Avalanche free agency is going to look pretty different after the great haul Colorado executives made over draft weekend — especially if they can sign Mikhail Grigorenko. And I imagine they wouldn’t have made a trade for him if they weren’t confident they could sign him.
So, one of the biggest areas of concern is a top-4 defenseman. In fact, at the conclusion of the 2014-15 season, head coach Patrick Roy talked about not building the team through free agency except for “a partner for [defenseman] Erik Johnson.