Rumor: 2022-2023 Trade Rumors and Free Agency: The Search for a 2C

[dahrougem2]

Look, I'm not the biggest Girard fan in the world but if you're going to compare him to a guy like Jared Spurgeon, let's not forget Spurgeon didn't truly take off and look like the player we see today until he was around 27/28 years old. Girard is still 24.

I think Girard, like a lot of defensemen, thrives on more minutes. The more he plays, the better he looks. Playing 15-17 minutes doesn't work well for a guy like him, but it's what he has to deal with usually being behind Toews/Byram and not getting PP1 time.

If Byram could just f***ing stay healthy for once in his career, the Avs should be seriously exploring moving Girard for forward help. Let Jacob MacDonald play 8-10 minutes on the 3rd pair while the other 5 rotate together. But until Byram proves to this organization that he is not a band-aid I don't think they'll pull the trigger.

 

[TruePowerSlave]

Girard has never been the same after being abused in the 2021 playoffs. Slower than before and with an injury history. G can get better since his current level is a bottom pairing player, but I doubt the ceiling is anything more than a top 4 D who struggles in playoff hockey.

 

[Chiarelli]

Girard to me is a function of the team he plays on. He’s not going to be the one driving the bus. He will look good on a good team that possesses the puck the majority of the game and he can play his game - skating, passing, and not defending a lot in his own end. We are not a good team at the moment between injuries and losing a chunk of depth.

 

[Ararana]

I thought Ryker summed up Girard perfectly a few weeks back "He's a guy you don't appreciate until he's out of the lineup".

There's nothing special about him that's going to pop out when he's in the line up with Makar/Toews/Byram but having that extra support guy is huge, especially when injuries start piling up. When you remove him and plug in a McDonald, the consistency Girard gives you (in the regular season at least) really becomes apparent.

It sure would be nice to see him stay healthy and not get overwhelmed in the postseason. The postseason is when you make your name, and my personal opinion is that Girard just doesn't have the frame to maintain in the postseason.

I do think trading Toews in the summer is the best decision for the defense going forward but relying on Byram AND Girard down the left is rolling the dice for sure. If they end up trading Girard and keeping Toews I wouldn't blame them at all, though it's probably going to cost more.

 

[Gumballhead]

I thought Ryker summed up Girard perfectly a few weeks back "He's a guy you don't appreciate until he's out of the lineup".

There's nothing special about him that's going to pop out when he's in the line up with Makar/Toews/Byram but having that extra support guy is huge, especially when injuries start piling up. When you remove him and plug in a McDonald, the consistency Girard gives you (in the regular season at least) really becomes apparent.

It sure would be nice to see him stay healthy and not get overwhelmed in the postseason. The postseason is when you make your name, and my personal opinion is that Girard just doesn't have the frame to maintain in the postseason.

I do think trading Toews in the summer is the best decision for the defense going forward but relying on Byram AND Girard down the left is rolling the dice for sure. If they end up trading Girard and keeping Toews I wouldn't blame them at all, though it's probably going to cost more.

I think there's also a decent chance that he's still not 100% and might not be until another offseason of rest.

 

[dahrougem2]

I thought Ryker summed up Girard perfectly a few weeks back "He's a guy you don't appreciate until he's out of the lineup".

There's nothing special about him that's going to pop out when he's in the line up with Makar/Toews/Byram but having that extra support guy is huge, especially when injuries start piling up. When you remove him and plug in a McDonald, the consistency Girard gives you (in the regular season at least) really becomes apparent.

It sure would be nice to see him stay healthy and not get overwhelmed in the postseason. The postseason is when you make your name, and my personal opinion is that Girard just doesn't have the frame to maintain in the postseason.

I do think trading Toews in the summer is the best decision for the defense going forward but relying on Byram AND Girard down the left is rolling the dice for sure. If they end up trading Girard and keeping Toews I wouldn't blame them at all, though it's probably going to cost more.

The best ability is availability and until Byram/Girard show they can stay healthy I think the Avs decision is a very easy one: keep Devon Toews.

 

[redacted]

I don't think G's issues are solvable in season... he needs an offseason of trimming down and focusing on picking back the up the steps he's lost. Gut feeling this is the Avs' push as they have all their players bulk, but hopefully G learns from MacK there.

On the trading of defensemen... it is a rock and a hard place. Even Toews hasn't stayed fully healthy. Byram and G have their own issues with health. This hurts the value of any of them. Add in contract questions with Toews and G with regression... and you have a mixture where the Avs are dealing from a point of weakness. Byram still has his value, but with each injury, more and more questions mount.

 

[Alienblood]

I thought Ryker summed up Girard perfectly a few weeks back "He's a guy you don't appreciate until he's out of the lineup".

There's nothing special about him that's going to pop out when he's in the line up with Makar/Toews/Byram but having that extra support guy is huge, especially when injuries start piling up. When you remove him and plug in a McDonald, the consistency Girard gives you (in the regular season at least) really becomes apparent.

It sure would be nice to see him stay healthy and not get overwhelmed in the postseason. The postseason is when you make your name, and my personal opinion is that Girard just doesn't have the frame to maintain in the postseason.

I do think trading Toews in the summer is the best decision for the defense going forward but relying on Byram AND Girard down the left is rolling the dice for sure. If they end up trading Girard and keeping Toews I wouldn't blame them at all, though it's probably going to cost more.

Yes trade Toews this summer

 

[Chiarelli]

Byram is the only injury concern for me cuz it’s been consistent at this level and on top of that the “C” word. Not sure if someone could pull this stat but I would guess less than 10-15% of nhl player play the full season these days.

 

[redacted]

Byram is the only injury concern for me cuz it’s been consistent at this level and on top of that the “C” word. Not sure if someone could pull this stat but I would guess less than 10-15% of nhl player play the full season these days.

Depends on how you define 'full season.' If you say it is 82 games full stop... 45 players accomplished this last season. If you figure all teams start with 23 players (not all do, just an assumption to make numbers easy). That is about 6%. If you go practical here and say 78 is a 'full season' giving a few games for sickness (especially in times of covid), suspension, scratches for lower end guys, etc... 172 guys played 78 or about ~23%. 245 players played 75+ games last year. 346 played 70+. A little under half the league played all but 12 games.

To me injury prone starts creeping in when a player misses 10+ games consistently. If a player misses 20+ each year, that's a major problem.

 

[Chiarelli]

Depends on how you define 'full season.' If you say it is 82 games full stop... 45 players accomplished this last season. If you figure all teams start with 23 players (not all do, just an assumption to make numbers easy). That is about 6%. If you go practical here and say 78 is a 'full season' giving a few games for sickness (especially in times of covid), suspension, scratches for lower end guys, etc... 172 guys played 78 or about ~23%. 245 players played 75+ games last year. 346 played 70+. A little under half the league played all but 12 games.

To me injury prone starts creeping in when a player misses 10+ games consistently. If a player misses 20+ each year, that's a major problem.

ya I’d say missing more than about 5-10% of the season starts becoming an issue. Just personal opinion. Thanks for the numbers.

 

[Balthazar]

Assuming that Byram really has a LBI and not a concussion then it's way too soon to label him as Ryan Murray 2.0

Remember Makar was often injured in his first few seasons too

 

[redacted]

ya I’d say missing more than about 5-10% of the season starts becoming an issue. Just personal opinion. Thanks for the numbers.

Yeah somewhere around there starts to mess with things.

A lot is made of the injuries, but that is really just who the Avs are as an organization. They top or nearly top the injury list every year. Might be poor staff, might be conservatism in that staff, might just be the players... who really knows. It is just a constant here though. MacK almost always misses 15% of the season. Rants will miss 5-10%. Makar is 10+%. G is 10+%. Nuke has been a 5-10% guy, but last two seasons is 20+%. Landy after being a pretty reliable guy under the 5% marker has taken a turn to the 10% and has been 20+% 3 of the last 4.

 

[dahrougem2]

Assuming that Byram really has a LBI and not a concussion then it's way too soon to label him as Ryan Murray 2.0

Remember Makar was often injured in his first few seasons too

For sure it's early, but he's only played 59 of a possible 161 games in almost 2.5 years now. That's a major cause for concern.

 

[redacted]

Assuming that Byram really has a LBI and not a concussion then it's way too soon to label him as Ryan Murray 2.0

Remember Makar was often injured in his first few seasons too

The only 'healthy' season Makar has had was last year where he still missed 6%. I'd say that Makar isn't out of the woods on having injury issues based off one season.

Byram's biggest issues is he invites a lot of contact with his style of play and how mouthy he is. Dude takes 3-4 hits a night on an average to below average sized frame. That will add up. Not many guys his size can take that level of abuse. If he was 6'3" 220... I'd worry less about that.

 

[Balthazar]

The only 'healthy' season Makar has had was last year where he still missed 6%. I'd say that Makar isn't out of the woods on having injury issues based off one season.

Byram's biggest issues is he invites a lot of contact with his style of play and how mouthy he is. Dude takes 3-4 hits a night on an average to below average sized frame. That will add up. Not many guys his size can take that level of abuse. If he was 6'3" 220... I'd worry less about that.

He's not as reckless now as he was before his concussions.

That said I really want to know how he got injured last time.

 

[redacted]

He's not as reckless now as he was before his concussions.

That said I really want to know how he got injured last time.

You can say he's not reckless (which I don't really agree with), but the dude still gets rocked a ton. His hits taken per 60 is actually the highest of his career career so far. If you combine the past 3 seasons and filter for 900+ minutes, Byram's rate is the 22nd highest in the league. Highest by far on the Avs (excluding Nemo). EJ... takes on average 3 less per 60. Byram is a magnet for getting hit.. and guys ~6'1" 190 don't tend to hold up to that level of abuse well. You get some randos (mainly Russians for some reason) that can hold up, but it is by far the exception rather than the rule.

 

[AllAboutAvs]

Yeah somewhere around there starts to mess with things.

A lot is made of the injuries, but that is really just who the Avs are as an organization. They top or nearly top the injury list every year. Might be poor staff, might be conservatism in that staff, might just be the players... who really knows. It is just a constant here though. MacK almost always misses 15% of the season. Rants will miss 5-10%. Makar is 10+%. G is 10+%. Nuke has been a 5-10% guy, but last two seasons is 20+%. Landy after being a pretty reliable guy under the 5% marker has taken a turn to the 10% and has been 20+% 3 of the last 4.

Yeah the Avs always seem to be near the top on missed games due to injuries. Every year there seem to be other teams more injured than the Avs but I don't think they are the same teams every year. I would be curious to see the data on where the Avs rank cumulatively over the last 3, 5 and 10 years. It wouldn't surprise me at all if they were at the top or maybe top-2.

Furthermore to this...it also seems like the injuries are primarily to very good players. I might be wrong on this though as the more TOI a player gets the more chance he would get injured but it really seems like the Avs have their top players injured more than other teams. Again rarely the top in a single year but continuously near the top every year. When I say "top players" I mean top-6 forwards and top-4 dmen.

Maybe you have data you can pass along on total missed games and also related to quality of players injured. I think that would be interesting to look at.

 

[redacted]

Yeah the Avs always seem to be near the top on missed games due to injuries. Every year there seem to be other teams more injured than the Avs but I don't think they are the same teams every year. I would be curious to see the data on where the Avs rank cumulatively over the last 3, 5 and 10 years. It wouldn't surprise me at all if they were at the top or maybe top-2.

Furthermore to this...it also seems like the injuries are primarily to very good players. I might be wrong on this though as the more TOI a player gets the more chance he would get injured but it really seems like the Avs have their top players injured more than other teams. Again rarely the top in a single year but continuously near the top every year. When I say "top players" I mean top-6 forwards and top-4 dmen.

Maybe you have data you can pass along on total missed games and also related to quality of players injured. I think that would be interesting to look at.

There is a million different ways to slice the data. Avs are frequently in the top 10, but rarely the top of the league. Usually in the 3-10 range. LWAR is the stat you're looking for (lost wins above replacement).

Index

Explainer Team injury breakdowns 2024/25 : 2023/24 : 2022/23 : 2021/22 : 2020/21 : 2019/20 : 2018/19 : 2017/18 : 2016/...

nhlinjuryviz.blogspot.com

That's the best public site out there for injuries IMO.

 

[Gumballhead]

Assuming that Byram really has a LBI and not a concussion then it's way too soon to label him as Ryan Murray 2.0

Remember Makar was often injured in his first few seasons too

I noticed today on the official Avs NHL site in the game preview for tonight that Bo's injury is listed as "Unknown," which isn't exactly encouraging considering his history.

 

[Vaslof]

I noticed today on the official Avs NHL site in the game preview for tonight that Bo's injury is listed as "Unknown," which isn't exactly encouraging considering his history.

I suppose it could be an off-ice injury, something random that athletes can still get like myocarditis. But yeah, not encouraging.

 

[TruePowerSlave]

Yes trade Toews this summer

Toews is massively better than Sammy G, if they really keep Girard over Toews the defense is taking a significant downgrade.

 

[Chiarelli]

Yeah somewhere around there starts to mess with things.

A lot is made of the injuries, but that is really just who the Avs are as an organization. They top or nearly top the injury list every year. Might be poor staff, might be conservatism in that staff, might just be the players... who really knows. It is just a constant here though. MacK almost always misses 15% of the season. Rants will miss 5-10%. Makar is 10+%. G is 10+%. Nuke has been a 5-10% guy, but last two seasons is 20+%. Landy after being a pretty reliable guy under the 5% marker has taken a turn to the 10% and has been 20+% 3 of the last 4.

I think part of this is being proven in both the league as a player and the league as a playoff team. We saw it with patty kane, malkin, Crosby, stammer, kuch, landy the list goes on where a star on a proven contender will take more time because they can afford it during regular season. Probably happens with proven depth/role guys as well just easier to remember the stars. They are saving themselves for playoffs. Honestly it’s a good strategy if matchups matter less than health come playoffs. You’re seeing it in the nba too - lebron and Kawhi have popularized the term load management. Landy probably has that surgery in the off-season if he thinks him being present is the difference between us making or missing playoffs.

 

[AllAboutAvs]

There is a million different ways to slice the data. Avs are frequently in the top 10, but rarely the top of the league. Usually in the 3-10 range. LWAR is the stat you're looking for (lost wins above replacement).

Index

Explainer Team injury breakdowns 2024/25 : 2023/24 : 2022/23 : 2021/22 : 2020/21 : 2019/20 : 2018/19 : 2017/18 : 2016/...

nhlinjuryviz.blogspot.com

That's the best public site out there for injuries IMO.

Thanks for the link. Great site to look at. There doesn't seem to be any cumulative data. At a quick glance for the previous 3 years (not including this season) it looks like the Avs are tops with PIT, EDM, STL and BOS not being too far back depending on which charts I look at. I'll have to calculate these data when I have more time. The charts I looked at quickly where LWAR vs Pts, CHIP vs Pts and MGL vs Pts.

 

[redacted]

I think part of this is being proven in both the league as a player and the league as a playoff team. We saw it with patty kane, malkin, Crosby, stammer, kuch, landy the list goes on where a star on a proven contender will take more time because they can afford it during regular season. Probably happens with proven depth/role guys as well just easier to remember the stars. They are saving themselves for playoffs. Honestly it’s a good strategy if matchups matter less than health come playoffs. You’re seeing it in the nba too - lebron and Kawhi have popularized the term load management. Landy probably has that surgery in the off-season if he thinks him being present is the difference between us making or missing playoffs.

The NHL hasn't really adopted load management like the NBA has... and may never just due to the parity and cap issues that exist within the league. The Kucherov situations are going to be more of an exception rather than a rule.

Kane is actually pretty healthy... IIRC he's missed something like 18 games since the start of the 15-16 season. Stammer also tends to play a lot on his healthy seasons. Just seems he has 1 of every 3 or 4 years that is a health mess. Crosby and Malkin are both certainly injury prone players. I would say as a group, the Avs are not filled with super healthy players.

Thanks for the link. Great site to look at. There doesn't seem to be any cumulative data. At a quick glance for the previous 3 years (not including this season) it looks like the Avs are tops with PIT, EDM, STL and BOS not being too far back depending on which charts I look at. I'll have to calculate these data when I have more time. The charts I looked at quickly where LWAR vs Pts, CHIP vs Pts and MGL vs Pts.

If you just want to look at CHIP:

Injury history charts

Notes Cap Hit of Injured Players (CHIP) represents the per-game cap charge of a player missing a game through injury/...

nhlinjuryviz.blogspot.com

There is a 14 year cumulative there. You can also just click Colorado at the left to see where the Avs are in each year.