Why Mark Alt is back with the Avs

Tyson Barrie will miss another game Friday night against the St. Louis Blues. That will be the third straight, with a somewhat mysterious lower-body injury. We’re told at BSN Denver that Barrie may go on the next four-game road trip following Friday’s game. So, while it doesn’t seem like this is a serious, long-term injury, the Avalanche decided to shuffle the deck a bit on Thursday to add more help on defense.

Mark Alt is your newest Avs callup, after spending all of this season previously with the Colorado Eagles of the AHL. Forward Sheldon Dries was sent down to the Eagles to make room for Alt, the 6-4, 201, defender who played seven games with the Avs last season.

In 19 games for the Eagles, Alt had four assists and a minus-8.

Whether he plays against the Blues, we’ll find out after the morning skate Friday. I don’t think the Avs were all that thrilled with the play of their Nos. 5 and 6 D-men – Patrik Nemeth and Mark Barberio – against the Penguins, so this move might have something to do with that.

I’ll try to dig up a lot more information on Barrie at the skate tomorrow. Been out of the loop a bit the last couple days with some family sick-bay stuff, but things are looking up.

I thought Alt should have played in the playoffs last year, instead of either Duncan Siemens or David Warsofsky. I thought he added some good stuff to the Avs in their regular-season finale win over St. Louis, but Jared Bednar elected to go with Siemens and Warsofsky over him against the Predators.

The Avs did not practice Thursday.