Great! Those jackasses who run the game decided to sort things out. That's fabulous. The 2013 season is underway and hockey is flooding back into our lives like faulty incontinence pants.

That makes lots of people very, very happy. It's just like buying a lovely new Avalanche car with it's lovely new car smell. Mmmmmmm. Lovely.

Except, under that new, clean aroma is a whiff of old, wet doggy smell. You know what I mean? The kind of stink that clings on, despite how many times you wash it, or use Febreze.

That stink, my wonderful internet pals, is mediocrity.

"Hold up," I hear you say. "It's only been six games. There's plenty of time yet."

You are, of course, correct. Six games only represents 1/8th of this shortened season. But - in a normal season of 82 games, many playoff spots are decided in the last week of the season - a margin of one or two points. When that season is condensed, that problem is magnified greatly. There isn't the time for things to even out over 82 games. A losing streak of six or eight games would not be a major problem, here, it would be a sizeable chunk of season.

New season, old problems.

1. Anaemic scoring

2. Baffling coaching decisions (Barrie instead of O'Brien/Hunwick)

3. Long term injuries to key players

4. Not so special teams

5. Not having the players put in a full 60 minutes of effort - not "starting the game on time."

I love the Avs, I really do, but after five years of this penny pinching shit, I am really fed up with it.