xXx..CK..xXx

For me this all seems a bit silly. It's somewhat of a self centered view in that I made post after post prior to the season about how this was the first season in some time where I felt as though we truly could not compete for a Stanley Cup based on things that transpired during the off season. On the other hand, I had sincerely not felt that way in any of our recent seasons where we also did not win the cup. Season after season I continued to believe when there were perhaps (what I believed to be more cynical fans) people who probably felt the same way I did this year in previous years. For me, there was simply something different about this off season than the rest. Then finally, we have those who seem to have believed this team was good heading into this season. I'm seeing a lot of posts where people are inferring that line of thought, or stating it directly. It seems to be for the most part, while not entirely, those people who are really going to the extreme of calling for bold trades as well as the firing of Bergevin. Although I'll concede that many of those who didn't like the team prior to the season probably already wanted Bergevin fired. From my standpoint, I still don't see it as the time for anything overly major. It's 20 games into the season and from the beginning, while I did not like our off season, I felt as though our team would always get better as the season progressed and decided that I would reserve final judgement of the team based on how our cap space was spent by the trade deadline or earlier. Now I wasn't a fan of Bergevin's off season but it seems as though there are a few things to remind ourselves of. First of all, I was the most displeased member of letting Radulov go. Prior to it happening, I knew it wouldn't. With that being said, it truly does seem like Radulov and his agent were playing hardball in that specific scenario. Markov, we'll just label that one as a mistake. Next there is Price. Price was the last one anyone expected to struggle as mightily as he has. Not to mention he's already been injured for longer than anyone would have liked at any point this season. This is part of the reason for the way our season has played out and that has nothing to do with the general manager or any moves he could have made. My basic point is that most people seemed to be willing to see what acquisitions would be made during the season to improve our team. Even if they weren't willing to wait and see, it seemed to be accepted that the team would need to do something with that cap space in order to improve our chances at a successful season. Now 20 games into the season, and all of a sudden many are ready to rip Bergevin's head off because things haven't turned out how they expected. Not only that but the manager hasn't been given the opportunity to make changes during the season which many people already knew were going to be necessary for this team to have a chance. Now don't get me wrong. I'm aware that there have been many vocal people who have been displeased with Bergevin for some time. My point is only that in my opinion if Bergevin were to have been fired, it should have been prior to this season. From my own standpoint, things haven't played out much differently than expected and so I can only assume that had our team played well to start the season, people would have accepted the mirage and not been calling for Bergevin's head. Jack Todd and Button should have noted that our team is "seriously flawed" prior to the season, not 20 games into it. While I understand completely why people would not trust Bergevin to rebuild this team, I personally do not think the team needs a rebuild. Trading Price, Pacioretty or Weber makes absolutely no sense to me, unless it's because elite NHL ready players are coming back the other way. Truthfully, Bergevin has demonstrated at times that he can make a decent move and every one of the hypothetical trade proposals in regard to how Bergevin "would" rebuild this team have been worse proposals than reality which already demonstrate a certain level of bias towards the guy.

Other than the concept of ageing, I have never been sure why people are so confident that Drouin will get 70-80 points (this year) when he's capped out at 53 points in 73 games thus far in his career. I think he's about right on pace for where he should be at this point in time when discussing Don's quote. My biggest positives from from the year include Gallagher as well, Byron and Victor Mete. Although Mete has hit a relative wall during the season, I had never seen him play before and (especially) his preseason play was outstanding.

I wouldn't trade Price, Weber or Pacioretty for pretty much any of the deals I've seen on this website so far. That is all... for now.

At least we won the Benn for Pateryn trade judging by the pairings...

Hopefully. This team wants players who hate to lose

I switched the game off but now I have to watch.

I'm not sure you should be allowed into the Bell Center during a live home game.

Think about it from a management perspective. The Habs have 8 million in cap space and I have to believe that somewhere within our management group there is an actual belief that the Habs have a shot or had a shot going into the season. Whether or not many of us as fans agree is a moot point. The fact is that the team was built with 8 million in cap space. Carey Price is making 6.5 million this year and will be making 10.5 million next year. Add those 4 million to Carey Price, who will likely be the same human being next year, and we still have his goaltending as well as 4 million in cap space to improve our team. Regardless of other contracts that will be coming in, the point is that we can have Carey Price on the team at the time as improving the squad we have on paper this year. This is not to mention that trade deadline moves when a team is a contender can always be made, and those players will hit the cap at a lesser rate. The cap will also go up ideally and so my argument is that the Habs can win a cup with Carey Price making 10.5 million. It's just a number that people like to get fixated on. I can't imagine his hit being an extreme issue to the success of our squad after witnessing a season where we went into it spending far from the limit.

I recently made a thread which shared the thought that the Habs needed a better backup goaltender for a myriad of reasons, including the mystery that is Price, which include periods of questionable play, often correlated with injury concerns. If that's to happen more than once, and the Habs are so reliant on their goaltending, then our backup needs to be able to perform if we don't want to throw in the towel on a given season. My thought was that we should have acquired a veteran goaltender like Miller to backup Price. The funny thing is that Lindgren is playing exactly how I saw Miller play in his opening game with the Ducks this season. Lindgren made breakaway save after breakaway save to keep his team in it last night, as well as on other nights. I suggested that the ideal backup goalie for the squad should have the mentality of a starting goalie, which Lindgren does, but that a veteran may be better because if you have a young guy like Lindgren, it might become an internal distraction to have to multiple young goalies playing great. Here we are, less than two weeks into said scenario and the sharks are already circling. Here would be my order of operations when it comea to the starting goaltender "situation". 1) Price comes back, Lindgren gets sent back to Laval. Hopefully Montoya and if need be Niemi back up Price. (Ironic that I don't trust veteran goaltender and previous NHL starter, Niemi) 2) Price comes back & Lindgren backs him up 3) Price comes back and we trade Montoya and acquire another serviceable backup outside of Niemi 4) Price comes back and depending how long Price was gone for, we trade Lindgren for something valuable because some GM sees it in him 5) Many other options, including Price playing backup to Lindgren until he falters and we send him back to Laval . . . . 31) Trade Carey Price for an all star return. Those would be my options...

I thought the team wasn't great on paper going into the season as a result of a few missed opportunities/signings yet I'm still hoping for my playoff hit this year. Taking a step back in the NHL rarely provides a certainty that there will be a forward step shortly thereafter.

That's why Don's saying he should go back to Laval.

I had a front row seat to 4 of those 7 points which came in one game, against the Habs.

Schlemko hasn't played a game with us yet but the defense was always going to be worse. Despite the hate some of them receive, Markov, Beaulieu and Emelin all brought something to the table in their varying degrees. I know he doesn't turnover the puck as much but I'd argue that Emelin's overpayment is similar to Alzner's. Emelin brought a little more physicality. We don't miss Beaulieu too much, other than the reality that Jordie Benn is either his or Emelin's substitute for the time being. I don't agree we're as good as last year but I enjoyed the type of game Radulov brought. I also believe Markov would have been serviceable for another year. Regardless of that, what he brought to the team even last year, outweighs anything anyone (it would have to be Alzner) has brought to the table on the back end this year.

If that's worth 1, then a shootout win should be worth 0.5 because it could be argued that that's even less of a "team win". I'm fine with how it is for the record.

This was just in response to my thread "The Habs Need a Better Backup"

Niemi's the worst right now. That is all.

Long live Hemsky

The officiating was bad, end of story. It doesn't matter whether we won or lost. My complaints still would have been there had we came back and won. Time to move on to another topic.

Probably the worst officiated game I've witnessed in awhile and I try to avoid complaining about the refs.

Agreed. It was obviously close but also obviously NOT over the bar. Even if the angle wasn't perfect, I'd still feel that way. Claude's reaction after the call made me like him a little more as well

Such a bad call... seriously

I was about to like Alzner for a little bit. Hopefully that counts?

Minnesota lost 4-2 to the Leafs tonight and Boudreau looked flustered and unhappy about it in his post game interview. He said he liked his team's effort though and that he hoped they would compete similarly tonight.

Kovalev was more exciting and I while I couldn't argue the skill level comparison, Kovalev did have that slap shot and could do things no other player in the league could. Drouin has speed but Kovalev was able to control the play even without the speed, which is somewhat of a backhand compliment. I just think the actual crowd reception was arguably better with Kovalev based on his play and he's not French Canadian which does say a lot. I also think that while Drouin is more responsible defensively, Kovalev could single handedly take control of a game. I think Drouin has the skill but I still feel that a contending team can't do it just with Drouin. I know how silly that sounds as no team can win a championship with one player but Kovalev was noticeable every game whether that was in a bad way or good way. Drouin can be quiet for a few games and a great team won't need him to be the go to guy on a nightly basis. As for the center thing... I think Drouin is capable of playing center but cannot say with absolute certainty that's it's necessarily the best position for him. He's a player with skill and versatility and he could play defense if we really needed him to do so. Have we found our first line center? That would be a lot easier to answer if we had a Kyle Turris or Ryan Johansen on our team. Or another binaries too 6 caliber center. If we did, would Drouin still be center on the first or second line, or would he be a winger for us? That hypothetical scenario is the only way I could answer whether or not we have "found" what we as Habs fans have long been looking for.

All in all let's just hope that when he does come back, he's feeling fully healthy.