Colorado Avalanche: News From Around the NHL October 8th, 2014

The Avs are pushing for an outdoor game.

The Colorado Avalanche say they're talking to the NHL about the possibility of hosting an outdoor game next season.

Team President Josh Kroenke is "pushing the league quite hard" to hold a game out in the elements in what would be the franchise's 20th season in the Mile High City.

For the first time since he injured Barrie, Cooke will play against the Avs tomorrow.

Cooke, 36, is aware he might have a bull’s-eye on his chest Thursday and Saturday, although Avalanche bruiser Patrick Bordeleau is injured and antagonist Cody McLeod isn’t exactly a heavyweight.

"I’ve been in this situation before. It’s nothing new," said Cooke, a marked man after previous on-ice discretions. "I’ve got to go out and play hard. That’s what I’ll do. I can’t really predict situations. I choose not to sit here and worry about it either.

"It’s Game 1 and these two points are important, especially the way our division and our conference are lined up."

Cooke, who has played 1,120 regular-season and playoff games and won a Stanley Cup with Pittsburgh in 2009, has been suspended six times, but last year’s incident was his first since March 20, 2011. Cooke tried to apologize to Barrie afterward.

"It was a pretty emotional time for me, and I just said I didn’t really want to talk to him," Barrie told the Denver Post on Tuesday. "But now, it’s a new season and I’m fortunate that there are no ill effects on the knee and I’m not a guy to hold grudges.

"The way I’d like to get back at them is to beat them, beat them good, and then come back here and beat them again and kind of set the tone for our year."

Unfortunately the Denver Post has suspended a hockey beat writer for using an "inappropriate" word on Twitter (and the way the situation was handled after that).   Hockey Buzz has all the screen caps. Love him or hate him, but in the end he has been suspended for two weeks...

Adrian Dater has been suspended without pay for two weeks by the Denver Post, for whom he’s the beat writer for the Colorado Avalanche.

The Great One almost didn't go to L.A.

Wayne Gretzky would have been playing for the Detroit Red Wings if his wife would have had her way in the 1988 trade from the Edmonton Oilers that gutted Canadian hockey fans.

On Aug. 9, 1988, the Oilers traded Gretzky, along with Marty McSorley and Mike Krushelnyski, to the Los Angeles Kings for Jimmy Carson, Martin Gelinas, $15 million in cash, and the Kings’ first-round draft picks in 1989, 1991 and 1993.

The retired superstar discussed his NHL career and the trade to the Kings with former Hockey Canada boss Bob Nicholson at the Greatness in Leadership forum in Lethbridge, Alta., on Tuesday.

"I got sold. I didn’t get traded," Gretzky said.

"At the end of the day and this is kind of unique the Oilers said, ‘what city do you want to go to?’ I had the choice of New York, Detroit or L.A.

"Everyone thought that my wife (actress Janet Gretzky) had picked L.A. and my wife said, ‘you should play in Detroit.’ It was my dad who called me and said, ‘you should play in L.A.’ For whatever reason, he said, ‘I think you should move to L.A.’ and I became an L.A. King after that."

The Globe and Mail has an interesting interview with the captains for all seven Canadian teams.