Eurolanche

O'Really tough decision on O'Reilly

Ryan O’Reilly. Only 23 years-old. Lady Bing winner. A strong, two-way player who puts up points and is great in his own zone. A character guy who bleeds work-ethic and desire to succeed. Can play centre and left-wing. Runs the stairs of Pepsi Centre after losses. Already in his short career O’Reilly has shown he is the type of player that any team would want to have. So what’s the problem?

For the second straight year O’Reilly and his agent Pat Morris of Newport Sports are having contract disputes with Colorado Avalanche management. There’s still no sign of a deal getting done with a looming salary arbitration date of July 23. A neutral arbitrator will decide O’Reilly’s new salary on either a one or two-year deal. O’Reilly cannot however receive anything less than 80% of his previous $6.5 million he made last season. This is all of course if a deal can’t be worked out before then, which doesn’t seem likely.

What should the Colorado Avalanche do with Ryan O’Reilly? It would be a tough decision for any GM. If you don’t get him signed long-term you run the risk of losing him for nothing in two years once he’s an unrestricted free agent. The Avs can’t let that happen especially after watching Paul Stastny walk for nothing on July 1st to their division rival St. Louis Blues. If the Avs do trade O’Reilly it would have to be for much needed help on the back end. They would need a young, likely top-two kind of guy coming back in the deal to make it worth while. The only problem with that is with the subtraction of O’Reilly and Stastny all of a sudden the the once dominant forward group of the Avs begins to look incredible slim. Another option that could make sense for the Avs would be to trade him for Winnipeg Jets forward Evander Kane who has clearly expressed interest in getting out of Winnipeg. Sure he may be a head case but there's no denying he's a talented hockey player. Maybe someone like Patrick Roy would be able to set him straight. In the end, no matter what trade the Avs could make, the player coming back wouldn’t have the impact that O’Reilly does.

Some people are definitely scratching their heads wondering why the two parties can’t come to an agreement. Colorado seems like a great place to play right now with a revived youth movement and Roy and Joe Sakic at the helm of the organization.  There’s no question O’Reilly fits in with the young core group of Matt Duchene, Gabriel Landeskog, Nathan MacKinnon, Semyon Varlamov, Erik Johnson and Tyson Barrie. Both sides have claimed that there's no hard feelings about the situation and that it's just the business side of the game. No one really knows, but it seems like there's more to the story than being alluded to.

O’Reilly might have a little bad blood over the decision to make Landeskog captain instead of himself. He has all the qualities you’d look for in an NHL captain and yet he was passed over for the younger Landeskog, all but guaranteeing he’d never have a shot to wear the C so long as he stays in an Avalanche Jersey.

The Avs obviously don’t think he’s worth the $6.5 million and O’Reilly’s camp clearly thinks he’s worth as much or more. Both sides have solid arguments. O’Reilly led the Avalanche in goals last season with 28 and the entire NHL in takeaways with with 82. Morris also claims that O'Reilly is one of the best defensive players in 25 years. That's a stretch, but not completely out of left-field. The 82 takeaways help his case. On the other side of the debate, should he really be making more than the likes of John Tavares, Jamie Benn and David Krejci? Tough call. Then there's also the talk of the Avs' salary structure. They probably don't want to pay anyone more than Duchene who has a $6 million cap hit.

Sakic has expressed his desires to keep O’Reilly in Coloardo for a longtime but O'Reilly might have other plans. All he has to do is stick it out for two more years and he can sign with whatever team he wants for a huge pay day. He just watched his buddy Stastny cash in. You can guarantee every NHL team will be giving him a call if it comes to that.

Colorado has some tough decisions to make in the coming days. If they’re going to trade him it has to be now as his value will probably never be this high. On the other hand you never know what you might be trading away and O’Reilly has shown he can be the type of player that will win you a Stanley Cup. If it’s only a matter of a million dollars or so I say the Avalanche should swallow a little pride and pay the man. You don’t come across a player quite like him very often.

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