Why the Avalanche's modest free-agent signings actually make good sense

I was just like a lot of you were when the day’s free-agent signings by the Avalanche were made official: I had to stifle of a bit of a yawn, but also wonder “Did the Avs just blow good money again on a couple of old guys that they’ll regret having on the books in a year or two?”

Vicariously, I watched in envy with the rest of you as Toronto announced with 100,000-watt marquee flash the signing of John Tavares, of the Vegas Golden Knights grabbing the next big bauble off the market, our old friend Paul Stastny, of boastful big-money statements made by Philadelphia (James van Riemsdyk) and St. Louis (Tyler Bozak). While some in the rest of the league showed off their new duds from Louis Vitton, it felt like we in Avalanche Nation had to smile and be happy with a day’s shopping at T.J. Maxx.

But as the news of the day – the Avs’ signings of defenseman Ian Cole and forward Matt Calvert – sank in more, I’m of the belief that the team is a better one now than it was on Saturday. No, Governor Hickenlooper probably doesn’t have to review any Stanley Cup parade plans through our fair city streets for next June just yet. These were fringe players added to the roster by Joe Sakic on Sunday, yet at prices that made some squirm when they first saw them Nearly $22 million was committed to these two combined for the next three years –  or $7 million more than the Avs spent on their entire team payroll in the Stanley Cup championship season of 1995-96.

We all know it’s an out-of-whack world when it comes to player salaries, and we all know hockey GMs never, ever, ever get tired of overpaying on free-agent day. But the money spent wasn’t my big concern when the signings were first announced. More like, “How does this make the Avs any better? And, what happened to Sakic’s early off-season statement saying the Avs might get even younger and faster by the time the pucks next drop? Are these guys going to stunt the growth of some of the young kids already in development?”

Let me give you my list of why I think this actually was a pretty good day for the Avs after all:

• First off, this is not a repeat of the Jarome Iginla-Brad Stuart-Francois Beauchemin off-season acquisitions of the team’s more recent, infamous past. Cole is 29, Calvert is 28. Those other guys were all in their mid-30s. They’re not old. Yeah, Cole is making a pretty hefty salary at $4.2 million, but the NHL salary cap keeps going up and that’s just the cost of doing business today. Calvert is making $2.8 million per, which is $800,000 more than Sakic made as a player in ’96, but, yeah, that’s inflation for ya.
• At least with the exchange of Blake Comeau (who left the Avs to sign with Dallas for, holy cow, three years) for Calvert, the Avs did get younger and faster. Calvert has some serious wheels and is considered a fine penalty killer, which was needed to replace what Comeau gave. Blue Jackets watchers tell me that Avs fans can expect at least one short-handed breakaway a week from this guy. Can he finish offensively? The career numbers seem to suggest no, but on paper at least, this seems like a good replacement for Comeau. Calvert is considered very tough, a heart-and-soul type of guy who is all about team and cameraderie and that other good hockey “in the room” stuff that doesn’t translate to analytics printouts. Watch this clip of him from a game in which he had a shot crush into his skull, only to leave and return with a WWI-style battlefield wrap around his head and score a big goal:

That’s the kind of guy I like on my team.

• Ian Cole has won two Stanley Cups as a player, both with Pittsburgh. Sure, Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin probably were more responsible for that happening than this guy, but he played a regular shift on those teams, including a combined 49 playoff games from 2015-17. He was the 18th overall pick in the 2007 NHL draft by St. Louis. He’s an experienced pro, and I always like having D-men in those years from approximately age 28-32. I think that’s when they best know the game and can still play at a level that is competitive. My friend Aaron Portzline, who covers the Blue Jackets for The Athletic and knows all things Jackets, actually said this about Cole to me today: “Ian Cole is a good, god damn player, man.” If a player has Porty’s endorsement, that’s a plus.
• Let’s keep this in mind about Cole too: The Avs may go into the season without the services of both Nikita Zadorov and Patrik Nemeth. Both are still rehabbing off-season shoulder surgeries and while Sakic said he is hopeful both will be ready by the start of the season, he isn’t sure. Cole could provide some really important, early-season defensive insurance. And, frankly, for any time of the season. He’s proven to be tough and durable as a player in his career, despite playing a heavy, physical game and a fearlessness about blocking shots (he was third in the league in that department two years ago). As Sakic put it in a conference call to a question of mine today, about why Cole was added to a team with seven D-men who played pretty regularly last year, “We learned you can never have enough depth on D.”Or, does anyone need a reminder about how the Avs went into the playoffs last year without their top D-man (Erik Johnson) and lost Sam Girard for a couple games against Nashville and had to give regular shifts to Duncan Siemens and David Warsofsky in some of the season’s biggest games? As colleague AJ Haefele smartly pointed out, too, that third year everyone is worried about with Cole’s contract could come in handy when/if it’s time to submit a list of unprotected players in a Seattle Expansion Draft in a couple years.

A few other highlights from the day and Sakic’s conference call, with added thoughts:

• Yes, the Avs were hopeful of getting a seat at the grownups table in the courting of Tavares, but Sakic said they never made the cut for the short list. Getting him would have made for a massively different day than it turned out for the Avs, and I’m surprised a team like Dallas got a rose to the next round instead of the Avs, but let’s face it: After Tavares posted that picture of him on Twitter, sleeping in Maple Leafs-embossed bed linens as a kid, did any team other than the Leafs have a real shot at him?
• I asked Sakic if he considered something more in the way of immediate scoring help, a “top-six” type of signing, and while he said he does want to improve the team’s secondary scoring still and might still take a look at what’s available on the market, it sounds more like kids such as Tyson Jost, Alexander Kerfoot, J.T. Compher and others will get more of the chance to fill the vacuum of a still unproven second line.
• Promising prospect defenseman Conor Timmins, who hasn’t done any real hockey activities since May following a concussion with his junior team in Sault St. Marie, is “slowly getting better”, Sakic said, and he didn’t seem worried about him being available starting with training camp. With a concussion, though, you always worry.
• We’ll have more tomorrow, with interviews with Cole and Calvert. Happy Fourth to all.