Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.
Do you hear that? It’s not just the bell signaling the end of the Avs’ season, it’s the clock tower telling the fans 11:45 and they’re just minutes to midnight.
While this isn’t the doomsday clock for all of mankind, it could certainly be the doomsday clock to a bunch of people around the Avs.
This season, the Avs battled inconstancy, crappy goaltending and lack of scoring talent that ended them here: 3rd worst team in the league and worst in the Western conference. (For further explanation see my previous
blog.
Entering this offseason, the Avs sit in a precarious situation. They have $45,987,500 tied up on 15 players, some of them past their prime. They have a coach who failed to get a consistent effort out of his players from game to game and period to period. They have GM who sat on his hands while his team continued to sink lower and lower in the standings.
Simply put, this mess of a team falls right at the feet of Francois Giguere. He was the one who rehired Tony Granato. He let Andrew Brunette (22 goals and 28 assists) go and essentially “replaced” him with Darcy Tucker (8G 8A). Giguere did nothing to help the team’s goaltending situation and put his hopes on Peter Budaj who has yet to show that he can nail down a starting job at the NHL level.
I will give Giguere a small break. He did have to save $6 million in cap room waiting on a decision from Joe Sakic. He also waited for Peter Forsberg to see if his fragile ankle would finally heal. He did lose both Paul Stastny and Joe Sakic for at least half the season as well as 300+ man games lost to injury. However, this is not enough to save him from the majority of blame to go with this horrendous season.
Everything that came out of this season is because of him. The only reason that the Avs did not finish dead last in the league this year was because of Craig Billington. It was because of Billington that the Avs had at least ten wins this year.
Billington has spent the last five years in charge of scouting and prospect development. He has been responsible for drafting players and getting them ready for the NHL. He has drafted Wojek Wolski, Paul Stastny, Chris Stewart as well as several other key players for now and in the future. He has instituted the team’s development camp in July and set up the players to make an impact at the NHL level. If this team didn’t have Billington and his policies, we probably would have the best odds for John Tavares. Billington deserves a ton of credit for the job that he’s done with our prospect in getting them NHL ready.
But enough about Billington and more about Giguere. I’m not in the team meetings nor do I follow this team’s daily procedures but it seems like Giguere gets caught up in the numbers of the game and doesn’t spend enough time thinking about the talent he’s signing. Andrew Brunette is a perfect example.
Andrew Brunette was the perfect player. He was reliable, durable and good for 40-50 points a season. He killed penalties, provided leadership and was a force around the net. He was also second to Joe Sakic in playoff point production last year. There was absolutely no reason to let him go.
However, Giguere let him walk and signed Darcy Tucker instead. Darcy Tucker wasn’t Andrew Brunette at all and we know we got from Tucker this year. Instead of paying $2.3 million for Brunette, we paid $2.25 million for Tucker. Did we really save anything? Did we gain anything?
Bar none, Giguere has to be fired if this team is to return to its winning ways. He’s been taken to town on trades, focused too much on money matters and has failed to meet his team’s needs.
If I am Stan Kroenke, my offseason checklist goes as follows:
1. Fire Giguere and hire a new GM
2. Fire Tony Granato and his coaching staff. Let the new GM make a new coaching staff
3. Get rid of, by any means: Tucker, Svatos, Salei and Clark
4. Resign Ian Laperriere
5. Find a better goalie
6. Clear out at least 6 or 7 forward spots, 3 defensive spots and one goaltender position for young kids to audition for in camp.
I’ll be writing a blog addressing all of theses check lists over the course of the next month, or as they happen.
I’ll also be looking for new and original ideas for blogs during the offseason. If you have any, please email me at [email protected].
Follow me on Twitter
Colorado Avalanche Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»