The Colorado Avalanche are fresh off what might be their most disappointing loss of the season. They blew a 3-0 lead to the Edmonton Oilers, to fall 4-3. It was a night that seemed to flip a lot of the team's established trends, and not in a good way.
Colorado has made a habit of slow starts, and strong finishes. Thursday's loss was the exact opposite of that. They raced out to a big lead, and then slowly crumbled, as they got outworked by the Oilers.
The recap of that debacle has already been covered by MHS. What I have to say is no less pleasant, but perhaps necessary. Simply by virtue of it being painfully obvious at the moment, I felt I must try to address Casey Mittelstadt‘s slump.
Casey Mittelstadt has 26 points on the season. That is good enough for fourth place on the team: behind Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar. Those three all-world talents are expected to produce at a high pace, and they do it consistently.
For a guy like Mittelstadt, the burden of expected excellence is a little lower for good reason, but he is nonetheless viewed as a vital part of the team's overall success. Mittelstadt was the team’s biggest deadline acquisition last year, and his extension was Colorado's most financially significant move in the offseason.
Indeed all signs were pointing to a potential breakout year for the 26-year-old forward. The season started rocky for the Avalanche as a whole, but Mittelstadt was actually an early bright spot, especially for a team so limited with early injury problems.
Thus CMitts slumping so hard right now is drawn into very sharp and drastic focus. By the numbers, the drop off in production is stark. Mittelstadt's story has gone a lot like the game against Edmonton did last night in fact. Mittelstadt tallied 6 goals and 7 assists in October, for a total of 13 points. I'm not a math wiz, but that's easy to calculate. Exactly half of Mittelstadt's offensive production came in the first month of the season.
In the ensuing two and half months, Mittelstadt hasn't been able to chip in nearly as often as he or the coaching staff would like. There are a multitude of reasons for that, as is always the case in hockey.
Mittelstadt's second line, which he was signed to lead, has been in constant flux with all the aforementioned injuries, but that was the case from the beginning, and nobody wants to hear excuses.
Indeed fans and media are starting to chirp about a possible trade that would see Mittelstadt out of Colorado. I want to throw some cold water on that idea. Not only because I think it would be the wrong move for the Avalanche, but also because I don't believe the front office would punt so quickly on a player they have invested in heavily.
Having watched how Joe Sakic and Chris MacFarland assess and evaluate talent, it is clear they take their time in making big decisions. The massive goalie swaps we have seen this season may have your average fan feeling trade-happy, but that is simply not the Avalanche philosophy. If anything, the team's patience with Alexandar Georgiev proves my point.
The Avalanche have shown repeatedly that they are loyal to their players. The cases of captain Gabriel Landeskog and Valeri Nichushkin may be different in nature, but also illustrate this core quality. Putting aside the question of loyalty, trading a young top six player with term left would be seen by other GMs as a panic move, and actually could tank the return value.
For now, I believe that coach Jared Bednar is playing the situation smart, by bumping Casey Mittelstadt down to the fourth line. It's obviously not what you want to see, but a reduction in ice-time and a return to the meat and potatoes basics of hockey, mainly hard work, and checking, could be good for Mittelstadt.
Fans might remember that Mittelstadt was similarly 'demoted' for the New Year's Eve game against the Jets. The unfortunate injury to Valeri Nichushkin that night almost immediately forced a shift in that thinking, but Mittelstadt responded by scoring the game winner.
Casey Mittelstadt is naturally a pass-first guy. That's fine for a second line center on a healthy Colorado Avalanche team. But right now, the squad is anything but that. I think that the way through this dry spell is a lot like the larger Avalanche issues in microcosm. Mittelstadt might be able to rediscover his offensive game by shooting more.
As much as we fans hate to see it, key players sometimes get into extended funks. Mittelstadt is clearly in one right now. However, the Colorado Avalanche spent literal years looking for a reliable 2C. I don't see them giving up on Mittelstadt for two and half months of subpar results.
In a worst-case scenario for Mittelstadt, I believe he would still be given the remainder of this season to figure things out. It sounds almost crazy to say more than halfway into the season, but we don't even know what a fully healthy Avalanche lineup looks like, so evaluating Mittelstadt's fit is a long way from complete.
Colorado might be patient and/or loyal to a fault, but you don't get one of the better reputations in the NHL as a solid organization by acting flighty. As I told one friend, who proposed a hypothetical trade to me mid-game against the Rangers, the offseason might be different if teams come knocking. Specifically, if the Avalanche are looking for a fast way to find money to retain Mikko Rantanen.