhle went 16th to Montreal and Schneider was snapped up at 19 by the New York Rangers, who traded up from 22 to acquire him.

As they went off the board, the Avalanche saw their options on defense dwindling but several forwards, J.J. Peterka and Noel Gunler in particular, they liked were on the board at 25. Peterka would have been similar to their selection of Martin Kaut in 2018 as a safe play on a projectable European player. Gunler would’ve been more of a classic home-run swing on a goal scorer with attitude questions.

Instead, the Avalanche selected a rangy defenseman whose struggles with a blood clot issue cost him a large portion of last season and will cost him 4-6 weeks of the ongoing QMJHL season after he had surgery to correct the problem. Enter Justin Barron, younger brother of Morgan, who happens to be best friends with Matthew Stienburg, selected by the Avalanche at the top of the third round last year.

“[Barron] had a procedure done and got a clean bill of health from the doctors,” Sakic said after selection Barron. “No issue there. Same sort of stuff a couple other players in the [NHL] have had and have had no problem after the procedure. We’re very confident in that.”

From Barron’s point of view, the decision was a necessary evil as it will cost him even more time this year but the hope is that it won’t be a problem moving forward.

“Getting the procedure done to fix what caused the blood clot was the right decision for me and my career,” Barron said. “We informed all the teams of that and sent them my medical records. At that point, it’s really up to them. Obviously Colorado kind of saw that the procedure was done well and it was a good decision and they can look past that and look at the bright spots in my game. I couldn’t be happier to be part of the Colorado Avalanche.”

For Colorado, this was a chance to add another great skater to their back end. Despite already building one of the league’s brightest young defenses, Sakic couldn’t resist adding another player to that mix.

“At our pick, he was the top player at our board,” Sakic said. “We were looking not necessarily position-wise but the best available player and it happened to be the d-man. As we know, you can never have enough good young defensemen. He’s a bigger guy, he skates real well, moves the puck, may not be the highest point producer but he plays a real, real solid two-way game. He’s going to really complement our [defense].”

Barron’s self-evaluation unsurprisingly comes pretty close to what Sakic said.

“I think I’m a two-way defenseman,” Barron said. “I think I skate really well and I think the game really well. I think those are probably my two biggest strengths. I kind of pride myself on being a guy that can play on the PK, play on the power play, play the last minute of the game, play against other team’s top lines. I think I kind of bring a mix in that sense of that two-way style defenseman game.”

As the Avs have guys in Makar and Girard who already pack some offensive punch, they’re preparing to add Byram to the mix next year and his dynamic puck-moving ability will only make them even tougher to handle. With Barron, they get another great skater but a less natural puck mover and a more polished defender.

Like I said earlier, we’re fortunate Justin was available for us,” Sakic said. “He was a guy that we had ranked higher than we got him. He’s really going to add to the way we like to play the game. We like to play from the back end, a lot of speed, a lot of puck-moving ability, and he’s a really good two-way player. He can defend well and penalty kill as well.”

Despite the glut of quality forwards on their board, Barron emerged as the clear-cut favorite when the Avalanche came on the clock at 25.

“Once we got to our pick and Justin was available, we didn’t want to move back,” Sakic said.

The other angle here is Colorado’s continued dominance of Nova Scotia, where they already iced Nathan MacKinnon and Ryan Graves on their NHL team. In their farm system, the Avs have other Maritimers in Stienburg, Alex Newhook and Shane Bowers.

Given the relative lack of talent to come out of the area, it’s interesting the Avs continue to invest so heavily in the region.

“It’s really special,” Barron said. “I think sometimes the Maritimes has been overlooked for hockey and prospects but in the past few years, we’ve shown we have a ton of really great players from around here. I think the hockey around here is on the come up and it’s only getting better. It was a long night sitting there but it’s all worth it. I couldn’t be happier to be part of the Avalanche organization.”

All those guys funneling into the organization makes it easy for Barron to get comfortable. While he received welcoming texts from MacKinnon and Cale Makar after being drafted, it’s the guys he already knows who will really make the transition easier for him.

“It was super exciting,” Barron said of finally hearing his name called. “You almost blackout there for a minute when you hear your name called. It’s pretty surreal. I know Alex Newhook, Bowen Byram, Matt Stienburg, Shane Bowers, I know all them pretty well. I was able to skate once with MacKinnon there before he was returning home to Colorado. It’s pretty to cool to see all the great players they have in the organization. A lot of them I happen to know and it’s special to now be a part of that.”

While the Duchene story was supposed to be the ultimate romance, it ended as a tragedy. It wasn’t without its lessons, however, and with those Sakic continues to write the next chapters of the Avalanche story.

We’ll see if tonight was the beginning of a love story.