Colorado Avalanche: Alternate Patrick Roy Reality
The Colorado Avalanche would have been a completely different team if it had been Joe Sakic, and not Patrick Roy, who resigned last summer.
Imagine for a second that things had gone down differently for the Colorado Avalanche last summer — you know I have. A lot.
It starts already late in the season. The team is free-falling out of playoff contention. It’s March 26, and GM Joe Sakic hears head coach Patrick Roy ripping into the team between the second and third periods of the Minnesota Wild game.
The Avalanche still go on to lose the game 4-0, and they still get eliminated from playoff contention. However, Sakic hears the blow up and decides to pull his old friend aside.
“Listen, Patty,” Joe says, “You’ve got to take these things in stride.”
“The team doesn’t have a winning attitude,” Patrick blasts back.
“They don’t, but that’s ok.”
Roy’s head nearly explodes. Red in the face, he demands, “How is that ok?!”
Calmly, Sakic explains that the team is going to go in a new direction. They’re going to move away from size and focus on speed and skill.
Roy rolls his eyes. “Speed and skill have always been an emphasis.”
“But now we’re going to sacrifice size for speed if necessary. In fact, we’re going to be getting smaller — but we’ll just say we’re getting younger and faster.”
Halfway through Roy is already shaking his head. “The team is going to get beat up. I’m not going to do that to my players.”
Sakic then utters the words that seals his fate instead of Roy’s. “You’re not going to have to worry about that. You’re going to just focus on coaching instead of player personnel.”
That gives Patrick Roy the head’s up sooner — Joe Sakic is trying to force him out. After indulging in an internal rage the includes observing Sakic wouldn’t even have one Stanley Cup, much less two, without his services, Roy begins to plot.
Patrick Roy overthrows the Colorado Avalanche hierarchy. He ousts Joe Sakic instead of vice versa. He intimidates the new general manager, Chris MacFarland, into giving him de facto control of the team and reminds assistant GM Craig Billington that he’s ever been Roy’s backup — and that hasn’t changed.
Let’s see what the Colorado Avalanche would have looked like if Patrick Roy, not Joe Sakic, had been wielding the reins last season.
2016 NHL Draft
My great pride is that in 2015, I predicted the Colorado Avalanche’s first three picks. I predicted Mikko Rantanen in a full first-round mock draft and both Nicolas Meloche and A.J. Greer in a seven-round Avalanche mock draft.
I’ve never managed that achievement again — the last two drafts have perplexed me. I had high hopes for that 2016 draft — I really thought I’d make the same predictions. See, the reason is I listen — when Patrick Roy spoke, I listened. I’ve been doing that with Joe Sakic, but it hasn’t helped me pre-determine what moves he’s going to make.
Anyway, if Patrick Roy had wrested control of the Avalanche from Joe Sakic, I’m pretty confident I know who Colorado would have chosen at least with their first round draft pick: Logan Brown. Here’s what I said at the time of Brown:
“Brown is the whole package — and it’s a big one. His height (6-foot-6) gives him the stride to be fast while his overall size makes him a mountain on the puck. Brown is a hard worker with elite puck and stick skills.”
In fact, I was so confident that the Colorado Avalanche were going to choose Logan Brown that, when Joe Sakic said, “From the Penticton Vees…” (Tyson Jost‘s BCHL team), I thought he was mis-pronouncing “Windsor Spitfires,” Brown’s major junior team. Or having a seizure.
Brown was so in the Avalanche’s mold of player — big, speedy, skilled and mature for his age.
In that same mold was who I had the Avalanche picking with their #40 spot, Tage Thompson — also a big, speedy, skilled, mature player. After the second round, it’s almost impossible to predict who a team is going to choose, but I had by eye on Gabriel Sylvestre, a good-sized defenseman who’s very scrappy but also has keen puck-moving skills, for the fourth round.
Instead, here is the list of who the Colorado Avalanche chose:
- Tyson Jost, center
- Cameron Morrison, left wing
- Josh Anderson, defenseman
- Adam Werner, goalie
- Nathan Clurman, defenseman
- Travis Barron, left wing
Now, there’s no way I can say Logan Brown is achieving more than Tyson Jost as he’s an alternate captain in the OHL, while Jost has transitioned into the NHL. Jost’s signing already with the team was largely based on the Avs’ need, and Brown may have been signed, too. However, Brown suffered a wrist injury last year, so he may not have made the transition as well.
Concerning my two picks versus who the Avs actually chose, Tage Thompson has already signed his entry-level contract with the St. Louis Blues and appeared in 16 games with the AHL affiliate. Gabriel Sylvestre is playing in the QMJHL.
From the Avs’ actual picks, Cameron Morrison has completed a year playing college hockey at the University of Notre Dame. There’s no news that he’s signing with the team yet. However, the Avalanche’s sixth-round pick, Nathan Clurman, will be there next season. Josh Anderson and Travis Barron both just completed major junior seasons — also no word on their signing with the team.
Alexander Radulov
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Right wing Alexander Radulov was considered a major sticking point between Joe Sakic and Patrick Roy. Roy had coached him in the QMJHL and wanted the explosive forward for the Avalanche. Sakic didn’t want to throw a bunch of money at a player who’s been bouncing back and forth between the NHL and KHL.
Last year the Montreal Canadiens took a flyer on Radulov. They gave him a one-year “show me” contract worth $5.75 million. Radulov earned 54 points (18 goals, 36 assists).
To put that in perspective, that’s a higher point total than any of the Colorado Avalanche players — Nathan MacKinnon led the team with 53 points. Only one player, Mikko Rantanen, surpassed Radulov’s goal total, though Matt Duchene did match it.
Contract-wise, that’s less money than either Matt Duchene or Nathan MacKinnon makes. It is, in fact, Gabriel Landeskog money.
Radulov is a supremely skilled winger who could have been had for the price of the Avalanche’s actual acquisitions, Joe Colborne, Patrick Wiercioch, and Rene Bourque. They combined for 38 points (20 goals, 18 assists).
Plus, you have to think Radulov would have helped the top players to be better — in fact, his CorsiFor% was 58.5% last season. The best Colorado Avalanche player was Gabriel Landeskog at 52.8%.
Now, I know Alexander Radulov is a player for the win-now team, and the Avalanche are clearly in a rebuild. However, what did Colborne, Wiercioch or Bourque do to help the Avs rebuild? Would it really have been so bad to spend $5.75 of the Kroenkes’ money to have been a little better team last season?
Matt Duchene Trade Rumors
The Matt Duchene trade rumors started when Duchene started out the 2015-16 season in a slump. He scored just one goal in all of October. Patrick Roy mentioned Duchene’s slump a few times in pressers, and the media took off with the notion that Roy was trying to get rid of Duchene.
However, unbeknown to us at the time, Patrick Roy actually took Duchene aside and showed him video of his own goals from previous seasons. Roy emphasized the fact that Duchene habitually scored by driving the net or hanging around the slot area.
Duchene said of his intervention:
“[Roy] pulled me aside and we watched video; he’s very perceptive in terms of the visual sense, and he helped me return to that foundation to what makes me go and what makes me, me.”
Indeed, Matt Duchene did him, and that resulted in an historic November. In 14 games Duchene scored 11 goals and earned 20 points. Those numbers were good enough to make history. He was the first Avalanche player to score 11 or more goals in a calendar month since Milan Hejduk did it in February of 2003, so first in 12 years. He also broke Claude Lemieux’s record for scoring goals in November — Lemieux scored 10.
The pace of scoring was frenetic. He earned at least a point in 11 of 14 games. He also had six multi-point games, including three three-point nights. Those numbers were good enough to earn Duchene third star of the month for the entire NHL.
Part of that was also Roy shifting Duchene from center — which carries a lot of defensive responsibility — to wing.
Matt Duchene struggled again last season. Where he had a career year for scoring goals (30) under Roy, he managed only 18 with Bednar. Yes, I daresay Patrick Roy would have been able to do again what he’d already done — get Duchene out of a goal-scoring slump.
The slump last season helped spark the trade rumors. However, Roy being the fiery man with reporters that he is, I venture he would have squashed them. He would have stated he was not trading Matt Duchene. Because he knew that a mental Matt doesn’t score goals.
Then, if he felt he needed to, he probably would have traded Duchene at the deadline when his stock was the highest.
Is that dishonest? Yes. Is that kinder to Dutchy than having the trade rumors thrown in his face at every turn? Also yes. A quick pain is better than torment, which is why you rip a bandaid off rather than peel it.
But you’ve got to have balls to pull off a move like that. Then again, I don’t think there’s a lot of people who would claim Roy doesn’t have balls.
Tyson Barrie Trade
Joe Sakic was cruel to Tyson Barrie last summer. He took the young defenseman all the way through salary arbitration then gave Barrie what he wanted anyway. He put Barrie through having to hear the team say nasty things about him just to prove a point to Barrie and his agent, Pat Morris. (Also Ryan O’Reilly‘s agent.)
Patrick Roy wouldn’t have done that to his player. Whatever faults he found with Barrie’s game — and the only “insult” he laid on Barrie was to joke the young rover reminded him of Sandis Ozolinsh, who created scoring chances on both ends of the ice — Roy was a player’s coach, and he didn’t make players twist in the wind with him.
No, Patrick Roy would have gotten Barrie to sign a deal, and then he would have traded him. Roy probably could have gotten a good return for Barrie — a young forward, a defensive prospect, and a draft pick.
For example, last year there was talk of trading Barrie for Drouin. I imagine Roy could have gotten a defensive prospect and a draft pick for, say, Barrie and a later round draft pick out of his old rival, Steve Yzerman.
That wouldn’t have been a bad haul. The Avs would have still needed help on defense, but then, Roy wouldn’t have traded away Nick Holden. And before you go writing something nasty about that observation in the comments section below, I’m not saying Holden is better than Barrie.
But then, Eric Gelinas was a Roy-guy, too. So, the d-corps could have looked something like this:
- Erik Johnson–Nikita Zadorov
- Eric Gelinas-Chris Bigras
- Nick Holden-Francois Beauchemin
Patrick Wiercioch may have been on that team, too.
It’s not ideal, but remember that the Avs would have had another defensive prospect waiting in the wings via trade as well as a shiny new forwardm — Jonathan Drouin, not Joe Colborne, up front.
Colorado Avalanche Record
In reality, the Colorado Avalanche had a 22-56-4 record in the 2016-17 season. They got just 48 points — 34 points fewer than they had in the 2015-16 season.
Now, one of the reasons pundits and fans claim the Avalanche dropped so quickly is because Roy left them in a lurch “right before” (in reality 6 weeks) the season started. If Roy had stayed, that reason is removed.
I personally think a large part of the reason is because the team took a 90-degree turn last offseason. Because they started going in a different direction, the pieces from the old mold held them back. Again, if Roy stayed and continued implementing his style, that reason is removed.
You could point out that the team was sliding under Roy already. The Avs went from 112 points to 90 to 82 in his three seasons. The first points drop is 22 with the second being just eight. Let’s average the two — 15 points.
If the Colorado Avalanche had dropped just 15 points instead of 34, that would have put them at 67 points — still not enough to make the playoffs, but a sight better than dead last by 21 points.
Maybe Roy’s team would have managed to meet their 2016 points, putting them at #23 in the NHL. Still not in the playoffs, but significantly better than #30 by 21 points.
Let’s say the team ended up somewhere between 67 and 82. You know what two teams ended up in that range? The Dallas Stars (79) and New Jersey Devils (70). Let’s see, they didn’t make the playoffs, but something really good happened to them…
2017 NHL Draft
If the Colorado Avalanche hadn’t finished dead last in the NHL last season, they would have had a better chance of winning the #1 or #3 draft pick. That’s not statistically true, but it’s how this year’s draft lottery played out.
If the Avs had finished #24 in the NHL, they’d have had the #3 draft pick. The #26 spot would have won them the first-overall.
Let’s not be greedy — let’s give Colorado the #3. Heck, they could have kept the #4 because Patrick Roy would have never selected Miro Heiskenan anyway — he just doesn’t believe in choosing defensemen so high.
You know who he would have chosen? Gabriel Vilardi, a statistical wizard who’s big and so-talented. He’s also a player who can transition into the NHL right away.
I won’t go too much farther into the draft with my speculation, but I daresay Roy wouldn’t have been able to pass on defenseman Nicolas Hague, who went #34. Hague is a gigantic 6-foot-6 left-hand shot who’s got excellent skating and skill.
Roy may have even traded a couple late round draft picks — say this year’s and next year’s seventh rounders — to move up. That would have let the Avs choose both Hague at #34 and another player — say center Isaac Ratcliffe — at their own position.
By the way, Patrick Roy would have never lost Calvin Pickard in the Expansion Draft. He liked Pickard’s “swagger.” He definitely would have exposed Semyon Varlamov, the Vegas Golden Knights would have chosen Andreas Martinsen (because Roy wouldn’t have traded his size for Sven Andrighetto‘s speed), and the Avs would still have their goalie tandem intact.
Related Story: Final Word on Why Roy Left
Related Story: Roy Had No Beef with Duchene
The alternate Patrick Roy reality would have been a better one. It wouldn’t have been perfect — the Colorado Avalanche have too many depth issues that still need to be addressed. However, the Avs’ 2016-17 season wouldn’t have been embarrassing.
I think we would see the Avs moving more strongly toward their future betterment in this reality, though. It’s not just that Roy has superior vision — we all know that I believe he does. It’s also the fact that the team wouldn’t have taken that 90-degree turn last summer.
Last year’s Colorado Avalanche wouldn’t have been hindered by players that no longer fit the mold because Roy would have been building toward the same mold. And maybe, just maybe, the Avs would have had a chance of making the playoffs next season, which they certainly don’t have in this reality.
Editor’s note: Congratulations, Avs Nation, on making it through the third post in my five-post Roypocalypse Remembrance/Roy was Right series. Though I have one more post to go, here is a fun video about dancing horses, as promised.