Avalanche finds “sweet spot” to keep Drouin and increase club’s performance

Colorado Avalanche left wing Jonathan Drouin (27) catches the puck against Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Jake Christiansen (23) during the first period at Ball Arena in Denver on Friday, March 22, 2024. (Photo by Andy Cross/The Denver Post)

Nathan MacKinnon could also be the MVP of the 2024 offseason.

The Colorado Avalanche signed several players on Monday, the first day of free agency. None of it was more important to the club’s ability to compete for the Stanley Cup in 2025 than finding a way to bring back Jonathan Drouin – and that won’t be possible without MacKinnon.

Drouin signed a one-year, $2.5 million contract to coach with the Avs after a standout season with Colorado, and his connection with MacKinnon was one of the reasons he chose Denver as his next destination a year ago.

“I think (his agent) Allan Walsh and Jonathan deserve a ton of credit,” MacFarland said. “First and foremost, the player has to want to be here, and I think Jonathan has committed to our group.”

“It wasn’t easy… but we found a good spot this morning and are very happy that it worked out.”

Drouin was one of the NHL’s best stories, proving he can be a dynamic player with a lot of playmaking and better defense than expected. He was successful both alongside and away from MacKinnon for the Avs, scoring a career-high 19 goals and 56 points.

Comparing Drouin’s contract to the ones he signed Monday and those from recent NHL seasons, his $2.5 million salary cap hit is a bargain. Double that amount, if not more, would have been fair.

While it was one of the most team-friendly deals on a wild day in NHL history – the first to include signings valued at over $1 billion – it might take some salary acrobatics to keep Drouin and stay under the $88 million cap.

If all players are healthy and available at some point this season after Gabe Landeskog returns from injury and Valeri Nichushkin returns from suspension, the Avs will have contracts worth more than $88 million, unless one of the currently scheduled starters is taken off the roster.

But that does not mean that the Avs have to trade someone. The salary cap is calculated daily. Nichushkin’s contract does not count each day he is suspended, which could allow Colorado to effectively have enough cap room to make up the daily overpayments upon his return.

There may also be other ways to manipulate the daily cap to create enough space throughout the season.

“In the summer, you get the 10 percent (buffer), and obviously we don’t know anything about Gabe and Val’s situation yet,” MacFarland said. “When you talk about the Opening Day roster in light of LTIR decisions and things like that, a lot of those things still need to be worked out.”

The Avs have now retained Drouin and Casey Mittelstadt, who signed a three-year, $17.25 million deal last week, for a total of $8 million against next season’s salary cap. That’s at least 30 percent less than it could have been, which also would have meant one of them not returning.

Given the uncertainty surrounding Landeskog and Nichushkin, keeping Drouin should help the Avalanche remain a good team early in the season and improve their chances of becoming a great team later in the year.

How good they are still depends on what Colorado gets from Landeskog and Nichushkin, or what they can do if one or both aren’t on the active roster by the trade deadline. But keeping Drouin raises both the floor and ceiling for this club in the 2024-25 season.

The Avs also found a handful of replacements on Monday, the most important of which is defenseman Calvin de Haan, who appears to be replacing Jack Johnson on the club’s third pair.

De Haan, a veteran who puts defense first, should be an improvement over Johnson on the ice. If Johnson doesn’t return, the Avs will be missing another experienced leader, but the return of Landeskog and another year of experience/maturity from the club’s core could mitigate that.

De Haan is a veteran of more than 600 NHL games and could be a mentor to Sam Malinski in his first full season.

“He’s a left-shot defenseman with a shorthanded game in his repertoire,” MacFarland said. “We were happy with the contract. We felt we were getting good value for a guy who has played a lot of games.”

The other signings were about giving the Avs some much-needed depth, with defensemen Calle Rosen and Jacob MacDonald expected to compete for the No. 7 position.