Sakic Says Makar Is Getting Done. Everything Else Can Wait.

Joe Sakic was at an alumni game Sunday, skating with old teammates, and still found time to say publicly what Colorado has been signaling for weeks: the Cale Makar extension is getting done before the season starts. Not "we're working on it." Confident. That's a specific word from a GM who doesn't typically freelance.

I've had two notes on this deal since August 4, and the cap math has always been the interesting part — a contract potentially north of $130 million restructures how Colorado builds around its defense for the next decade. Makar put up 55 points last season, most of them from the back end of plays that nobody else on the roster could initiate. Locking that in before training camp isn't just housekeeping; it's the organizational statement that the blue line is the load-bearing wall, and everything else gets built around it.

The everything else is the part worth watching. Schwartz is still out with no timeline. L'Heureux just signed. Merkulov is a bet on reclamation. The right wing depth behind Logan O'Connor remains thin. Colorado has been patching the forward group all summer while the Makar negotiation ran in the background, and Sakic's confidence Sunday suggests the franchise isn't going to let one complicate the other. Get the cornerstone locked, then sort out the rest in camp.

My read: the next ten days are about whether the Makar deal closes on paper the way Sakic says it will in public. If it does, Colorado heads into October with its foundation settled and its questions concentrated exactly where they've been all summer — on the forwards.