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Colorado Avalanche: Considering the Justus Annunen Signing

By Nadia Archuleta

PLYMOUTH, MI - FEBRUARY 15: Justus Annunen #31 of the Finland Nationals follows the play against the Sweden Nationals during the 2018 Under-18 Five Nations Tournament game at USA Hockey Arena on February 15, 2018 in Plymouth, Michigan. Finland defeated Sweden 5-3. (Photo by Dave Reginek/Getty Images)*** Local Caption *** Justus Annunen
PLYMOUTH, MI - FEBRUARY 15: Justus Annunen #31 of the Finland Nationals follows the play against the Sweden Nationals during the 2018 Under-18 Five Nations Tournament game at USA Hockey Arena on February 15, 2018 in Plymouth, Michigan. Finland defeated Sweden 5-3. (Photo by Dave Reginek/Getty Images)*** Local Caption *** Justus Annunen /
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The Colorado Avalanche have another goalie in their stable, Finnish star Justus Annunen. What will he mean for the team’s goalie situation?

On Thursday, the Colorado Avalanche signed their 2018 draft prospect, goalie Justus Annunen, to his entry-level deal. It’s a pretty standard entry-level contract for the 20-year-old third-rounder — three years at $880,833, $70,000 in the AHL.

The Avalanche now have a proper goalie stable. If you discount Michael Hutchinson, whom they picked up as a rental and is an unrestricted free agent this summer — the Avs now have four goalies signed at least through next season. Antoine Bibeau is an unrestricted free agent, while Hunter Miska will be a restricted free agent. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Colorado sign one or both.

Without signing those two pending free agents, Colorado still has a good tandem for both the NHL and AHL levels. That gives them the depth of call-ups whenever the inevitable injury bug bites.

Side note: We now know what manner of bug has been biting the Avs all season — it has to be that murder hornet.

Back to Annunen, who’s a much more pleasant topic. He’s been playing for the Kärpät of the Liiga, the premier hockey league in Finland. (It’s the one Mikko Rantanen played for.) He started 22 games and recorded a 1.76 goals against average and 0.921 save percentage. He also played for Finland’s U20 teams this year.

Here’s Annunen in action:

He makes some solid saves. He has good positioning. I like what I see there.

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Now, on the face of it, Annunen seems to be just a depth signing. However, since the beginning, Colorado has been trying to draft the goalie of its future. That’s never happened thus far. The goalie of their future has always been a player they traded for. In fact, I like to joke that I’m watching how the Washington Capitals’ goalie prospects are developing to see who our next starter will be since our last two came from there.

Colorado has tried to draft their next star. They took Marc Denis with their first-ever draft selection in 1995. They chose him in the first round, but he still played only 26 games for the team. They did a little better with Calvin Pickard, who played 86 games for Colorado.

The closest they came to drafting their own starter was with David Aebischer and Peter Budaj. Aebischer played in 214 games for the Avs, Budaj 242. He’s probably the closest they had to a homegrown starter.

Would you say that Budaj rises to the level of even Philipp Grubauer? Would you call him a Semyon Varlamov? It’s hard to put him there.

The hope is that maybe Justus Annunen will be that player down the road. Maybe he’ll leapfrog over Adam Werner. Or maybe they’ll spend the next season competing for the starting job and a chance at the big club.

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Like I said, the Colorado Avalanche look pretty well set at goal tending for a change.

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