{"id":669527,"date":"2026-05-28T05:47:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T05:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/669527\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T05:47:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T05:47:08","slug":"cale-makar-could-miss-the-start-of-next-avs-season-denver-sports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/669527\/","title":{"rendered":"Cale Makar could miss the start of next Avs’ season \u2013 Denver Sports"},"content":{"rendered":"

The totality of Colorado\u2019s Western Conference Final exit via sweep<\/a> could carry into next season in more ways than just the stink of it.<\/p>\n

The injury that kept Cale Makar out of Games 1 and 2 against the Vegas Golden Knights is \u201cpretty significant,\u201d according to NHL insider Elliotte Friedman, who said Wednesday that the Norris Trophy-winning defenseman\u2019s status for the start of next season is now an open question.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve heard his injury is pretty significant,\u201d Friedman said on his podcast<\/a>. \u201cAnd I know some people have been wondering, will he be ready for the start of next year? I guess we\u2019ll find all that out, but I just don\u2019t think that that\u2019s the reason here. I think it\u2019s more of an excuse than anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vegas beat Colorado because Vegas was better, as Friedman noted. But the injury is real, and it\u2019s serious enough that the conversation is already shifting from this spring to next fall.<\/p>\n

It looked like a harmless collision with Minnesota\u2019s Mats Zuccarello midway through the third period of Game 5. Makar\u2019s reaction said otherwise. He grabbed his right arm immediately and skated straight to the locker room. He\u2019d been grabbing that area and talking to trainers throughout the game already. He returned to the ice a few minutes later \u2014 but it was the cumulative hits, plus a hip issue, that slowed him the rest of the way.<\/p>\n

He finished the playoffs with five points in 11 games after a 79-point regular season. It tied for the fewest points he\u2019s tallied in any playoffs, including years where the Avs lost in the first round.<\/p>\n

Now the Avalanche head into an offseason with one of their stars, and arguably the best defenseman in the world, facing a recovery timeline that is uncertain as of now.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s another brutal blow to a team already staring down hard questions. Colorado was swept in four games. The locker room used words like \u201cwaste\u201d and \u201chumiliating.\u201d Jared Bednar is entering the final year of his contract. And the franchise\u2019s championship window \u2014 built around Makar and Nathan MacKinnon \u2014 just shrank.<\/p>\n

A shortened summer for Makar means a more complicated one for everyone trying to figure out what comes next.<\/p>\n

Bednar said to expect more formal injury updates in the coming days after the Game 4 loss.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The totality of Colorado\u2019s Western Conference Final exit via sweep could carry into next season in more ways…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-669527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}