Avalanche Trade Nick Holden to New York Rangers

Craig Custance from ESPN is reporting that the Avs have traded defenseman Nick Holden to the Rangers for a 4th round pick in 2017. Not quite the 3rd rounder we need but it'll do.

Holden's tenure with Avs zig-zagged around from healthy scratch on his arrival to spot duty at wing to revelation in the 2nd half of his first year. From there it was a solid yet unspectacular 14-15 campaign then finally ending up as Tyson Barrie's partner for all of last year. He closes out his 3 years in Colorado with 21 goals and 37 assists in 214 games. The Rangers get all this and more for 2 more years at $1.65M per.

We knew this move was a possibility. Even though he wasn't the poorest performing Avs D, he was the one that ended up playing over his head this past season and a change was necessary, both to open up some cap room and to try someone else in the top-4 that could be more effective. That someone else will likely come from a pool containing Nikita Zadorov, Chris Bigras, Eric Gelinas and a possible free agent signing or traded player.

I expect we will see some moves that build off of this in the coming days.