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Sakic Just Watching Hockey |
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Joe Sakic is the embattled architect of the thirtieth place Colorado Avalanche.
The repeated failures of the Avalanche are Sakic's responsibilty. There's nobody else to blame but himself for the mess that his team has become.
Sakic was in Buffalo on Wednesday afternoon watching his disappointing team practice in advance of their Thursday night match with the Sabres.
Sakic was spotted by media in Boston earlier this week. The Hockey Hall Of Famer turned NHL suit was scouting players at the annual Beanpot tournament.
Sakic has two weeks to decide what roster moves he is going to make at the March 1 NHL trade deadline.
Will Sakic trade pending UFAs Jarome Iginla, John Mitchell, Rene Bourque, Andreas Martinsen, Fedor Tyutin or Cody Goloubef?
As it stands today, Sakic has $3.3 million in salary cap space on trade dealine roster moves. He will gain more cap space by dealing the his veteran UFAs who don't figure in his long term plan to add younger and more skilled players to his six-man core group which consists of all world center Nathan MacKinnon, forward Mikko Rantanen and 2016 first round draft choice Tyson Jost, defensemen Tyson Barrie, Erik Johnson, goalie Semyon Varlamov. Youngsters J.T. Compher and A.J. Greer are respected prospects who are playing well in the AHL this season and will transition to the Avs roster next season.
“There have been a lot of conversations about a lot of different things,” Sakic told the Denver Post.
“We’re in this position, so we’re certainly not going to be buyers at the deadline. We’re going to listen to offers for our (pending UFA). That’s where we’re at. We want to start our rebuilding process and get younger. I’m not looking to do something big. If something happens, I will listen to get exactly what we want to help the team in the future, and we’ll certainly listen and think about it. But if not, I’m continuing to go into the summer and see how we can improve in the summer. There’s no real deadline that way. But we’ll look at all options to get better.”
Sakic emphasized that he is not about to make a trade for the sake of making one. Sakic has a plan and he isn't going to deviate from it.
That is, unless one of his 29 NHL GM counterparts wants to
“I’m not going to make a deal just to make a deal,” he said. “If it’s the best possible deal for us long-term, we’ll look at that possible deal and make that decision. But it’s not going to be something for now. It’t not going to be, ‘Let’s do it and shake things up. It has to be what’s best for the Avalanche.”make a blockbuster trade for one of his highly sought after veteran stars.
Sakic was spotted at the Boston-Montreal game Sunday night which added accelerant to Matt Duchene and Gabriel Landeskog trade rumors. Duchene to Montreal trade talk has been reverberating for the past few weeks, The intensity of teat runor increased all he ,ore after Mike Therrien was fired from Montreal on Tuesday. On Wednesday, Habs GM Marc Bergevin reiterated his desire to go-all in to build the best contender of his team in the next two weeks. Alex Galchenyuk for Duchene rumors will persist until March 1. Landeskog to Boston in exchange for defenseman Brandon Carlo make no sense for the Bruins to do.
Duchene has also been linked through trade rumors to Buffalo, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh and Nashville. Landeskog continues to be linked to the Anaheim Ducks, NY Rangers and Minnesota Wild.
Rumors are rumors.
Sakic was also noticed at the Harvard-BU Beanpot final Monday in Boston. The Bruins have two prospects, including defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who played in the Beanpot final. The Habs also had two prospects in the Beanpot final.
Sakic contends he was simply watching a couple of hockey games with no ulterior motives.
“I was just watching hockey,” Sakic said. “There’s really nothing to say. We were doing our due diligence. I went to see players play and some good college hockey.”
Uh huh. Just watching hockey. Why not just pop a beer and watch hockey on TV instead?
It's a shame that a Sakic has to travel a great distance away from his tanking hockey team to watch a competitive game. His Avs are horrendous and are on pace for an NHL worst ever record 48 point season.
“I was just watching,” Sakic said. “There are a lot of good players out there. We were here (east coast) and it was a good opportunity to go watch a couple of college games.”
Your nose is growing, Joe.
“I’m not the one talking about it,” Sakic said of trading Duchene and Landeskog for two king's ransoms consisting of young players, prospects and premium draft choices.
Sakic said that he is not the one creating the trade buzz around his coveted players,
“I’m not the one starting it. I will say that where we are at, it’s going to be talked about. It makes sense for people to see where the Avalanche are and start talking different players. That’s probably a compliment to those guys. Because they’re really good players and you’re not going to talk about players who aren’t really good.”
When Sakic mentions “different players”, he is talking about forward Mikhail Grigorenko and defenseman Nikita Zadorov, who were traded to the Avs as featured players in the Ryan O'Reilly blockbuster.
Sakic will be in the press box in Buffalo on Thursday night. Unless he takes a scouting run to another Eastern NHL city.
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Grigorenko is looking forward to playing against his former team again.
Grigorenko was taken 12th overall by Buffalo at the 2012 NHL DRaft.
Grigorenko, 22, has been disappointing thus far in his NHL career.
In 193 career games, Grigorenko has scored just 18 goals (only 2 PPG, 11 PPP) and 41 assists for 59 points. He is -20.
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