Last week I decided to create the definitive list of the best Avalanche players of all time. Not the best players in general to wear the Burgundy and Blue, but the players who most contributed to the success of the team, whether they played well for other teams at some point or not.
I got a ton of great lists from the valiant members of Mile High Hockey, but I also wanted to get the perspectives of the big dogs in the Denver sports media, too. I sent emails to Rick Sadowski of the Rocky Mountain News and both Adrian Dater and Terry Frei of the Denver Post.
All three responded with lists of their own, because they are wonderful human beings and champions of sports journalism.
Their rankings are listed after the jump.
Dater:
Sakic
Roy
Forsberg
Foote
Hejduk
Blake
Bourque
Deadmarsh
Kamensky
Lemieux
Drury
Tanguay
Ozolinsh
Stastny
Keane
Yelle
Krupp
Klemm
Brunette
Pretty similar to everyone's lists so far, with the usual suspects included.
Frei:
I'm sure I'm forgetting someone:
SakicRoyForsbergBourqueBlakeFooteHejdukTanguayDruryLemieuxDeadmarshOzolinshKamenskySvatosKeaneKonowalchukBrunetteRicciYoung
Sadowski:
This was a tough one. Hope I didn't forget someone (probably did).
1-Joe Sakic
2-Patrick Roy
3-Peter Forsberg
4-Milan Hejduk
5-Ray Bourque
6-Adam Foote
7-Rob Blake
8-Valeri Kamensky
9-Claude Lemieux
10-Chris Drury
11-Sandis Ozolinsh
12-Alex Tanguay
13-Adam Deadmarsh
14-Paul Stastny
15-Uwe Krupp
16-John-Michael Liles
17-Andrew Brunette
18-Sylvain Lefebvre
19-Mike Ricci
He's the first to include Lefebvre.
With a ton of great lists to go off of, I'm now going to start compiling the definitive, final, unarguable list of the Top 19 Avalanche Players Of All Time. I'll start posting profiles of the hallowed few hopefully by the end of this week, starting with number 19 and working up to number 1.
Feel free to offer more suggestions!