ESQ wrote: ↑Wed Oct 14, 2020 8:04 pm
I think we've had this debate a few times - either you're a big Sakic fan (understandable), or you're a big Avs fan (unforgiveable!).
So, Sakic started in 2013. He hired his buddy Patrick Roy as head coach, and rocketed off to a 52-win season. Surely, you would agree that season - the best regular season record in Franchise History - does not go to Sakic's credit, who made almost no moves other than re-acquiring Tanguay. Surprisingly, fan attendance remains low.
The following season, he started his process of trading off or letting go of very good young players, many of whom went on to win Cups. Starts with Stasny walking, while Sakic adds Iginla and Danny Briere. For reasons still unknown, Roy walks and the team middles its way to just missing the playoffs.
In 2015-16, he trades away ROR in an extremely lopsided trade. He signs Comeau on a fair UFA deal, and Beauchemin - who Sakic winds up having to buy out. Avs finish .500 and just miss the playoffs.
16-17: he really goes for the full-tank, having extended MacKinnon with a $6.3 mil cap hit after he'd established himself as a 50-60 point guy. Only 10 players on the team earn more than $2 mil. Sakic's trades acquire a pair of 4th round picks. Sakic strikes gold with Makar at 4th overall...but then extends Erik Johnson for $6 mil until he's 35.
17-18: Colorado establishes itself as a cap-floor team. However, Rantanen explodes to become a PPG player in his 2nd pro year. Thanks unreal years from Barrie, Mackinnon and Rantanen, the Avs are back in the playoffs! In spite of being a cap-floor team! Rebuild over! Sure, they were out in the 1st, but their young stars looked great!
18-19: The top line is the most dominant in hockey, Barrie's piling up the points, Soderberg is too, Kerfoot is an Elite 3rd Liner. And yet, Sakic sits on $10+ million in cap space. They look dominant in the 1st round, but lose to Ancient San Jose in the 2nd round. Sakic follows this up by:
- trading Barrie and Kerfoot for Kadri, acquiring a 3rd line center with grit...hey, I wonder how ROR would have looked in that spot?
- Trading Soderberg....off a 49-point season at 4.75 mil for one more year...for a 3rd
- letting Varlamov walk and going with career-back-up Grubauer and rookie Francouz
19-20: In spite of an encouraging step foward, Sakic decimates his goaltending and defence. He winds up with the 4th-lowest payroll in the NHL, but possibly THE lowest if he doesn't retain salary on Barrie. The forwards are hit by injury, but the top-end talent is so good they just roll through the reg season. In the playoffs, goaltending depth is pushed...and breaks. Meanwhile, Varlamov backstops the lunchbucket Islanders to game 6 of the ECF.
Interestingly, the year that Sakic dumps roster players is also the first year of the first Big Contract he's negotiated since Mackinnon - $9.5 mil for Rantanen. I think that's the 6th or 7th highest cap hit given to a player coming off an ELC. Taken to the cleaners? Certainly not a bargain.
In short, I don't think your two-chapter "playbook" of Sakic's really explains why he's spending at the floor year after year, and jettisoning so many players for such little return. This past season, imagine how they'd have done if they'd at least kept Soderberg? You call it a "value move", but Connauton and a 3rd is not value, its highway robbery. Neither asset will assist them last year, or this year - which coincidentally is the final year of Landeskog's bargain contract.
This year, I think Sakic is done making moves. He has 3 RFAs to extend, and that's it. Will Saad and Toews be enough to push Colorado through - finally - in the 7th year of Mackinnon's career and final year of Landeskog's bargain contract and final year of Makar's ELC?
Go back to Sakic's first year with Roy - the team was led by Duchene, ROR (2019 Stanley Cup, Conn Smyth), Landeskog, Mackinnon, Stastny (2019 Stanley Cup)
If you're talking about "finding value" in terms of bang for buck, I guess Sakic gets a lot of credit. But if you're talking about trading players and receiving better players, I don't see it in Sakic's record. I do see a team doing well for what its spending, but I see subtractions made for internal budget reasons and worse players coming back.
He inherited a team with a handful of lotto-pick players, won the lotto a few times himself, and hasn't taken advantage of a unique moment of high-value contracts in Landeskog, Mackinnon, and now Makar to go all-in.
Avs were the team to beat this year, according to yourself and myself and many others, but beaten they were.