Tyson Jost's tumultuous tenure in Colorado ends with deadline deal

Well, the writing had been on the wall for a bit here and after the last two trade deadlines of close calls, Tyson Jost’s tenure in Colorado has officially ended with the trade today that sent him to the Minnesota Wild in exchange for forward Nico Sturm.

The how’s and why’s of Jost never developing into the top-six forward many envisioned when he was drafted 10th overall in 2016 can be left for another day. In reality, they just aren’t important today and he will get an increased role with the Wild to show the Avs misused him in his tenure here.

Jost’s usage aside, money also was a driving factor in this deal here as his $2M salary signed through next season will give the Wild a little cost certainty at a time they badly need it and it saves the Avs $1.25M on their cap thanks to Sturm’s $750K salary.

That money saved can immediately be applied to whatever Colorado wants to do with the rest of the trade deadline as they continue big-game hunting for an impact forward.

Putting all of that to the side for now, let’s get to know Colorado’s latest acquisition.

Nico Sturm – The Good

At 6’3″ and 206 pounds, Sturm is certainly bigger than Jost and is, at least in theory, built better for the playoff experience. Sturm as a fourth-line center immediately helps Colorado in one area that Jost was not useful and that is faceoffs.

Winning 51.7% of his draws this year, Sturm can immediately replace Jost on Colorado’s fourth line and penalty kill (Sturm was third on Minnesota in PK ice time) and the chances of him winning a faceoff are much better than with Jost, who was a truly terrible 39.3% in the dot.

Between just those attributes (size, PK ability, faceoffs), the trade makes sense for Colorado. Too often this year the Avalanche simply weren’t getting enough out of their fourth line and trying to find a taker for Darren Helm or Nicolas Aube-Kubel is likely not realistic, making Jost the obvious odd-man-out in the situation.

With Sturm, he will fill a niche in Colorado as Joe Sakic and the front office continues trying to raise the floor of his roster. The fourth line has been a consistent vulnerability throughout the season and Sturm addresses that. Let’s dig into some of the fancystats to get a look at what he brings to the table.

The WOWYs (With/Without You) aren’t everything but they again tell the story of a productive role player.

Drives play? Check
Prevents chances against? Check
Scores the occasional goal? Check
Avoids taking penalties? Check
Plays against decent competition? Welllll…no.

And if you’re looking for a ceiling on Sturm, that’s pretty much it. While he’s a 13.7% career shooter, he’s very limited offensively with 17 points this year and last year in 50 and 53 games played, respectively.

He’s a fourth-line center who won’t hurt you but doesn’t significantly move the needle forward, either.

Given the money involved in the deal, if Colorado uses those savings to do something wild in the next week, this looks even better. If they take those savings and just sit on them, it’s not really maximizing that aspect of this deal, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world if that’s what they decide to do.

Nico Sturm – The Bad

So you have an idea of what Sturm does well and where he falls short.

Let’s start with the offense because 11 goals last year and nine goals this year are certainly encouraging in that he can finish some chances, but 14 assists in 103 games isn’t great. It’s not really a meaningful step forward from Jost’s production, which was part of the problem with Jost in that role.

Now, with Sturm, you’re hoping he continues the solid PK play and wins faceoffs at a higher clip that even if the production remains the same, he makes up for it in other facets. There’s also the physicality aspect to consider given the notable size difference.

The problem is that Sturm isn’t overly physical. While he has 61 hits compared to Jost’s 44, that isn’t a sizeable difference across the 50+ games each has played this season. They didn’t go get a crash-test dummy in Sturm, just a bigger body that occasionally will throw his weight around.

Unlike yesterday’s deal for Josh Manson, this doesn’t significantly add the element of physicality to the fourth line. It’s there, just not as much as you’d think with the Sturm’s size.

You also lose the kind of bizarre element of Jost’s game that was a no-doubt positive and that’s penalties drawn. Sturm, who takes almost no penalties, draws almost nothing in terms of calls. Sturm has only been called for four penalties this year while drawing six, which is a major departure from the 24 penalties Jost has drawn this season.

It’s not a huge thing, but having your fourth line put you on a power play was one of the few things Jost could actually hang his hat on that Sturm isn’t likely to replicate.

On the business side of this, Sturm is already 26, meaning he’s heading into free agency at the end of this season. While a new contract for him likely won’t be too expensive, if he was such a stalwart 4C, why were the Wild already actively looking to replace him (they offered his role to one of their college prospects before he turned them down while informing the Wild he wouldn’t be signing with them)? The team that knows him best, having signed him as a college free agent in 2019, was already actively looking to move on.

I understand the Jost upside conversation and that explains why the Wild were happy to acquire him, but they seemed perfectly content moving on from Sturm. That gives me some pause.

The other thing that had me curious was the conversation around him being built for the postseason. We often say that about players simply because they are big and the postseason is where all reason and logic goes to die as hockey gives in to its base neanderthal instincts and reverts to the overly physical, penalty-filled-but-not-called kind of game that they insist on removing from the regular season to better sell the game.

Fine, but how did Sturm actually do against Vegas last year?

I have this in “bad” category but it’s really not good or bad because Sturm held his own in some ways and gotten beaten up in others.

At the end of the seven-game series, Sturm had produced a 45.22% CF at 5v5. Not a good mark, but it was actually seventh-best among Minnesota’s regulars. Goals were only 2-2 with Sturm on the ice during the series and he scored an empty-net goal to seal Game 5 while adding an assist in Game 6.

Those are solid numbers. Where it got hairy was in the quality of chances as Sturm’s expected GF% at 5v5 was just 38.09. The Knights had advantages in scoring chances (28-22) and high-danger chances (12-6) with Sturm on the ice throughout the series.

All in all, some good, some bad.

In truth, this is a minor move for the Avalanche this year. It feels like the move before THE move, but we’ll see how Colorado chooses to utilize the additional cap space.

In the immediate, Sturm helps a little and losing Jost hurts a little. It should be a net positive for Colorado, but not substantially so.