The Chicoutimi Cucumber

No question. It is almost impossible for Sekac to be worse than Dourque, who was literally a gigantic turd sitting on the ice; so we come out ahead, or at worst even, no matter what happens.

Gomez's decline was utterly unpredictable and, really, quite a piece of miserable luck for the organization. He went from being very effective to being useless literally overnight. This sort of thing does happen to players now and then, but I always find it puzzling and kind of sad. As for his whole "realist vs optimist" business: the thing is, apart from dynastic powerhouses like the 1970s Habs or 1980s Islanders, NO team can ever been considered "likely" to win the Stanley Cup in any given season. Even mighty Chicago has lost the Cup far more often than it has won it in the Toews era. So if that's your standard of evaluation you are basically always going to be skeptical, negative, frowning, and pessimistic until that magical moment when the probabilities shift convincingly in favour of your team winning the Cup, something that really only happens once you've got a big series lead in the Stanley Cup Finals. Look at the Bruins: a high-end, widely-feared team for several seasons now, one that I'm pretty sure all Habs fans would have traded their entire squad for. Yet they only won one Cup; every other season has ended in failure. Pessimism is thus the "realistic" response to that squad. "Realist" fans would have been frowning upon them every moment UNTIL Game 7 of the 2011 Finals. And then the frowning would have re-commenced, justifiably, the following day; and rightly so, since they didn't repeat. This doesn't seem a recipe for enjoying fandom. I follow the Habs through thick and thin. As a fan, I'm grouchy when they suck and happy if the Habs have a good, strong, competitive team that has at least an outside chance of doing serious damage in the playoffs. I think this describes our team at present. It is certainly legitimate to debate whether they are better than that - i.e., really serious contenders. But emitting a cloud of negativity, caricaturing them as a "bubble team," ripping into them relentless because they aren't likely to win a Cup? Non merci.

Sekac looks awesome now. Let's see how he looks after 40 games. Rookies traditionally have trouble putting together a complete season. That said, he's older than the average rookie and has substantial pro experience, so maybe he can handle it. As for his being "ripped out of the lineup for now good reason" by that old debbil Therrien, maybe Bourque was being shopped around and dressed for that reason. It's not rocket science.

Didn't know that about Hawerchuk. That obviously would have been a better trade than the Savard debacle, although still a bad deal in the long run. In fairness to Serge Savard, Denis Savard had been massively productive in Chicago immediately prior to the trade here (80 points in 60 games - prorates to a 109-point season), and had been comparably productive for years prior. Now, in retrospect we can see that Steve Larmer might have been absolutely crucial to a fair bit of Savard's success - after all, Larmer went on to a 44-goal, 101-point season after Savard left, while Savard's production immediately plummeted. Conversely, Savard may have simply hit his "best before" date in the summer when the Habs acquired him. Which amounts to fairly terrible luck. I've never been sure that it's fair to evaluate trades based on information that the GMs could not possibly have possessed at the time. All the evidence suggested Serge Savard was trading Chelios for a spectacular, 100-point centreman. Could he really have been expected to know that Savard was exactly at the point where he would plummet downward into a 59-point C? (A similar problem affects the condemnation of the Gomez deal: once MacDonagh became a top-2 defender, that would be a bad deal no matter how you slice it, BUT we should remember that Gainey was acquiring a 60-point C and one of the league's top puck-rushers and playmakers. There was simply no basis for predicting Gomer's precipitous decline into a marginal player within two years).

In terms of Bourque getting ice over Sekac, why are people so dismissive of the possibility that the Habs were shopping him and therefore dressing him in the hope that he'd play well enough to persuade other teams to take a flyer on him? This theory eliminates any "issues" between coach and management altogether, and seems pretty plausible to me. When you're trying to trade a guy, you don't, traditionally, depress his value by benching him.

I can't believe people mention Phil Kessel in the same breath as this turd. Kessel is a prodigiously skilled, deadly, highly-productive winger, one of the best pure offensive threats in hockey. Idiots can complain that he is not physical; you may as well have said the same thing about Guy Lafleur. Cammalleri is not as good, but still a reliably offensive sparkplug and a repeatedly superb playoff performer. Bourque is a bum, a turd, a worthless POS who plays purely for a paycheque, who has one good playoff in 10 years, and who finally miscalculated in his quest to remain in the NHL while doing the bare minimum. Drawing any correlation between Kessel and Cammy - two legit, high-end NHLers - and this slug is a grave injustice to the former two. You should have heard Ray Ferraro on Bourque on the radio yesterday. He just let him have it. Called him "infuriating" because he's so naturally gifted and does so little with those gifts. It was the frustration of someone who battled all his life to carve out a distinguished NHL career contemplating someone with twice the talent and 1/10 the results. Bourque has ZERO respect from anyone in hockey. And rightly so. I'm fed up with these Kovalev/Kostitsyn/Bourque/Eller enigmas. If we never see Bourque in the CH again it'll be too soon.

Pacioretty himself has been very vocal, repeatedly over the years - in fact, since he first came up! - that he wants DD as his centreman. While that isn't the only consideration, it's a significant point in DD's favour. I don't hear the league fourth-best goal-scorer clamouring for Lars Eller. Beyond that, say what you want about Desharnais, the effort is there on a nightly basis with him. Unlike Eller. The whole argument is a dead-end anyway. Desharnais is simply not the issue. Eller is. It's up to Eller to take charge and generate good things on the ice no matter who his linemates are. This whole logic of blaming Therrien because Eller does not reliably do that is, not to put too fine a point on it, misguided, and I don't know why people have some sort of chronic inability to ask PLAYERS to take responsibility for their own performance. As for Eller being a victim of line mixing, while I agree that the Prust-Eller-Sekac combo should be kept together until it becomes necessary to separate them, the simple fact is that in today's NHL ALL coaches mix lines and ALL players have to be capable of dealing with that. Stop making excuses for Lars Eller.

It wouldn't be the first time that GM and coach disagree on player usage, and it won't be the last. I wouldn't read much into it. I also think a completely different interpretation is possible, i.e., that Bourque was dressed in the hope that he would do something to enhance his non-existent trade value. In that case, the lineup decision would definitely have been co-ordinated with the GM.

Ha, well, there's a huge difference between Bourque and all three of these guys. Say what you want about DD and Moen, but it's plain as day that both of those guys (a) care a lot and (b) work really hard. Both have made careers out of getting the most out of their what talent they possess. I for one find it hard to despise players like that; even if they are overpaid, getting rid of them becomes a business decision (as it was with Gorges) rather than cause for celebration. Bourque is the exact opposite, a player with considerable natural gifts who never seemed to give a crap and who has done the absolute bare minimum with what God gave him. THAT'S what's so aggravating about him. Eller is much closer to Bourque in this respect, and of the three he's the one I'd be most like to develop a full-blown hate-on for. But he too gets more rope than Bourque, because he's still relatively young. Unlike Bourque, then, there is at least some lingering hope that he will figure it out and "put it all together," becoming a reliably good hockey player. Eller is, however, definitely on borrowed time before he becomes Habs' fan Enemy #1.

Arrrrrggghhhh....the Pope should excommunicate you for that one

Wouldn't surprise me one bit. However, there's one big difference between the Bourque and Gorges dumps and a hypothetical jettisoning of Moen: Zoot Suit never signed the first two to those contracts. He was, though, the GM who signed Moen to his present deal. I'm not saying it'll make a difference - but it might.

Could be. This also explains why they were dressing him over Sekac. Trying to drum up interest on the trade market.

I'd move Emelin before either Tin-Man or Beaulieu, so I agree, but I think we have to accept that this team without Emelin has a very serious problem on the blueline. He'd leave a hole that would absolutely have to be filled - so that's a move we'd have to think long and hard about.

A player with that size and playoff performance will get a look, I think. It's not inconceivable that some dolt takes the bait.

Once again, MB shows himself a ruthless, cold-eye operator happy to throw anyone overpaid or under-performing on the scrap pile. I love it.

Ha ha haaaaa, nope - don't want that!!

Totally agree. I was highly vocal in condemning the hiring, as I have been in attacking the whole idea that the Habs' coaching position is an affirmative action program for francophones. But that's different from the question of whether his actual job performance has been sufficiently poor to warrant his firing. Sadly for the haters, there is a grand total of ZERO evidence suggesting that it has.

Gallagher makes every line he's on better, so the same would be true here. However, scoring and offence wouldn't be Prust's role on that line. Offence would be Eller and Sekac's job. Prust's role would be to grind it out in the corners, crash the net and otherwise do two things: first, be the gritty sh*t-disturber that makes room for the other two; and second, demonstrate to the other two the price you need to pay to be successful, as well as drive them to excel by his example and his seniority (leadership). So what I'm saying is that Prust would be there precisely to be a "plumber." That wouldn't be the first line to thrive with one player who isn't especially skilled offensively. As for Eller, we've been over this many times, the difference being that I don't accept endless excuses and pity parties for beloved young players. Bourque is not the reason Eller has looked utterly indifferent in 90% of his regular season time with us. Eller is.

If Michel Therrien were named Joe Blow, there'd still be no reason to fire him. His team has reliably performed up to its potential. That's the bottom line.

Correct. Habs29 is probably right that Prust isn't the long-term solution on that line - mainly because he's so often injured. But that doesn't change the fact that Prust may be vital to that line's success. I simply do not trust that Eller will deliver if left to drift along according to his own devices, because NOTHING in his NHL career gives any reason for such trust; and I don't trust a rookie (Sekac) to be the driving force of any line. A blood-and-guts veteran who will show Sekac the way and keep Eller accountable is exactly what the doctor ordered for those players. If it isn't Prust, it'll have to be someone else like him. Maybe Weise, I don't know. But until he flags, Prust should be the man on that line.

I see the point, but I dunno - Prust seemed to me to be pretty critical to what made that line tick last night. Left to his own devices, you just know that Eller will revert to his "just happy to be here" Clueless Lars mode. Prust may be there to keep him honest, i.e., working hard, getting dirty, creating room. And certainly we don't want Sekac taking his cue about how to be an NHLer from Lars Eller. In short, Prust is the leader on that line and we might want to keep him there.

On Subban: I thought he was a presence out there and had a solid game. That said, you're right that he has not looked like PK SUBBAN (all in capital letters) this season. What worries me is the possibility that that's exactly what the coaches want. It's almost as though he has finally internalised the message not to take risks. Don't ever go for the big hip check. Don't ever carry the puck further than the opposition blueline - always dump it in after that. In short, don't ever go for that difference-making, game-defining Big Play, because sometimes those plays don't come off and therefore backfire. All the stuff that made PK such an extraordinary player is also the stuff that made him grind up against the conventional Babcock/Martin/Therrien wisdom about what players are supposed to do. I've long believed that PK is that rare, special player to whom the normal rules don't apply. His "risky" game was never actually as risky as "experts" said it was, because his skills are so off the chart that he can get himself out of trouble 90% of the time. Today's coaches would have taken Bobby Orr and beaten all the creativity and dynamism out of him, turning him into a nice, manageable, safe, 50-point player like Drew Doughty. And that seems to be what they have finally accomplished with PK Subban.

Umm...you don't think Emelin is valuable?

I can't believe the "Euro" factor is even brought up in this day and age. Can we all just move on, please. Not having watched the preseason, last night was the first game where Sekac really made me sit up and take notice. If he can play like that on a regular basis, well, damn! Let's find the world's biggest crapper and flush Rene Bourque down it as soon as possible.

That Sekac-Eller-Prust line was a revelation! Tremendous cycling and jam. Prust is just what the doctor ordered for Eller (an honest player who shows how it's done) and Sekac really looked good: big,. strong, skilled. What's not to like? Bourque, don't let the Bell Centre door hit your arse on the way out. Kudos to MT for striking gold with that trio...for one game at least Price was simply The Man. As always when he's on his game, you're only going to beat him on a perfect play. And that's a good team, because these guys were asleep in the first (again). The classic signs of a team clawing out of a slump...gutting out a win, then having slumping individual players start to produce. The trend lines are in the right direction. On another note, Bob Cole is even worse than I remember. Yes, yes, a legend and all of that. But holy smokes, he hardly named any Wild players all night (because by the time he remembered their name, the play had moved on), and some of his commentary is just inane. "This game started as a tie..." Ya think, Bob??? Time to hang 'em up.