The Avalanche shouldn’t wait to make a deal for Claude Giroux
Feb 17, 2022, 6:42 AM
The Colorado Avalanche don’t need much. The NHL’s leading team with 74 points in 48 games, the Avs are loaded from top to bottom with award-winning talent. And now that their goaltending has rounded into form, there’s no pressing need for general manager Joe Sakic to make a trade.
He should go get Philadelphia’s Claude Giroux, anyway.
Giroux, 34 years old and in the final year of a contract that pays him $8.2 million this season, is exactly the kind of trade acquisition that can put contending teams over the top in the minefield-strewn battleground that is the Stanley Cup playoffs, where injuries can derail the best-laid plans, and where veteran leadership becomes more important than ever. Leading the woebegone Flyers with 37 points and with 16 goals on the season (numbers that would put him sixth and fifth, respectively, on the stacked Avalanche roster), it’s obvious that Giroux still has what it takes to chase the Cup… if Philly’s respected captain actually wants to, of course.
“The organization here, it’s been great for me,” Giroux told the Philadelphia Inquirer earlier this week as trade rumors began to swirl. “The last 14 years, they treated me the right way. I had the chance to play with a lot of great players and had great coaches. And I feel it’s an honor to be — to have been a Flyer this long.”
The native of Hearst, Ontario has played all 988 of his regular-season games with Philadelphia, and Giroux is considered to be loyal almost to a fault. He’s spoken about being a “Flyer for life,” and how reaching 1,000 games with the club would be meaningful to him — and he could make it. With a delayed trade deadline of March 21, the Flyers have 14 games remaining before that deadline will force Giroux into a decision that he apparently finds difficult: Finish out the season with a underachieving team he clearly loves before potentially moving on, or do so in a matter of weeks as an in-demand player for Cup contenders.
Despite all the hand-wringing, however, it’s possible that the decision’s already been made. Giroux has a full no-movement clause in his contract, but 104.3 The Fan’s Avalanche insider Adrian Dater reported that Giroux has already informed the Flyers that, if he were to be traded, Colorado would be his preferred destination. That should be news to Sakic’s ears.
Bear in mind that the Avs wouldn’t be Giroux’s only suitors, however. Dater also reported that Giroux would also accept deals to either the Minnesota Wild or the St. Louis Blues, both of them Colorado’s division rivals in the Central, and the two teams directly (if distantly) trailing the Avs in the playoff chase. The Blues’ salary-cap situation is even more limiting than the Avalanche’s, perhaps taking them out of contention unless they could find a third party willing to facilitate a trade. The Wild, however, have no such issue, and could likely take Giroux on without needing to make any other deals. The clock is already ticking, despite the deadline still a month away in the distance, and the first team to act decisively may be the one to land him.
If you’re the Avalanche, why wait? While it’s true that waiting until the deadline would mean that another $1.4 million or so would be conveniently shaved off of Giroux’s contract, that won’t help the Avs if the rival Wild get him first.
The Flyers’ scouting department has deployed personnel to both Avalanche games, and to games for the AHL Colorado Eagles in Loveland, looking for possible trade targets. They’ve been enamored with stout left-winger Sampo Ranta, 21, who still holds tremendous promise despite his (perhaps unsurprising) inability to stick with the loaded Avalanche at the NHL level yet. Ranta, and a selection of draft picks, should be enough to get close to a deal. Though it’s likely that Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher would also like an established NHLer like forwards Tyson Jost or J.T. Compher, Sakic may be able to rebuff those requests — Giroux’s no-movement clause severely narrows Fletcher’s possible avenues to jumpstart their rebuild before Giroux’s contract expires, and Sakic certainly knows it.
While Eagles prospects like defenseman Justin Barron and forward Alex Beaucage should be off the table, someone like forward Martin Kaut might be able to seal the deal. Kaut, still only 22, looks very much like a player that could use a change of scenery and a quicker path to the NHL. Philadelphia would provide both; Ranta and Kaut would almost certainly break camp with the Flyers next fall, if not sooner.
The Avalanche are clearly in win-now mode, as well they should be, allowing Sakic to mortgage some of the future to enhance their championship pursuits. Trading a selection of picks shouldn’t make much difference in Colorado’s near-term future, and Ranta and Kaut would be acceptable sacrifices to obtain Giroux — who would likely move from first-line center to second-line left wing with center Nazem Kadri and right wing Andre Burakovsky. Further shuffling would be necessary, including moving Valeri Nichushkin to the third line and possibly bumping Logan O’Connor to the fourth, putting either speedy veteran Darren Helm or in-season addition Nicolas Aube-Kubel on the bench.
Adding Giroux would bring both scoring punch and veteran savvy to Colorado, along with another hedge against the Avalanche’s most dangerous opponent by far: Injury. If the Avs have truly pushed in all their chips in an effort to capture their third Stanley Cup, it doesn’t make any sense to allow their rivals to dictate their course of action. So why put off until tomorrow what you can today?
Never mind the deadline, Joe; get Claude to Colorado as soon as you can.
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