Habs Fan in Edmonton

First time I have heard Kent Hughes speak, am definitely impressed. I think the Habs made an excellent choice, no doubt he and Gorton will work together well. I look forward to the next steps.

It certainly can't hurt with signing them. Gorton is also a Boston areas guy so you would think Harris would feel really comfortable with these guys. I bet he signs with the Habs.

I would agree if their only experience was being an ex-player. Just being an ex player doesn't make someone a good candidate, it's what they did on top of that.

Whether someone is an agent or ex player doesn't make them a good or bad candidate. It depends on the individual involved and their skills/abilities. Hughes speaks French and grew up in Montreal, that should be plenty good enough for the French media although I suspect some of those were hoping for Saint Patrick.

I didn't see that. I saw a lot of criticism of Bergevin from fans (a lot on this forum) and in the media, some justified and some was not. When you are under the microscope in a hockey market like Montreal you will get criticized unless you win a lot of cups. And even then.....

Just a couple things to say about the hiring of Kent Hughes: 1) Glad the hiring process is over and they can concentrate on the rebuild 2) I wish Kent Hughes the best of luck and hope he does a fantastic job. Obviously Jeff Gorton thought he was the best candidate and that's what counts.

If it's down to two then we should know very soon. Unless there is a mystery candidate??? Looks like Patrick is out of it which is fine with me and not unexpected. But maybe as a coach?

And Seattle also gets 2 points, if you are part of "Team Tank" then not a bad day so far.

That's an interesting proposal but I would say no. I still think Caulfield will be a 30-35 goal scorer in this league on a regular basis and Romanov has made good strides this year and they are still very young. Arizona is trying to sell high (don't blame them for trying) based on 1 excellent year Chychrun had last year.

It certainly is. Would have liked Buffalo to get 2 points today but at least they got one.

I think he was proposing retaining about 1.75 - 2.0M per year for Gallagher/Petry (25-30%) so the other team was paying 4.5M/year, that's how I understood it. We would have to retain for the life of the contract which for Gallagher is 5 years, Petry more reasonable at 3.

I am certainly not against taking on some salary if it allows us to acquire additional good young prospects and picks as we would likely be able to afford it if we have a number of young players on ELC's as you pointed out. We will likely have to take on some salary to get a good return back for some of these players. Taking a chunk of Petry's salary for 3 years would be reasonable if the return was worth it. However taking on 5 years of Gallagher's might be a little steep. I think Brendan is here for a while. I definitely think the return for Toffoli can be very decent as he can be a big help for a contender, agree his contract is very tradeable. Chariot needs to stay healthy as he is our best bargaining chip this year. I also agree about Lehkonen, one of my favourite Habs because of his work ethic and defensive awareness, no need to trade him unless they get an offer they can't say no to. I think a lot of teams value (especially contending teams) what he brings. It should get very interesting here as we get closer to the trading deadline. One thing we know for sure. We will be sellers. Just a question of who and what we get back.

Good to see that Arber isn't slacking off when it comes to PIM's.

Who do you think put the pieces together for the Rangers? He was GM there from 2015-21 and now they have one of the best records in the NHL in 2022. Who do you think is responsible for that? Did the new GM magically acquire all these players? What were your short term expectations for Gorton when he got the job? Make wholesale changes without getting to know the personnel first which also coincided with Montreal having half their team injured. Make a quick decision on a GM? Some people are so impatient. News flash: building a winner here won't happen overnight.

Fair enough but it is my understanding that Gorton is looking for someone to mentor, none of the candidates have management experience at the NHL level but Darche has had the opportunity to be involved working very closely with Brisbois on all aspects of their operations. You seem to totally dismiss what he has learned working for one of the best organizations in the NHL. He has been much more than a depth management piece. Briere has experience at the ECHL level but that is a far cry from the NHL. Is Anaheim interviewing Briere? I don't know much about Hughes. If negotiating contracts was the most important part of a GM's job then he would be the leading candidate. I would think that evaluating talent and finding the right pieces to put together to build a winning team is but I don't know nearly enough about Hughes to make a determination of his skills in this area. We will know soon. I am confident Gorton will make a good decision.

No question that Madden would be great to have at the draft table. You would think that Anaheim would give Madden the opportunity for the Montreal GM job if they are not going to hire him as their own GM. That would be the classy thing to do.

What don't you like about Darche?

Darche was my favourite at the beginning of the process, only because I had seen a couple interviews with him and he came across as a very measured, intelligent, thoughtful guy. I am hardly an expert on the candidates being interviewed, far from it. I have also watched a couple interviews with Briere recently and came away with a more positive impression of him, not that I had a negative impression before, just didn't have any impression. Stu Cowan made some good comments about Darche, we will likely know soon. Glad they are taking their time with this process.

Darche is obviously held in high regard by more than the Habs. He is not being interviewed by Anaheim because he speaks French, it's because of his ability/skills.

If you listen to Stu Cowan's comments, Hughes and Gorton have an existing relationship so there is a good reason to have that feeling.

A good article on Briere. He has certainly been doing a lot of the right things. Darche was my choice but I think there is a lot to like about Briere. https://nhltradetalk.com/former-nhl-star-daniel-briere-trying-to-become-next-great-nhl-gm/

There will never be a perfect system where everyone is happy but they have made progress over the years. I remember a playoff game many years ago where Montreal was playing the Rangers. Serge Savard (I think) clearly scored an overtime winner but the puck went in and out so fast that the goal judge missed it. They didn't use video replay so it never counted. Fortunately the Habs scored just a bit later to win the game. It would have been an absolute travesty if they had ended up losing that game. That type of thing would never happen today.

On a positive note the Sens, Sabres and Islanders win. The KKurse will be over soon. The Habs are playing better.

Last night the effort was there but not the result, tonight we get both, maybe, oh I dunno, a 4-2 win!!

No doubt, taking that kind of cap hit off somebody's hands is worth way way more than a late 3rd round pick.