Paul Klee: With Seattle Kraken on the clock, are Avalanche nearing end of Gabriel Landeskog era? Stand by
Jul. 19—DENVER — Aside from one seriously cool logo and a sports-hungry city that's going to party like the Sonics had returned, the Seattle Kraken soon could have something else going for them.
Say it ain't so, Joe.
The NHL expansion draft is Wednesday, a great day for puck heads who know a fantastic addition to the league when they see one. Seattle's going to be a major hit as a hockey town. Shoot, it took only a matter of minutes for the Kraken to unload 4,000 tickets for an expansion draft watch party.
It could also be a heartbreaking day for Avalanche fans, who saw their beloved exclude "Landy" from a list of protected players when the Kraken assemble their roster through the draft. Seattle will choose one player from each team (except for recent new team Vegas). Anyone else think an expansion team would leap at the good fortune of a 28-year-old, respected captain as the first face of its franchise? Talk about a perfect fit.
But it would be a jarring development in Colorado, where Landy's sweater lines the seats at Ball Arena and his philanthropic efforts can be witnessed all over town. Hard to believe, but he's been the captain here for nearly a decade — through the good, the bad and the ugly, like the dreadful 48-point season only four years ago. While the Broncos shuffle through quarterbacks and the Rockies ship off their best players, one constant in Denver sports has been the levelheaded presence of No. 92.
The most recent version of the Avalanche was the most frustrated really good team I can remember. After the Golden Knights booted the Avs out of the second round with four straight wins, star forward Nathan MacKinnon aired his grievances: "I'm going into my ninth year next year and haven't won (expletive)." And anything short of a Stanley Cup championship was going to result in key players moving on. General manager Joe Sakic himself said "this is as deep a team as we're going to have here," a clear indication there would be contract casualties. That's not a surprise. Star defenseman Cale Makar and goalie Philipp Grubauer are also up for hefty paydays.
Problem is, the Avalanche need more hard-nosed tough guys like Landeskog, not one fewer.
It was eye-opening to read that Landeskog was "disappointed" in contract negotiations with the Avs, according to Peter Baugh of The Athletic — not because of what he said, but that he said anything at all. Sakic prefers silence, something he gathered from late GM Pierre Lacroix, and that suggests the two sides really are far apart.
"The one thing that everybody knew about Pierre is you never knew what he was doing," Sakic said last season.
If the Avs lose Landeskog to the Kraken in the expansion draft, or to a league rival in the free agency period that begins July 28, we'll know what the Avs are doing. They're saying three straight defeats in the second round of the playoffs isn't good enough — and neither is the team's core. Boy, life comes at you fast. Is Colorado nearing the end of the Landeskog era?
Stand by.
