Avalanche thoughts and attempted answers to questions

Good Saturday to you all. This will be a day of yard work for me, trying to fix those dead spots in my yard. Thanks to CHN subscriber and noted greenthumb Aaron Hinton for some tips. But I wanted to do an Avalanche Q&A on some pressing questions before getting out the shovel and grass seed.

What kind of contract will Cale Makar get on his next deal – long-term or bridge? Tough question. If Makar agrees to a contract any longer than four years, he’ll enter some of his “UFA years”, which the Avs would have to pay a premium on. That realistically could make his cap hit…gulp…$10 million or more. If he takes a shorter, bridge deal, he almost certainly wouldn’t get that much per year. There’s risk on both sides. If the Avs are locked in to some, say, eight-year deal at, say, $80 million and he gets hurt or underperforms, then the Avs would have a cap liability on their hands. If Makar is somehow allowed to go into his UFA year unsigned, then he could be lost for nothing. I’m going to predict a long-term deal, but in no way am I overconfident about that. I think it makes the most sense from an Avs perspective, though. You want your best players locked up long-term in most instances.