The Colorado Avalanche booked their ticket to the 2022 Stanley Cup Playoffs last night. Let’s take a closer look at their roster to gain some insight into how they’ve built contender.
Postseason Roster Profile
We’ll start with a look at the Avalanche roster profile for the 2022 postseason. This plot uses the current season ending player projections, incorporating this season’s results to see how the Avalanche roster stacks up relative to the other 31 teams. Both their offense and defense are strong relative to the rest of the NHL, with offense being a significant standout. The have no lack of star power, and it shows in their high ranking for top 6 forwards and their defense corps is well above league average from top to bottom.
Current Season Performance
When we look at the Avalanche team level key metrics, their all around strength shows. They’ve been above average at generating offense. Along with strong finishing, they sit in the top quartile for 5v5 GF/60. Likewise, strong team defense combined with good goaltending has them in among the lowest 5v5 GA/60 in the league.
Roster Construction
How did the Avalanche put together a roster that has found a high level of success this season? We’ll attempt to answer that question by looking at their roster from two angles: first, from the context of the salary cap to see where they found value while building their roster and, second, from the context of actual performance versus projected performance to see where players have provided additional value relative to the projections. We’ll be using the season opening player projections for all of this since it is reflective of the information available last offseason when the Avalanche were putting the 21/22 version of their roster together.
Projected Value Versus Cap Hit
Looking at the players on the Avalanche roster, it’s clear that the Avs have consistently acquired players whose cap hit is reflective of their value. There are a few stars that have cap hits exceeding their value, although it’s much less dramatic than for many other teams. Nathan MacKinnon’s deal continues to be one of the highest value propositions in the league and they’ve found high value deals further down the lineup from the likes of Arturri Lehkonen, Alex Newhook, and Ryan Murray.
When we put Colorado’s contracts in context with the full suite of NHL contracts, their spending efficiency stands out. Their forward group is almost exclusively below the overall value curve, with only a couple of star players as exceptions. Defensemen follow a similar pattern and, while their goaltenders sit above the value curve, it’s not by a large amount.
Performance Relative to Projections
While the vast majority of the roster was projected to provide value exceeding their cap hit, reality doesn’t always follow the projections. Let’s take a look at performance relative to projections to see how the Avalanche players have performed relative to expectations at the start of the season.
After a slow start to the season, the Avalanche got rolling and have led the Central Division for most of the season. Their forwards, star defensemen, and goaltending have led the way, providing value near or above projections. While there aren’t many players greatly exceeding projections, there also aren’t many that have fallen well below. Based on the generally high value projections we noted above, it’s a recipe that’s led to a high level of success.
Cup Contender
The Avalanche have put together a roster that is a legitimate Stanley Cup contender this season. They’ve done it by putting together a group of players with strong projected value relative to their cap hits who have generally performed as expected.
