Colorado Avalanche May Get Defense Help in Andrei Mironov

The Colorado Avalanche may be bringing defenseman Andrei Mironov, their fourth-round pick in 2015, from the Russian KHL.

The Colorado Avalanche drafted Russian defenseman Andrei Mironov in 2015 in the fourth round. He’s been playing in the KHL for the Dynamo Moskva since 2013.

However, it sounds like he’s coming over to North America. According to an article in the Russian news outlet Championat, Dynamo GM Andrey Sanfronov stated that Mironov is “heading to Colorado.” The stated reason is that the Colorado Avalanche are rebuilding their team, and Mironov wants to try his hand in the NHL.

Mironov is a good-sized defenseman at 6-foot-2, 194 pounds. He’s already 22 years old as he wasn’t drafted until the age of 20. Hockey’s Future considers him a “bruising” stay-at-home defenseman with “enough puck skills to help get the puck out of his zone and to his teammates.”

Future Considerations considers Mironov more of a two-way defenseman who’s “feisty” and “gets under the opponents skin.” The site also states that Andrei is a good puck mover.

Imagine Mironov doing this to, say, a Minnesota Wild player:

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According to Avs insider Adrian Dater, Andrei is a hard-hitting defenseman who patterns his game after Darius Kasparaitis. To be honest, I find that intriguing — I always loved Kaspar’s brand of annoying hockey, all the way back to his time as with the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Apparently Mironov coming to Colorado isn’t a done deal yet — Dater states that Avalanche spokesman Jean Martineau remarked there’s no deal in place.

I don’t see why the Colorado Avalanche wouldn’t offer Andrei Mironov an entry-level, two-way contract. He’s had pretty good success playing in a professional league already, the KHL. At 22, he’s nearing his prime as a defenseman. So, what you see is what you get with him without a lot of gambling.

Andrei Mironov can be a nasty player:

He wasn’t overly nice to former Avalanche Joey Hishon either:

Here he is rocking Russian fashion:

The Avalanche need to improve their prospect pool, especially when it comes to defense. The team only have four players definitely on contract next season — Erik Johnson, Tyson Barrie, Francois Beauchemin and Mark Barberio. Now, it’s expected that Colorado will sign Nikita Zadorov and hoped they will buy out Francois Beauchemin.

That still leaves some open roster spots. In the roster the Avalanche have Chris Bigras, Anton Lindholm, Sergei Boikov, Mason Geertson and Nicolas Meloche. They may offer yet another limbo contract to Duncan Siemens. Of those prospects, though, I see only Bigras and Lindholm as legitimate contenders for a roster spot out of training camp.

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That means the Colorado Avalanche might indeed have use of a rather big, rather mean Russian defenseman, perhaps as the seventh d-man in the lineup.

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