GHT120

Thought they had to be on the NHL roster for a certain length of time, before which they have to be offered back to Ottawa before being waived ... anyway, it is always possible that Kovacevic could be the one to be moved out ... although I suspect I am in the minority, but I'm not as "sold" on Barron as many others (although I loved the character he showed in his Pride reaction).

Mainly, sad as it is to say, because Melnyk passed and the team has been sold ... Michael Andlauer is good at least until he has to fire a GM he has hired. It also helps that the sports media is as soft and fawning as any in North America ... the most they ever did about Melnyk was acknowledge that some fans were unhappy. IMO the fanbase has been through a few rebuilds in which drafting and prospects led to nothing, so just the roster is only enough for the "black, red, gold, and white" tinted glasses crowd ... if the Sens aren't making the playoffs this season their fans will find several new "Wade Reddens" to flog ... if they make the playoffs and lose to the Leafs John Roddenberg will need to mainline coffee for a week. BTW - you wouldn't happen to have worked for Ag-Can at Billings Bridge?

Nice of Paul and good choice by Mailloux

The annual ... "let's make some short-term moves and hope to make the playoffs, then anything can happen" approach for almost all of the 30 years since the last Cup victory has not prepared fans for the need for patience.

Saw some concern expressed by Sens fans that because of Travis Hamonic's NMC the Sens would end up having to send Jacob Bernard-Docker and/or Lassi Thomson through waivers ... ignoring that there are other ways to resolve that quandary, are either of those players good enough to warrant claiming them given that the Habs would have keep them on the NHL roster (for how long I do not recall)?

Murray, Muzzin and picking a back-up goalie gets them to within a little over $2M ... but what will be fun to watch is that of the 15 players on their roster making $2M or more (counting the two LTCs), 14 have some form of NTC ... 5 of those have NMCs ... the only one of them that does not have any trade protection is their latest saviour in goal, Samsonov.

Might as well go defensive since the PP specialist seems to be anything but ... CW averaged all of 1:15 PP-TOI per game played (46) last season ... he scored zero PP goals and had two PP assists (one primary, one secondary) ... it is true the Habs PP was awful last season (4th worst in the NHL), but as a "specialist" supposedly quarterbacking the PP some of that awfulness starts with him.

Unless someone makes a ridiculous offer, I expect Kovacevic is at worst the 7D.

And what do the Canadiens give that bottom dwelling team to entice them into taking on DeSmith (a moderately priced backup) or Allen (a very expensive backup), and Gallagher's contract with FOUR years remaining @$6.5M AAV?

Barring injury, not certain there is roster room to give Beck 9 games

I have to wonder whether Wisconsin might have made the decision, and not Smilanic ... I'm not certain that scholarships are "guaranteed" contracts ... schools have been known to "run off" players to get back a scholarship slot.

At least in terms of expectations ... let the lad find his level ... if it happens to be Plek-ish that will be tremendous.

Unless Peterborough trades him, Beck will be in Ottawa on 2023-09-29, 2023-10-20, 2023-12-08 and 2024-02-09 to play the 67s ... and Peterborough is only 3-ish hours away down Highway 7.

Slightly easier for a forward ... but it can be done, and hopefully will be by Hutson.

All-star is an imprecise term ... the All-Star Game is a worthless measure IMO (John Scott made it) and there are only 12 year-end NHL all-stars amongst 650+ NHL players ... but I would agree there are few elite (Top 6/Top Pairing/Starting Goaltender) prospects in the group.

Same height, but BU is listing Hughes at 155 lbs (Wikipedia* claiming 161, or 11 stone 7 lbs), while Canucks list Hughes at 180. * - I'm guessing Lane, someone in the Hutson clan or his agent updates Wiki every time he puts on a pound ... or 161 is before he went hiking and he didn't take his boots off.

His future (however big or small) with the Habs or elsewhere in the NHL now depends on this coming season with Wisconsin ... for his sake, I hope he does well enough to earn a contract ... for the Habs sake I hope he does well enough to at least have some trade value (likely more as an add-on to a trade).

The ordinary NHL/AHL or junior-eligible players back to junior are standard team decisions ... it gets slightly more complex with Euros if they previously played pro overseas ... If the team can convince the player then it is a consensus decision (the ideal approach) ... issues can POTENTIALLY arise (short or long term) when the team imposes its decision ... NCAA players are the others that can get more complicated as they sometimes want to turn pro rather than return to school and can force the issue by leaving school even if the team wants them to return.

True ... but how teams treat players can make a difference come next contracts, dealing with free agents, retaining your own free agents, etc. ... HuGo seem sensitive to this.

Unless he makes the Habs (hope not) he will be returning "home".

Logan Mailloux, Xavier Simoneau, William Trudeau, Joshua Roy and Riley Kidney spent much of the summer at Brossard training with Nick Suzuki, Kaiden Guhle, Juraj Slafkovsky and Arber Xhekaj. Cole Caufield and Josh Anderson dropped by occasionally to join them. - Journal de Montreal, Plusieurs recrues du Canadien ont passé l’été à Montréal (my translation) Francis Bouillon, Habs development coach, had suggested the youngsters do it ... although teams cannot require players to train over the summer, the Habs were able to make their facilities and resources available to the players ... including Adam Nicholas (director of hockey development) and Scott Pellerin (hockey development consultant), as well as the on-site chefs/nutritionists.