Colorado Avalanche Trade Carl Soderberg, Get Defenseman Back

The Colorado Avalanche made a trade ahead of free agency, trading Carl Soderberg to Arizona in return for Kevin Connauton.

The Colorado Avalanche have traded center Carl Soderberg to the Arizona Coyotes. In return they’ve received defenseman Kevin Connauton and a 2020 third-round pick.

Soderberg was fifth on the team for scoring with 49 points (23 goals, 26 assists). Those numbers heralded his second-best points total and the first time he scored 20+ goals. Soderberg spent the majority of the time anchoring the third line.

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Kevin Connauton seems to be a third-pairing defenseman. He played 50 games for the Coyotes last season, recording 1 goal and 7 assists for 8 points. In all, he’s played 310 games in the NHL between three teams — his draft-team Dallas Stars and the Columbus Blue Jackets. He’s recorded 27 goals and 49 assists in that time.

The move looks a little puzzling. Soderberg definitely looks like a higher-end player, which is probably why the Coyotes had to sweeten the pot with the third-rounder. However, the Avalanche just got younger by four years — Soderberg is 33 to Connauton’s 29.

Kevin also comes with a lower price tag. Soderberg was on the final year of his contract with a cap hit of $4.75 million. Connauton also has one year left but at $1.37 million. So, that’s a savings of about $3.4 million. Not that the Avalanche needed that space since they had $35 million before the trade.

According to Ryan S. Clark of The Athletic, defenseman Ian Cole had surgery on both his hips. I didn’t know about that. We did know that defenseman Erik Johnson had surgery on his shoulder. Avs insider Adrian Dater considers neither will start the season on time.

So, suddenly, the Colorado Avalanche are out their two veteran defensemen. Tyson Barrie would be the closest to a veteran d-man, but maybe Colorado wanted to augment that field with Connauton.

Right now, though, the blueline looks pretty well filled. Even with Johnson and Cole out, Colorado has Barrie, Mark Barberio, Cale Makar, and Samuel Girard signed with Ryan Graves and Nikita Zadorov likely to get qualifying offers. They also have the potential of players such as Conor Timmins, Nic Meloche, Josh Anderson, and Mark Alt.

The trade does leave some questions open. Who’s going to take Soderberg’s place on the third line? Maybe Colorado thinks Tyson Jost, J.T. Compher, or Alexander Kerfoot will take that role.

The biggest question: How big a splash are the Colorado Avalanche going to make in free agency?

Well, a fond adieu I bid to Big Ol’ Carl. He had his ups and downs, but he definitely left us on a high note.