Ready to contribute<\/p>\n
Gavin Brindley<\/a>, acquired from the Columbus Blue Jackets in the June 27 trade of forwards Charlie Coyle<\/a> and Miles Wood<\/a>, will have a chance to earn a spot as a bottom-six forward. The 20-year-old had 17 points (six goals, 11 assists) in 52 games with Cleveland of the American Hockey League last season, his first as a pro. He’s versatile enough to play center or wing, and Avalanche general manger Chris MacFarland said the staff has been impressed by what he called a “high-motor, tenacious player,” that has maintained that approach as he progressed through two seasons at the University of Michigan, one season in the AHL and now potentially a spot in the NHL.<\/p>\n Fantasy sleeper with EDGE stats<\/p>\n Brock Nelson<\/a>, F: The center had 13 points (six goals, seven assists), including three power-play points in 19 games after being acquired in a trade with the New York Islanders last season. He’s expected to remain on the second line, where he could bring exposure to talented wings in Valeri Nichushkin<\/a>, Artturi Lehkonen<\/a> and\/or Landeskog. Nelson is a three-time 30-goal scorer during his 12 NHL seasons, and per NHL EDGE stats ranked among the forward leaders in total skating distance (259.89 miles; 97th percentile), midrange shots on goal (77; 93rd percentile) and 20-plus mph speed bursts (171; 91st percentile) last season. — Pete Jensen<\/p>\n Projected lineup<\/p>\n Artturi Lehkonen — Nathan MacKinnon — Martin Necas<\/p>\n Gabriel Landeskog — Brock Nelson — Valeri Nichushkin<\/p>\n Victor Olofsson — Jack Drury — Ross Colton<\/p>\n Zakhar Bardakov — Parker Kelly — Joel Kiviranta<\/p>\n Devon Toews — Cale Makar<\/p>\n Samuel Girard — Brent Burns<\/p>\n Sam Malinski — Josh Manson<\/p>\n Mackenzie Blackwood<\/p>\n Scott Wedgewood<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ready to contribute Gavin Brindley, acquired from the Columbus Blue Jackets in the June 27 trade of forwards…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":167528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-167527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}