Deen's Daily
Deen’s Daily: Rantanen Sends Avalanche Home — An Offseason of Questions Begins
Mikko Rantanen had a third-period hat trick to send the Avalanche home. Now begins an offseason of questions for Colorado.
All that and more on this edition of Deen’s Daily — May 4.
Colorado Hockey Now
Well, that may have been the worst loss in Colorado Avalanche history. The Avs led 2-0 with just over 12 minutes remaining, but let in three goals in 8:15 to watch their season slip away.
They lost another Game 7. And they, because the superstar they traded away a hundred days ago, got the last laugh.
No moral victories now. The Avs are out in Round 1 and have an offseason to figure out what to do next. Who will be the general manager? Who will coach this team? Who will play second-line center? Those are just some of the things that might need to be answered in short order.
And most importantly, how in the world does this team build a roster to win after trading away Rantanen, only for him to end up back in your division?
Read More: History Lesson: The Avalanche Haven’t Won a Game 7 in 23 Years
Tonight’s Schedule
- Game 7: St. Louis Blues at Winnipeg Jets (5 pm MT on TBS)
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Avalanche Mailbag 2.0: Revisiting the Mikko Rantanen Saga
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Avalanche Mailbag 1.0: Coaching, Management, & What Went Wrong in the Playoffs?
The reasons for trading Rantanen were legitimate. However, MacFarland got the short end of the stick. He traded Rantanen mid-season, only for him to later be traded again to his main division rival. Rantanen hadn’t made a big impact in the series until Game 7. He was invisible through the first two periods, but then, luck seemed to be completely on his side as if fate wanted MacFarland to pay for his mistake. Rantanen benefited from teammate interference on Lindgren, allowing him to gain control of the ice and take a solid shot for his first goal. Then, Makar broke… Read more »
A veteran GM would have held out for this stipulation to the deal: Rantanan could not be traded to a list of Western teams this season. And the Stars would have been on the list, obviously.
I’m making over $13k a month working part time. I kept hearing other people tell me how much money they can make online so I decided to look into it. Well, it was all true and has totally changed my life. This is where I started
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HERE—————⊃⫸ https://tinyurl.com/4e9eczre
Yup..it’s luck & the “hockey gods” jesus, do you believe in tarot cards & black magic too. Just because you change your handle doesn’t make your argument & points any less dumb. It’s not that complicated. You don’t trade a top 10 player in the world during his prime over a small bridge in contractual demands. You figure out a way to pay him & make it work. But nope..McFarland tried to be slick & wanted to try & be the smartest guy in the room. Which he clearly is not. You’re telling me the Avs just as the Canes… Read more »
So just to be clear. The Avs did not lose this series. Mikko single handedly won this series all by himself. Ii amazes me that the coaches and management didn’t realize this. If they had, I am certain they would have traded every other single player on the team, watched Mikko bring the cup home all by himself. Only 1 problem. Mikko still would have walked in free agency, which was the plan all along. So we traded away the cup this year, so that we could have a team next year. All snark aside. I couldn’t wait for your… Read more »
You’re smarter than this man. First off, why do you assume I was referring to you as one of the idiots? Yes you were seemingly fine with the trade & have been consistent about not liking the way Rants played at times in Colorado. Lackadaisical, etc. To my knowledge you didn’t make dumb comments such as he was a “Mackinnon merchant”. If you did…then yes. You need to accept that you look like an idiot now lol. We obviously disagree & always will regarding how the situation was handled. He should still be an Av period. Even if he did… Read more »
You can call me IDIOT as many times as you want but the numbers support my words. The sample is far too small for you to say that Rantanen is not a Mackinnon merchant. I still believe that he is. This season, Rantanen has had its worst performance in the last 5 seasons with a good deviation from its standards. Is Mackinnon a Rantanen merchant? It doesn’t seem to be the case since Mackinnon had his 2nd best season of his career, despite playing in the 4 Nations Cup final and being named player of the tournament. If you analyze… Read more »
Ok. If I were you I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting on Rantanen’s decline. Then again …maybe you should. We’re going in circles at this point. If you really believed the bullshit you’re trying to sell. You wouldn’t feel the need to continously make the same detached from reality argument. How, after what we just witnessed can you sit there & still maintain that the Avs are better off with Marty “ice queen” Necas. As oppose to future hall of famer & one of the premier playoff performers of this era at least, Mikko Rantanen? We don’t need to converse… Read more »
Aarif, do you think they are going to fire McFarland or Bednar? I know knee jerk reactions are the norm in hockey. As angry as I am about that awful loss, I don’t know that it would be wise to hit the reset button just yet. Let’s not forget that people said this was basically the Western Conference finals in round one due to the dumb playoff format. Dallas was the higher seed, and we still took them seven.
The poor performances in the playoffs have been going on for 3 years now. We’re not just talking about a mistake in this case.
I agree with you that three years in row isn’t just a mistake. But I put the blame more on MacFarland than Bednar. The Mikko trade was terrible. I understand trying to get something rather than lose him for nothing, but he should’ve made darn sure Mikko was going to sign where he was traded so he didn’t end up back in the division. And honestly it goes back to signing Val instead of Kadri after the Cup, the Val situation took them down the last two years.
It’s easy to say in hindsight that Kadri would have been a better choice than Nichushkin. No one could have predicted what would happen with Nichushkin over the past two years. He was arguably the Avalanche’s best forward during the 2022 Stanley Cup Final against Tampa Bay, a true locomotive. I believe this failure falls on both MacFarland and Bednar. MacFarland never seemed to discuss trading Rantanen and didn’t appear to influence Bednar’s coaching decisions. More specifically, Bednar always played Rantanen alongside MacKinnon. Given the circumstances, I think this prevented MacFarland from accurately assessing Rantanen’s true value. MacKinnon is… Read more »
Actually, Compher’s last year in Colorado. Rantanen played very often with him on the 2nd line. And he elevated Compher to a 50 plus pt season. And got him that overpay from the Wings. There seems to be this bizarre need from everyone within the fan base to rationalize the Rantanen deal. Whether at the time it happened & even now. It’s not complicated you pay him. Even if you end up going over your desired number. Since you referenced the Blackhawks. What did they do after they won their first cup. They paid A LOT of money to Kane,… Read more »
I think the Kroenkes sent a message to their sports empire with the firing of Nuggets coach Michael Malone. Will the Avalanche and Arsenal leadership be next after disappointing seasons?
If nothing changes nothing changes. The Avs have to move on from Bednar and/or MacFarland or we will just continue to have these disappointing playoff losses (probably to Dallas) in the future. The Cup year is looking like the fluke now and the norm is getting knocked out early.
The first move should be the releases of the head coach and GM. This team needs to get tougher and smarter. Bednar is not the former, and MacFarland is not the latter.
Just think: If MacFarland hadn’t made a panic move before the trade deadline, the Avs would have had seven of the top nine players on their Stanley Cup championship team intact for the playoffs Only Kadri and Kuemper would have been gone. Bet that would have been plenty good enough to beat the Stars in what could turn out to be the Western Conference finals. Another trip to the Stanley Cup Final would have been worth the risk to keep Moose for the remainder of the season.
Those 7 players would have been MacKinnon, Rantanen, Landeskog, Nichushkin, Lehkonen, Makar & Toews. Yup!!
Something was up with Makar this series. Maybe an undisclosed injury but he was not himself. That was a big reason for the power play woes.
Was Necas even on the ice or did Kiviranta just put on an 88 sweater occasionally? Yes. the Moose trade was hasty and botched, but this was a win-able series and Bednar can’t hang with DeBoer. The PPs are the real story. They score on them and we don’t. Makar’s presumed injury certainly played into the ineffectiveness, but Bednar had bad matchups, even with a depleted Dallas team in Denver that they exploited. Girard directly contributed to two go-ahead goals for Dallas in the series by getting muscled off the puck and failing to clear or being out of position.… Read more »
Lekhonen mack nuke necas landeskog ??????
That’s the top 6
Coyle colton wood kelly drury LOC
That’s the bottom 6.
Toews makar manson Girard middleton
That’s our defense.
With that being said wood colton girard manson should all go in my opinion.
Id sign donato and Bennett and trade for luostarinen and mikkola.
Fire bednar hire Peter Laviolette
Dump:
Drouin, Malinski, Girard, Wood, Necas, Nelson.
More food for thought than an actual question, but if the Oilers lose in the 2nd or even 3rd round, they may very well be in the same spot that we are. That being the need to find success in the imitate. Could there be any moves between the two? I doubt any of the big 4 move (Mackinnon, Marak, McDavid, Draisaitl), the only trade that seems possible is Draisaitl for Makar. However, I would rather have a superstar at D and as a forward than 2 elite forwards. However, trading Wedgewood, and one of our dmen like Malinski, Girard,… Read more »