Nathan MacKinnon baffled by reporter's bizarre question

After he suffered a Game 6 loss and sequential playoff elimination against the Vegas Golden Knights, Colorado Avalanche star Nathan MacKinnon probably felt even worse after his post-game press conference.

In the middle of questions asking where he goes from here, what he could have done differently, and the endless roll of cue-card queries that reporters ask, MacKinnon suffers through the most bizarre and inept question that an athlete might have ever faced in history.

Adrian Dater, an infamous Colorado reporter that has bounced around publications after a few scandals, is believed to have asked the question — if you can call it that.

If you didn’t catch all of it through the muffled Zoom call, well:

“Uh Nate, you know I know you're a gamer and uh, and all this and uh you know I'm just thinking maybe out loud as far as in your shoes right now it's like alright we've done all the things we can do we've done all the game planning we can do maybe, maybe just f— it we'll just go in next year and not think that anymore and just win this thing when we don't think so much is that uh am I on the right path at all with this like maybe you just guys think a little too much?”

Word vomit isn’t a strong enough describer. It is complete word butchery that belongs in a “Friday the 13th” movie.

The puzzled look on MacKinnon’s face — clearly not understanding a single phrase coming out of Dater’s mouth — is beyond hilarious. If he didn’t just suffer the 6-3 loss to the Knights and wasn’t down in the dumps after realizing that he has been in the NHL for nine years, totalling two second-round exits as his career peak, he might have given more than, “no...and he swore?”

Jumbled phrases aside, the question is essentially asking if they’re just going to try and not think through their next playoff appearance. The Avalanche are clearly one of the league’s best teams and will be for a while, so the merit of the question seems valid if you want to get an answer about mental toughness or something, to eventually criticize a player that has been putting up historic postseason point totals.

Hopefully no one will be discussing Colorado’s ability to close out series next year and MacKinnon will get that much-deserved extended postseason run.

Through 48 games this season, MacKinnon scored 20 goals and 65 points, and was named as a Hart Trophy finalist earlier this week.

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