MacFarland on the Absence of Landeskog and Approaching the Offseason

Avalanche General Manager Chris MacFarland addressed the media via Zoom on Tuesday afternoon to discuss Gabriel Landeskog's recovery following his knee surgery (scheduled for May 10) that will keep him out of the lineup for the 2023-24 regular season and to share insight on the front office's approach to this offseason and upcoming NHL Draft.

How much does it help to know right now what Landeskog's status is going into the season in terms of how that could affect your approach on the offseason (free agency, trades, drafting, etc.)?

Gabe Landeskog is a really special player in the NHL and for our team, his importance transcends to the ice. He's a power forward that touches every conceivable game situation. In terms of replacing him, it's really hard to replace your captain and what he does off the ice is as good of a player as he is on the ice. He's a hard guy to replace. The narrative of knowing that he's potentially out and how we handle that and knowing that, then we have some things that we have to look at. It potentially opens up avenues that weren't available to us this past season.

When looking at those avenues for this offseason, how do you balance making those decisions knowing that you can't make some of those longer-term commitments with the hopes that Landeskog does return healthy and back in the lineup?

[President of Hockey Operations Joe Sakic], myself, and our scouts, as always, we'll look at every opportunity to improve the team. That will include both short and long term type of players. If there's a player that we can potentially add that has term and he fits into what we're trying to do from an age standpoint, and it makes sense, we'll find a way to make it work. If it's more shorter term deals, then we'll certainly have the ability to strike on that. We're early in the process of that with our scouting meetings here coming up shortly on the pro side. Then, with the combine and the draft, I think things will potentially crystallize. I think everything will be on the table for us to try and improve but having X number of dollars because a player has a long term injury is one thing. Gabe Landeskog is a really special player and while the knowledge of his situation maybe certainly helps, replacing him is an entirely different conversation.

How do you look at how this year went? Do you look it as a victory with how despite all the injuries, this team went on to win the Central Division and go into the postseason or do you see it as the First-Round exit is not up to your standard given the championship DNA that you guys have created?

Look, what the guys did last year was incredible. We had a great year and ended with a championship season. Obviously, we think we have high expectations in large part because of what those guys have built towards over the last three, four, five years. The group dealt with a tremendous amount of adversity this year, in large part because of injury, not just games either. There were a lot of guys that were dealing with injuries all year and battling through. From that standpoint, I think Joe, myself, our coaches, it's been said that they were incredible. They got 109 points, they grabbed home ice. Did the playoffs go the way we hoped? No, it didn't. I think they have the expectations that they can deal with whatever is thrown their way. They have the resiliency and the innate competitiveness of our group. Every one of them would tell you that they expected to keep battling and keep and still be playing. We'll do our part to try and improve the team this offseason. But I'm very proud of the group. We've got great leadership in there and a very resilient group that wants to win. I don't think that will change.

Given what we know now about Landeskog's knee injury, how impressive was what he did during that Stanley Cup run to help you win it all?

It was massive. I think it says everything about Gabe. He's a winner. He drives the emotional barometer of our team and in so many ways. We have great leadership in that room but Gabe is our captain. He's been here for quite some time and the things he does that just not even on the ice but off the ice that really helped us set an internal bar is incredible. A lot of it goes unseen but we know his importance. What he did last year and how he played and battled through something, we'll never forget and obviously he was a huge piece of that championship run. He was incredible.

Could you provide injury updates on some other players?

Pavel Francouz had a procedure done on an adductor. Artturi Lehkonen, he broke a finger and then he broke a toe right when he came back early. He played through that. Josh Manson had a procedure done last week as well. These are guys that were playing through a lot of stuff through the year and then we had a few other guys. Obviously, you know what [Andrew Cogliano suffered a C5 vertebra fracture against the Seattle Kraken] had before that he had a shoulder issue, an AC sprain. Darren Helm got injured early in the playoff series against Seattle. Pretty much every other guy had bumps and bruises. When you get through the full 82 games and then into the playoffs very few guys don't have something. But in terms of offseason surgeries, it was Francouz and Manson and both are expected to recover here in the near future.

Was any part of not having clarity on Landeskog's injury a distraction, not necessarily in a bad way, but do you think with the timeline changing so much it was a distraction?

I don't think so. I don't want to speak for every player. But in talking to our guys, everyone wanted Gabe back. I think having him around having the hope throughout that that the player and our medical team had that we were going down every avenue was checked. Every avenue in our sort of toolbox in terms of talking to people and tapping on other organizations was explored at full support of our ownership and Joe. Obviously, our leadership group and everyone was hopeful. Everyone wanted Gabe back and he deserved the opportunity to be back as late in the year as possible because he's Gabe Landeskog and if he can get back there that's such an important cog for us. So I don't think it was a distraction at all. In fact, I think having Gabe around for the guys and him being around our group was nothing but a positive so I would say no.

Given the Landeskog situation potentially clearing up some cap space, is there a level of urgency to make some moves?

We're still tight on cap space. Anytime you're talking about these situations, there's multiple layers that you have to look at it through. Who can you get? What assets do you have to move that might be deemed attractive to the other team? So there's a lot of different things that we have to decipher and analyze here and that starts now, that starts with our scouting meetings, talking with [Avalanche Head Coach Jared Bednar] and Joe and the staff and then attacking it. into the offseason and seeing what we can do, what's available and are there any matches? Whether that's a trade or in free agency, is there an AAV in term match that makes sense for the the short and long term of our group? Because I think for us, we have a great core, we have a young core. So we think we have a very good team here for the foreseeable future. And we'll try to maximize that both short and long term.

The Colorado Eagles went on a pretty good run, with cap space being so tight, is there anybody from down there that you guys feel like might be able to come in and fill a role on the roster next year to make things a little easier?

Well, we're certainly going to have opportunities for guys to to make a dent and prove to our coaches and our group here that they can make our lineup. So whether it's you're talking about a guy like Ben Meyers or Justus Annunen or some of the college guys that we signed late in the previous spring here, Jason Polin, Ondrej Pavel, Sam Malinski, those guys were all signed because we have we have NHL hopes for them. Now, hopes and doing it are two different things as you guys all know. We were able to find a Logan O'Connor who you know was a free agent and he's carved a role and earned trust and became a member of our bottom six. We need those guys. We need somebody to grab the wheel and run with it. They're going to have every opportunity to have a big offseason. That's a controllable for them in how hard they work, the improvements they can make in key areas and then and then come and try and grab a spot in training camp but that work starts here. The Eagles did have a really good year. Our injuries certainly affected them and then they had some of their own injuries but Greg Cronin and his staff and our players down there did a heck of a job. Getting a playoff spot, they're disappointed today because they felt you know that they could have advanced too so. All in all, a very good year with some positives, but we'll need some of those guys to take a step but they have to earn that.

You guys have a bunch of guys that are entering unrestricted free agency during this offseason, how do you balance navigating the current guys that are UFAs and considering resigning them versus looking at new options?

Part of the CBA is unrestricted free agency. When players are entering that year, that's a right that they have is to test the market. We have, like we do every year, we have offseason meetings. Part of that is the puzzle piecing of our roster with our pro staff and Joe and the coaches certainly. Between now and the draft we will have those internal discussions and see if any of the current UFAs will certainly cycle with some of them and see if there's a contractual fit and away we go. If not, then we have then we know what we have in terms of cap dollars as we approach the draft and free agency to see who can make it fit. So that work has started and will continue to be a key focus here between now in the draft and certainly the bulk of the summer.

Is there a little bit of murkiness in terms of salary implications with the cap?

No, there's no murkiness. We know what we have in terms of our cap. We have a pretty good feel on the areas we want to tighten up and improve to get the roster where we feel is in a good place as we enter training camp next year. So we're excited. We've got a really good group here. We've got some really hard to find pieces and keys position spots with [Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, Cale Makar, Devon Toews, Artturi Lehkonen, Alexandar Georgiev]. There's a lot of reasons to be excited here with our group. A lot of them have been through the battles with us over the last number of years. So we expect to be a good hockey team and a competitive team and our guys have set a high bar. That certainly makes my job and Joe's job and our staff's job easier. We'll figure it out, but they're there. They're the drivers of this and we feel really confident in them moving forward.