DENVER — Chris MacFarland doesn’t overcomplicate the mission.
“We’re trying to win, right?” the Colorado Avalanche general manager said Tuesday at a news conference previewing their Western Conference finals matchup with the Vegas Golden Knights. Simple enough — but the way he’s gone about building this team is anything but.
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Of the players on Colorado’s active roster, only three — Gabe Landeskog, Cale Makar, and Nathan MacKinnon — were drafted by the organization. Everyone else arrived via trade or free agency, which makes the Avalanche’s sustained success a quiet testament to MacFarland’s eye for talent and his willingness to spend organizational capital to get it. It’s also a big reason he’s one of three finalists for the NHL’s GM of the year award.
“We’re sacrificing some of that youth. Some of those picks and prospects. So, you’ve got to delve into (free agency),” MacFarland said. “Our scouts have done a great job supplementing the moving out of the (draft) picks. We’ve got high, high-end drafted players that are still with us. … But the cycle that it’s kind of been building on over the last 7-8 years — that’s just part of the beast.”
MacFarland got to work last offseason, signing Brent Burns and retaining Brock Nelson. He kept building as the season progressed, adding Nazem Kadri, Brett Kulak, Nicolas Roy, and Nick Blankenburg through trades. The moves paid off — Colorado led the overall NHL standings from early November through year’s end, finishing with a franchise-record 121 points.
Brent Burns was another signing that was initially criticized, but it’s turned out to be another CMac masterpiece. Credit: Isaiah J. Downing – Imagn Images
Head coach Jared Bednar didn’t mince words about his GM’s recognition. “I think it’s probably a couple of years coming. But oftentimes with the work you put in — and the blood, sweat, and tears — there’s a delayed reaction,” Bednar said. “This team for me wasn’t just built in this year. It was built over the last couple of years with the guys that have remained, with some of the new guys we got last year. … I’ve known and worked with (MacFarland) for a long time. No one’s going to outwork him and no one’s going to watch more games.”
MacFarland, never one to let a moment pass without a little levity, cut in: “Easy. Easy.”
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Bednar pressed on: “I shouldn’t say nobody. … A lot of the tough (decisions) that we’ve made over the years, especially in the last couple of years, they all seem to be turning out and working out pretty well for us again this year.”
Not everyone was ready to give MacFarland that kind of credit — not after January 2025. When he dealt star winger Mikko Rantanen to the Carolina Hurricanes, the backlash was swift and loud. Rantanen was subsequently traded again, this time to the Dallas Stars, and the Stars made Colorado pay for it — eliminating the Avalanche in a bruising seven-game first-round series. Calls for MacFarland’s head, and even Bednar’s, weren’t hard to find in the aftermath.
I’m guilty of it too. I wrote a piece for Mile High Hockey calling for both of them to be fired. I was wrong — and to my credit, I admitted it well before many others did. We’re all human. As for Bednar specifically, losing to Pete DeBoer again just left a sour taste. But sometimes that’s exactly the point. Defeat, when it stings badly enough, has a way of forging something stronger on the other side.
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Bednar knows this better than most — and DeBoer has been the recurring source of that education. Colorado blew a 2-0 series lead to DeBoer’s Vegas Golden Knights in 2021, eventually falling in six games. It was a gut punch, the kind that ends coaching careers in other markets. Bednar has now lost three playoff series to DeBoer alone. And yet, the very next season, the Avalanche hoisted the Stanley Cup. The losses didn’t break the program. They sharpened it.
Floyd Mayweather weighs-in for his May 2007 bout against Oscar De La Hoya. Credit: Ed Mulholland – Imagn Images
Sports history is full of those moments, and since Colorado is once again staring across the ice at a Vegas team, it’s only fitting to reach for another Vegas example. Floyd Mayweather Jr. fought the defining bouts of his boxing career in that city — and the fuel for all of it traces back to a single, devastating loss. When Mayweather dropped the gold medal final at the 1996 Olympics, he was inconsolable. No words, just tears. Pain and embarrassment, raw and public. He made himself a promise that night: it would never happen again. It didn’t. That Olympic bout stands as the last defeat of his competitive career — an unblemished professional record built entirely on the back of one crushing setback.
His financial record, on the other hand — the IRS disputes, the curious loan arrangements overseas — that’s a separate conversation entirely. The man can box. Budgeting is a different discipline.
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But back to hockey — because that’s where Bednar and MacFarland have always let their work do the talking. The firings that never came. The rebuild that wasn’t really a rebuild. The trade that looked like a disaster and may yet prove to be the final piece. Colorado has been counted out before, and they’ve responded by winning a championship. Now they’re back in the conference finals, one round from another shot at the Cup, with the same coach, the same GM, and a roster assembled with the kind of quiet confidence that doesn’t need to announce itself.
MacFarland said it best at the top: they’re trying to win. Turns out, they’re pretty good at it.
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