Thanks!

Wasn't on my mind this morning, probably would have remembered at noon and it would have been over.

It's also airing on NHL Network right now. Man, really wish I could be there. Huge crowds. Been watching NHL Network almost non-stop since Sunday night, just like I watched the NFL Network non-stop for a few days after the Chiefs won the SB. 95% of their content has been Avs. So awesome, just trying to let it all sink in.

Surrounded by Broncos fans? No thank you.

Quite the contrary, actually. There's never been a better time to be a Chiefs fan surrounded by Donk fans. I love being surrounded by them. #13Straight

NHL has some badass trophies. Conn Smythe is almost as cool as the Stanley Cup.

This was fun until the politicians arrived.

Not that I think any Blues fans care to watch this, but you might enjoy that Kroenke got booed.

Kadri's Too Many Men shirt. ROFL

Lol, that is pretty cool. My best friend is a Blues fan and hates Kadri
so much, I should order one for him.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Tshirt link 👇 🙂<a href="https://t.co/PCW4E2G5zH">https://t.co/PCW4E2G5zH</a></p>&mdash; bella (@bellatink221) <a href="https://twitter.com/bellatink221/status/1542584111969214468?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 30, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

My cousin just sent me this:

https://i.imgur.com/ymI5rIo.jpg

I wanted to go to the Chiefs parade except I'd be surrounded my all those damn Mizzou fans! :cuss:

My friend went to college with the guy who cares for The NHL trophies( the guy with the white gloves)he had the Conn Smythe in his car when he showed up to his 40th BD party which would would have been cohen ok if I hadn’t had to work .My cousin also played AAA minor hockey with Gregg Devries and was invited to his party when it was his turn to have it for a day , think he had a chance to drink from it.

Byram was stopped by a cop and told to get back over to the fans' side. LMAO

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If you do, here's a link to the actual one he had made.

https://twitter.com/guffychan/status...0ix1HvanQ&s=19

Happened to be in Denver this last weekend with my daughters softball team, ended up watching most the last game in a small bar/grill in a small town near red rock. My wife was outside when we scored what ended up being the game winning goal, and could hear the entire street erupt. Was pretty cool.

Still need to replace my Av's jersey, ugh.

Dermy down for the count LMAO

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">SONKKKK Kurtis down ⁦<a href="https://twitter.com/spittinchiclets?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@spittinchiclets</a>⁩ ⁦<a href="https://twitter.com/BizNasty2point0?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@BizNasty2point0</a>⁩ ⁦<a href="https://twitter.com/Avalanche?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Avalanche</a>⁩ <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/avs?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#avs</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/cup?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#cup</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/dent?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#dent</a>? <a href="https://t.co/oEwlslFQCQ">pic.twitter.com/oEwlslFQCQ</a></p>&mdash; Mags (@mlongenecker99) <a href="https://twitter.com/mlongenecker99/status/1542744124595482624?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

That's great, it's sounded like the entire city has embraced the team.

I still have Blake, Roy, and Sakic jerseys.... home, away, and the old alternate with the diagonal Colorado like the Rangers.

I've wanted to buy a MacKinnon and Makar, but just wouldn't wear them enough to justify the price tag (even if they were relatively cheap, I'd still wear them like twice a year).

I had one with no number, I like it that way. Same reason I don't buy chiefs jerseys, I'm more a fan of the team than the player. For some reason Jerseys don't like fire and tons of water...

I've just given up and figured out how to find reasonably high quality knockoffs. :)

Yup. I've thought about that. Might do that for the one I need to replace, but haven't decided yet.

Kuemper is gonzo. I like the move. Kuemper was good enough to help us get a Cup, but you can't give a guy who lets in the type of softies that Kuemper lets in a long-term big money deal. Especially with his age factored in. But some team surely will, and I'd expect it to go about as well as Grubauer in Seattle - not good.

Sounds like any "attitude problems" Georgiev is supposed to have revolved around not getting the playing time he wanted. Playing time is kind of tough to get when you're behind Shesterkin. I trust Sakic, this is the kind of deal he likes to make. Hopefully it opens some space to re-sign some combination of Nuke, Kadri, Manson, and/or Burakovsky.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Colorado Avalanche Hockey Club announced today that the team has acquired goaltender Alexandar Georgiev from the New York Rangers in exchange for Colorado’s third-round and fifth-round selections in the 2022 NHL Draft and a fifth-round pick in the 2023 NHL Draft.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/GoAvsGo?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#GoAvsGo</a></p>&mdash; Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) <a href="https://twitter.com/Avalanche/status/1545088641449566208?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 7, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Yeah, Sakic has always been good at selling high and he's just too much of a risk between health and not being amazing (outside of not seeing the puck well)... they'll see what they have with the two they've got now and if Frankie's ready for a larger role.


Saw the Blackhawks traded DeBrincat, which is interesting with Toews' and Kane's ridiculous contracts coming off the books after this next season. They have a TON to work on contract-wise in the next couple seasons, but you'd think they could have held onto him at least. Wonder if they plan on going full tank then and letting those two go.

Blues draft Snuffleupagus with Yurov and Lambert still on the board.

Okay - I get being scared of the Russian. But how do you take a lesser version of Jake Neighbors when Lambert is still there?

Ugh.

And he's still on the board, too.

Not sure I've ever seen someone buy a jersey for a player before they were drafted...

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Sakic got promoted, but have to assume he'll be heavily involved in getting MacKinnon locked down.

Nichushkin signed for 8 years and ~$6mm/year. Surprised by the 8 years, but if this past season wasn't a one time thing, it'll end up being a bargain in the long run.

Yeah, that's a longer contract than I would have expected for Nichushkin. I like Nichushkin though. Wonder if that means Kadri is gonna walk? I've heard talks of that. After trading for one goalie and drafting another, it sounds like Kuemper might be gonzo.

Yeah, Kuemper's gone, especially with Georgiev's contract at $3.5/year and I think Kuemper was making $4.5 and I'm sure will want more.

I really don't mind letting Kadri go, just not sure who they'll get at 2C... can we have O'Reilly back now? :D

The Avs have signed Valeri Nichushkin to an eight-year, $6.125M contract. Woot.

Kuemper to the Caps, as rumored. Manson resigned with the Avalanche.

Lehkonen signs for 5 years!

So who is he?

Because that's a lot to give to the guy he was for the first 3/4 of his career. Probably a little light to give for the guy he was last season.

There's some risk there for sure. But nothing has worked out poorly from a player development standpoint in 5 years for the Avs so he'll probably score 40 next year.

The Avs haven't made a secret of the fact that they pay a lot of attention to analytics these days, and Nuke is a fancy stats monster. I worry that this is going to hamstring us in the later years, but 1) hopefully the cap will spike by then and 2) our window will likely be closing by then anyway.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Burakovsky signs with Seattle. 5 years at $5.5 mil Aav.</p>&mdash; Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) <a href="https://twitter.com/DarrenDreger/status/1547293427938861060?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 13, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Honestly, getting Lehky, Manson, and Nuke back was better than I thought we'd do. Very happy about all 3.

That's a pretty hefty price tag Seattle paid for Burakovsky. He's very good when he's on, but he's not very physical and you could make a case for him being injury-prone. Good for him though, he helped us win a Cup (except for the games where he was injured or a healthy scratch).

Now we just need to sign a couple vets on the cheap who are hungry for a Cup and we're good.

Yeah, I'd rather tale a chance with Nichushkin at $6/year than sign Burakovsky at $5.5.

To be through one day of free agency and the only other hole to fill is potentially Kadri's is pretty nice.

The Avalanche are so goddamn irritating.

The Blues are hard up against the cap. And y'know what - they don't have a bad contract on that entire !@#$ing team. At least not for right this very minute (in 3 years a few of them won't look good).

But Marco Scandella at $3.275 is as close to an underwater contract as they have on that roster. Everyone else is being paid at/below their production/talent. And it was the case last year as well.

But since the Avs have like 5 guys making a FRACTION of what they should be making, merely doing a very good job with your cap and roster structure isn't good enough. You're still gonna have to deal with that friggen juggernaut.

So the answer is to just wait these Colorado deals out and home Sakic slips on some of this contracts going forward. Or just build a very good team, home Colorado's goalie situation implodes and then you get a little lucky.

Because as well as the Blues have built their roster and roster depth, they simply cannot match Colorados skater talent.

The Avs have the benefit of 1) being really shitty for a long time (and therefore getting top draft picks) and 2) making a couple of really good trades (Duchene) that also netted them top draft picks. Having Byram and Newhook for peanuts plus MacKinnon being laughably underpaid helps.

They'll stretch it out by dumping EJ's $6 million next year and a couple more young guys in the prospect pipeline, but they also mortgaged the future a bit at the end of last season. It paid off, but it'll get really tough to keep it all together in 3-4 years.

After that, I have to believe that MacKinnon + Makar will keep them in the running for just about as long as they're both still around, but they certainly won't be able to maintain the "juggernaut" when they run out of cheap contracts.

Looking like 7 years/$9.8... and speculated the largest offer by the Flames was 8 years/$10.5.

But hey... Columbus is marginally better than Calgary, maybe? :shrug:

(I know he wanted to be closer to family in Jersey, too)

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Johnny Gaudreau is going to Columbus</p>&mdash; Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) <a href="https://twitter.com/FriedgeHNIC/status/1547355674874634242?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 13, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

So he took 15M less to play in Columbus? I've been to Columbus...the city of Calgary must really suck.

The wine isn't great, but the bottles are pretty cool!
https://manoswine.com/collections/colorado-avalanche

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/02...ed-02_720x.png

I've never understood it. Cheap, nasty ass wine at markup prices just because you slap an ugly ass logo on it ROFL ROFL sucker born every minute

To be fair, most championship stuff is crap quality. My Chiefs Super Bowl t-shirts are super thin and probably won't last long.

No doubt. Complete garbage

Yeah, I bought a Royals one that was ~$30 at the time and looked like it wouldn't last a wash... but, it's somehow still around and doesn't look terrible (don't remember where I got my Chiefs SB tshirt, but it's actually pretty good quality).

I have a fanatics gift card and was browsing the other day... they want $40 for an Avalanche tshirt. LMAO I know they have a lot of sales though, so might wait for one of those 65% off sale and grab something.

They'll slap a sticker on anything, but the one thing I got for KU was a pair of etched glasses that cost just as much as slapping a sticker on a pilsner glass... similar to the wine bottles that are well designed and will last forever.

Thanks for the win.

https://i.imgur.com/kaEZYiW.jpg

Yeah, I've heard this rumor since FA started.
A bit strange though, considering Lou signed him to the shitty deal he's just getting out of.

So we can all agree he’s dirty piece of shit now, right?

Blues fans were largely alone in believing he was dirty this season, so I'm not sure how his leaving to another non-Blues team makes any difference.

Because we're all Claude Lemiuex apologists? :shrug:


Avalanche player or not, I've never really shouted at clouds about guys like Kadri, Evander Kane, Tom Wilson, etc... they cleared have the talent to be in the NHL and it's up to the NHL/NHLPA to figure out player discipline. I've kind of stopped caring about it because nobody in the league seems to care about disciplining the dirty hits, so why should I?

And if someone with their talent can keep their head on straight, then I really don't care. Not saying people shouldn't care at all if a star player is knocked out of the playoffs from a dirty hit, I'm just kind of over hoping the NHL will fix it.

That said, goons like Ryan Reaves can go **** themselves because they aren't even talented enough to be in the NHL.


So for Kadri... I wish him the best and hope he keeps his head on straight, as he's obviously been given several 2nd chances at this point and made the most of it with playing clean this postseason.

Lemiuex vs McCarty was one of the best fights I've seen in the NHL to this day. There were probably better but the lore and anticipation made it the GOAT IMHO. I still remember Claude sitting in the penalty box and the camera zooming into him while he tried to set his jaw manually.

That was some epic tough guy shit. :rockon:

Matt Tkachuck should be on your list of dirty ****s. If you keep an eye on him, he's always trying to injure players but make it look like an accident.
He just hasn't quite got the hang of it yet.

I was still a few years from really getting into hockey at that point, so I know the backstory and all, but didn't follow it as it happened.

I watched the ESPN doc when the playoffs were over, which was really well done... crazy how those teams were pretty loaded with talent, yet hockey was secondary to all out brawls complete with goalie fights. Smashing Foote's face into the glass really seems to get overlooked given everything else that happened.... and those turtles by Lemiuex is what the kids would call "cringey".

MacKinnon signed... 8 years, $100.8 million, $12.6 average.

That's a big number, but it's hard to argue he's not worth it. Hopefully between EJ's salary going away after this season and the cap recovering soon, this will be a really nice contract down the road.

Crazy to think that we now have Landy, Nichushkin, MacKinnon, and Makar all locked up through at least 2027.

With Mckinnon, Mazar and Rantanen the Lanche are gonna win 1 or 2 more cups the next few years minimum

I'd love to see candid interviews with players like Kane and Toews, McDavid, MacKinnon, etc; on that entire process. I'm sure some players heavily weight salary over anything, while others don't want their team to tank because they can't sign any depth players... and then agents are in their ear telling them the salary cap will go up and it's the GM's job. And then how transparent are GMs in telling stars they aren't miracle workers.

You absolutely sign those guys, of course, and they're in a great spot for the next few years... while at the same time being right up there with the Oilers, Leafs, TB, for percentage of the cap dedicated to a few players (well, not quite the Leafs with 3 $10mm guys).

Great that it's done and not a thing to discuss for the next year.

Congratulations to Ovi on his 800th. Well done.

It's crazy to think he could still break Gretzky's record... and also really crazy how many more assists Gretzky has on top of anyone (Ovi is 18th in overall points).

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Great and totally inexplicable game in Edmonton last night.

Blues probably aren't going anywhere but hey, at least they come up with some exciting shit.

What is he doing?

Yup. I think Gretzky’s all time points record never is broken. It’s like Cy Young’s all time wins record or Jerry Rice’s all time receiving yards and TD records. Basically unbreakable.

Guessing either waxing his blade or cleaning his visor.

Never seen that set up before. And I thought maybe he was messing with the blade of his stick, but in context with scoring his 800th, I wasn't sure what he could be doing there.