Colorado Avalanche 2008/09 Season Predictions

The Avalanche roundtable is winding down as Jibbles is hosting the last question today on expecations. And do you know what that means? It means the season is starting tomorrow!

I'm not going to find time to do a full breakdown of the team before the pucks drops so I decided to do a quick post with a few predictions for the season. If every one of them comes true, you all owe me $5.

Paul Stastny will be top 10 in points
In Stastny's first pro season he put up 78 points in 82 games, good enough for a .95 PPG rate. In a shortened season Stastny put up 71 points in 66 games, a 12% increase to 1.07 PPG. If he stayed healthy all season and scored at that rate, he would have been tied for 10th in the league.

If we take that 12% increase and extrapolate over an 82 game season, that puts him at 98 points this season which would have been good enough for 3rd in the league.

The top 10 is on Stastny's radar and, if he has a healthy season, he should hit it no problem.

Joe Sakic moves into 7th place all-time in assists
Sakic currently sits in 11th place on the all-time assists leaderboard with 1006 assists. He is 28 shy of taking sole possession of the #10 slot, currently occupied by Mario Lemieux. Once he hits 1034 - that's right, once, not if - he will be a mere 16 assists from passing both Marcel Dionne and Gordie Howe to climb into the #8 spot.

But he won't stop there. He'll need a measly 14 more assists to leapfrog Steve Yzerman to #7 all-time. And he will do it this year.

It's only 58 assists and Sakic is just one injury shortened season removed from a 64-assist season. Time knows no boundaries and neither does Joe Sakic.

Ruslan Salei will be the Avs best defenseman
Salei is an extremely versatile defenseman. He puts up points, he plays the PP and PK, he lays out solid hits, he can put up 20+ minutes a game and I heard a rumor that he is coming up with a plan to fix the economy. No joke.

Jordan Leopold and Marek Svatos will be injury free
The Shane law says "The more things stay the same, the more likely they are to change". Ok, somebody much smarter than me probably came up with that before but I'll claim it as my own. 

As we're all painfully aware, it's been a long streak of injuries for Svatos and Leopold and it's time for that to change. I'm not saying one of them won't come down with the flu but there will be no more ACL tears, no more serrated thighs and no more broken bones.

David Jones scores 30 goals
I'll say it. I've got a mancrush on David Jones. As I've said before, he's big, fast and if he finds his scoring touch, he'll be gold.

Is 30 a stretch? Damn straight it is. But I'll look like a friggin genious if it comes true.

Ben Guite grows out the fu before the Christmas break
This one isn't even close to a stretch. The Fu will be back.

Peter Forsberg doesn't return
Last season I didn't think Forsberg was coming back. We all know how that worked out. So this year, I'm flip-flopping and waiting for him to prove me wrong again.

Hejduk has a bounceback year
The last time Hejduk had a 50-point season, he came back the next year and put up 35 goals and 70 points. In fact, since 2001 Hejduk has been consistently inconsistent as he alternated between 50 and 70-point seasons. History will repeat itself this year.

There you have it folks, eight predictions which have now been completely jinxed by me and will not come true. So you know who to blame when Jones only gets 29 goals.

Related Links

In-Depth Look at Season Opener

It's Gambling - and Prediction - Time!

I live in Canada. Land of the free. Home of the brave. 

Wait, that's not us. We're still free but we shun the "brave" tag for "strong". We're strong, have glowing hearts, get lots of massages and more importantly, we can legally gamble online.

Why, I remember when frankfurters only cost a nickel...
My last foray into the world of betting was back in my early high school years.* I headed in to our local lotto/barber shop, grabbed a Sportsline ticket, made picks on the winners for all six games that night and laid down $10. The next day, I walked out of the store with $75 and promptly retired.

I was dormant in the gambling world for over a decade as I lived the life off my winnings. Lavish houses, luxury cars, weekends in Venice, winters in the South of France. You name it, my $75 covered it. 

But during the 2007 playoff run, my winnings dried up so I pulled a Brett Favre. 

I opened an account with Pinnacle Sports, dumped $15 into my account - whoa, big spender! - and laid $10 on the Ducks against Minnesota. The Ducks won, I made $5 and I went into hibernation.

Then came UFC 70. Mirko Cro Cop against Gabriel Gonzaga. A man with one of the greatest looking highlight reels in history against a guy I'd never heard of. Laying big money on Cro Cop would seem to be the smart move, right? I decided to go the other way. The odds were 5-to-1 against Gonzaga so I put all my winnings on Gonzaga. And he ended up nearly knocking Cro Cop's head off.

I had tripled my money from $15 to $45. Combine that with my $10 into $75 trick and I was up $95 off a $25 investment. How could I go wrong!

Fast forward past me building up my winnings to $200, losing it all, then gaining it all back by riding the Wings through the 2008 playoffs and here we are. 

I've got blood money sitting in my account and it's time for speculation betting as the NHL season is about to get underway.

Lines, Wings and Kings

Pinnacle has their NHL Futures lines up and are taking bets on the winner of each division, the winner of each conference and the winner of the Stanley Cup.

Detroit is the favorite for the Cup and the Western Conference while the Pens are the favorites for the East and second in line for the Cup. I don't see the Penguins winning the East this year but unfortunately you can't bet directly against a line. 

The Kings represent a huge payoff if they are able to go on what would be the most improbable run in history and take the Stanley Cup. For ever dollar you bet on them, you'd walk away with just over $100 if they walk away with the Cup. 

Predictions and Prognostications

The divisional favorites are: Pittsburgh, Washington, Montreal, Detroit, Calgary and San Jose. I think they're half-right. I'll give them Montreal, Washington and Detroit.

I want the Canadiens to win their division. And the conference. And I think it would be great if they made a run at the Cup. I come from a long line of Habs fans. I even drank the Kool-Aid in my single-digit years so I've got a bit of a soft spot for them. And it would be a great - if slightly overdone - story for them in their 100th season.

The Capitals will get in mostly because there's really nobody else in the Southeast to challenge them.  But Jose Theodore will do his best to give them a challenge.

The Wings? They'll take their division, promptly causing all their fans heads to explode due to overinflation.

The Penguins are going to struggle out of the gate with their backend pinched by injuries. It will leave the way for the Devils to slide up and claim that division.

The Sharks look great on paper but I'm calling Dallas in the Pacific this year. Richards is going to have a career year while Morrow and Turco lead that team to the top.

And as for the Flames? Well, you know how most of us feel about the Flames. And that keeps my brain from allowing me to think they could take the division. Of course, they've got a much better shot than Vancouver, as do most teams in the Northwest. 

Again, I wish we could bet directly against a line. But I'll say go straight homer style and say Colorado wins the Northwest. It's my blog and I'll say it if I want to!

Put up or shut up

I'm putting some money on the Devils to win the Atlantic because that looks like the best value of the bunch. Will I put money on the Avalanche? I might toss a $1 at them and hope for the best. And if they don't win the division, I'll assume it's because I jinxed them with the bet.

Round and round we go

And don't forget the roundtable action continues today over at Jersey's and Hockey Love with some thoughts on Tony Granato.

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* A benefit of small towns is that if the store owner likes you enough, he (or she) doesn't give a hoot about things like legal ages for gambling or drinking.