Alright... as camp wraps up. Some of my thoughts.
Drouin - looks great on the PP as you'd expect. 5v5 much less so. That's going to have to change for him to work in the top 6. He's not taking Rants' role on the PP, so his PP points are likely more limited.
Olofsson - Props to him on winning the 4C role. Not that the Avs had a ton of guys there who you'd pencil in that role, but he flat out won it. Something you like to see.
Tufte - He shouldn't be a center, but I think he earned a NHL job. I'm not sure what that says about the depth, but always good to see guys come in an earn spots.
Olausson - No doubt he has issues, but he flashed his shot multiple times. At this point that flash will get him a shot at somepoint. Gotta round out the rest of the game.
RyJo - You see the talent one minute (like his tip last night) and then you see all the BS that goes along with. He played lazy hockey. That can't keep up.
Colton - This line without Tatar might be limited offensively a bit more than expected, but you know what you get with Colton. Straight ahead, [MOD]. He won't make any friends across the western conference and that is a good thing.
Clurman - He presented himself as an option. Again, this can make you question somehings about the depth like some of the other guys... but props to him for showing up.
Malinski - IMO he's the exact wrong fit right now. I think on certain teams, he could be a NHL player today and find a role. On this team, he's not steady enough defensively, he takes bad penalties, he turns over the puck, and he's not a guy who will add offense in comparison to many on the Avs' backend (at best he's the 5th best offensively there). I don't see a reason to keep him up. Let him marinate in the AHL and if a couple offensive guys on the backend go down, he can be called up.
MacK - He looks primed and ready to go for a great season.
Other vets - It is always hard in preseason. Some are clearly going through the motions. Still with that you'd like to see more out of Nuke, JMFJ, LOC, Toews, etc. I'll give Makar a pass as he just looked a bit tentative to me... maybe motions, maybe just getting up to game speed. The third line right now looks like high event hockey in good and bad ways. Bednar won't like that, he wants the energy and offense, but if they give up more than they put up... their usage will be limited quickly.
When you dive into the stats... there are some ugly things here. xGF% 5v5... there were only 6 regulars who were over 50% for their preseason work. Makar, MacK, Rants, Colton, Wood, and Girard. With two guys who I think will make the team, you can extend that to 8 with Tufte and Olofsson. 9 if you include Dermy, but for the love of god he should not be. Off hand that's not the worst though. If guys are 47-48-49, whatever preseason things can ramp. Specifically with Toews, RyJo, Drouin, Nuke and Byram... that was not the case. All were below 40%. We need that whole group to be 53+ this season. It is preseason, so it isn't an alarm bell... but that is not a great piece of first evidence. We need to see that be much better to start the season. On chances, RyJo basically created almost nothing 5v5 and neither did Nuke. Those two are likely to be on a line together, they need to find chemistry. Byram and Toews bled chances against. Colton and Malinski were give away machines (even Byram had issues).
All and all... lots to clean up right now. I'm keenly interesting in RyJo and Nuke's start to the season and if the 3rd line can limit the chances they give up. Those two lines will probably determine how the start of the season goes. The need to mesh and get going, otherwise we're going to be relying a lot on MacK and Mikko to start the season strong.
