Colorado Avalanche: RFA Qualifying Offers and New Schedule

The Colorado Avalanche made some surprising moves on an otherwise inconspicuous Tuesday. Lost in the hullaballo was the introduction of the 2019 draft class.

The Colorado Avalanche kept busy today as they first traded away veteran center Carl Soderberg then introduced their new draftees to season ticket holders at Pepsi Center. Oh, and today was the deadline for teams to make qualifying offers to their restricted free agents.

Not surprisingly, the Avs didn’t extend a qualifying offer to winger Sven Andrighetto. He started out with such promise for a team that was so bad — they traded away Andres Martinsen to the Montreal Canadiens in 2017 in the midst of that dreadful 48-point season.

However, though he scored the game-winning goal in Game 5 of the playoffs in 2018, he never lived up to his promise. Andrighetto was often injured and could just never seem to get on track, especially the last season-and-a-half.

Rumors were circulating during the playoffs this year that Andrighetto was entertaining offers to play in the KHL. The Swiss-born player may well go that route, but he stated at the time he was focusing on the present. If he can’t get on with an NHL team, he’ll likely go the European route.

Meanwhile, three more players failed to get qualifying offers:

• Spencer Martin, goalie
• Julien Nantel, forward
• Mason Geertsen, defenseman

To be honest, I’m pretty cheesed off about that last one. There was no reason to let Geertsen go. In 58 games with the Eagles, he earned 16 points (3 goals, 13 assists). He was a physical presence on the ice and a leader both on and off the ice. Maybe he was never going to crack the NHL roster, but he was very serviceable at the AHL level, so why not QO him?

I could say a little of the same about Julien Nantel, though he struggled. He definitely performed better at the ECHL level than AHL.

Spencer Martin didn’t come as too big a surprise. He just never panned out as the future of Avs goaltending, even as a backup. Colorado Signed Adam Werner to an entry-level contract this year, and they still have Peter Kvaca on the hook.

Plus, according to Avs insider Adrian Dater, the lines of communication are still open between Colorado and Semyon Varlamov. I have to say, I’m going to be annoyed if the Colorado Avalanche traded Carl Soderberg so they could free up cap space to overpay Varlamov.

Anyway, Colorado initially didn’t tender a QO to Sergei Boikov but later sent one to him. Why they chose him over Geertsen, I’ll never know.

Other players who did receive a QO:

• Alexander Kerfoot
• JT Compher
• Vladislav Kamenev
• Ryan Graves
• AJ Greer
• Dominic Toninato
• Sheldon Dries
• Anton Lindholm
• Mikko Rantanen
• Nikita Zadorov

Those last two are the tricky ones. Mikko Rantanen is going to be the highest paid Avalanche player unless Colorado gets into a bidding war over Artemi Panarin. And Zadorov may well go to salary arbitration.

Moving on to the new schedule. The Colorado Avalanche will begin their 2019-20 season at home hosting one of their latest playoff rivals, the Calgary Flames. Here’s the entire schedule:

We’ll see Carl Soderberg back in Colorado the following week, in Game 4 of the Avalanche’s season. The other most notable game is February 15, when the Avs host the Kings at the Air Force Academy stadium in their latest Stadium Series appearance.

The Colorado Avalanche are in the midst of holding their Prospect Development Camp. Free Agency Frenzy starts next Monday, and after that we have the true offseason.