Avalanche Send Out Qualifying Offers; Interesting Players Let Go Around NHL

Friday afternoon was the deadline for teams to hand out qualifying offers to their restricted free agents. To the surprise of absolutely no one, the players the Colorado Avalanche qualified were some of the last to come to light.

Based off what we already knew, there were no real surprises.

The five players who did receive qualifying offers (so the Avalanche can keep their rights) are:

• Bowen Byram
• Ross Colton
• Ben Meyers
• Justus Annunen
• Sampo Ranta

Again, no surprises. Ranta has left for Sweden for two years, but we knew the Avalanche were going to qualify him to keep his rights. Byram and Colton are the big ones, and I anticipate a Colton extension will be finished pretty soon. And as for the other two, everyone expected them to get qualified, and extensions should be easy to figure out for them.

The Avalanche did qualify Alex Newhook before he was traded, and I’m hearing the Canadiens may be giving him some good term on his new deal, whenever that’s signed.

The two players who did not get qualifying offers…

• Denis Malgin
• Ryan Merkley

We knew Malgin was not going to get a qualifying offer the other day, and the reason is fairly obvious – arbitration. He has a good case, and would make more than what the Avalanche would prefer to play. He’s not the only RFA around the league to not get qualified because of the fear of arbitration, and we’ll get to that.

As for Ryan Merkley, I’m not surprised. He struggled with the Colorado Eagles after being acquired, and is a very frustrating player to watch, which I went over in the film room. The Eagles scratched him for the playoffs, as Sam Malinski essentially came in and took his job.

Both of them are now free agents and can sign with anyone.

So that’s it for the Avalanche, but there were some good players around the league who did not get qualified, and it makes the start of free agency even more interesting.

We have confirmed that we have captured all 113 players that did not receive Qualifying Offers by today's deadline on the site.

The full list of 2023 RFA's not qualified for your viewing, sorting, and filtering pleasure:https://t.co/t99DHb1Hp2

— PuckPedia (@PuckPedia) June 30, 2023

Some interesting ones to note, in relation to the Avalanche…

• Michael McLeod
• Christian Fischer
• Morgan Geekie
• Daniel Sprong
• Noah Gregor
• Maxime Comtois
• Denis Gurianov
• Jesper Boqvist
• Klim Kostin

And more. Certainly makes free agency a lot more fun. Some of these players could still return to their old teams, but now that they’re free to talk to anyone, why not see what’s out there?

We’ll be ready for anything tomorrow. Make sure to follow CHN on Facebook and Twitter for any updates as well.