The Chicoutimi Cucumber

Wow, terrible on-ice results and an unstable ownership situation. Now there's a winning recipe for attracting UFAs if I ever saw one.

Well, any other team would have canned Carbo before Bob did. In fact, if Carbo hadn't won that Dallas game I'll bet he wouldn't look nearly as good as he seems to in retrospect. Let's see: the young players almost to a man regressed this season; the veterans were mailing it in; he lost the room; team defence was catastrophic. And let's not forget his ridiculous slowness in making adjustments (c.f. last season's playoff vs. Julien). I fail to see any argument that Carbo is the answer, or that he had the answers. You can well argue that he wasn't *the problem* - but neither was he the solution. And the fans all chanting his name at games are a pack of hypocrites. I'll bet ANY money that a good chunk of them were calling for Carbo's firing a few weeks ago. So I ain't buying this whole 'Carbo is a misunderstood genius' argument. What Gainey needs to do is stabilize the situation by hiring a veteran coach with impeccable credentials. Hartley may be the best bet, though what we really need is a Joel Quenville. Now, it's increasingly popular to argue that these guys just suck. I dunno about that. Mike Komisarek, Tomas Plekanec, Andrei Kostitsyn, Sergei Kostitsyn, Carey Price - last season, these players were regarded as the core of one of the very best young talent pools in all of hockey. Concluding that they 'suck' is waaaaay too hasty. They're just too young to draw definitive conclusions; for all we know, this season could turn into the most valuable learning experience of their careers. But clearly none of these players were prepared to follow up on last season's breakthrough. Add to that the gruesome-to-behold decline of Saku Koivu and the regression of Kovalev, you've got a dying veteran core attached to an immature young nucleus. That's a bad, bad mix...but it may not really be anyone's fault, when you think about it. Should Gainey have known that Koivu would pick this year to wash up? (And he *did* bring in Lang...) or that Kostitsyn would manifestly fail to step into the role of 'Kovalev replacement?' In theory, the rising young guns should have helped to carry the declining veterans and vice versa. Unfortunately it went the other way. It's a bloody shame and I can't think of another team that has done as the habs did, patiently rebuild with young players, and had it blow up in their faces so badly. It's just...really, really shitty luck, in a way.

Yes. And, assuming that Gainey is still GM, I can't wait to hear all the anger and resentment spewed his way when he "fails" to re-sign UFAs or when he "fails" to attract new ones. I think we have a chance of keeping Komisarek and other UFAs who may well have a sense of loyalty to the city/team, friends on the club, etc.. But what 'external' UFA in his right mind will sign with a team that 1. has returned to the mediocrity that defined its past decade after one scintillating season 2. has all sorts of rumoured problems in the dressing room (to say the least) 3. has a school of media sharks relentlessly feeding on the chum of players' problems 4. is reportedly on the market, with no more stability at the ownership level 5. has shown cracks at the management level, with that a*sehole Boivin spouting off and rumours of Gainey having been pushed into firing Carbo 6. may not even have a coach (other than the GM) by July 1 7. has no obvious, elite-level 'rising young stars' and only declining veterans who are themselves UFAs 8. plays in a province with a different culture that scares their wives and ignorant family members 9. plays in a province with very high tax rates UFAs will stay away in droves. But all the blame will fall to Bob, even though he is only responsible for #6. You heard it here first. That's why the non-stop suckage of our young players this season has driven me crazy. They don't seem to understand the long-term damage they're doing to the entire rebuilding program of which they're a part. The only way Montreal will attract UFAs is if the franchise is perceived as a winner. But nah, it's more important to party, hang out with mobsters, fail to be prepared to pay the price night after night, and then slip into a catastrophic team slump that corrodes their confidence and undercuts the entire organization. I can't think about it any more, it's too damned frustrating.

I believe that we can sign UFAs. A lot of our unsuccessul pursuits have been a result of simply being outbid. *Some* lame-ass cowards are afraid of the Montreal pressure; but I don't understand why the pressure here is SO much worse than in any other hockey-crazy Canadian market; e.g., Toronto has just as zany a media environment and yet it's considered prime UFA country. (I will grant that the pressure is mostly worse for francophone stars who fear the burden of becoming the Next French Canadian Star). As for non-francophone players, I'd say the main disincentives are: 1 - higher taxes (one reason why we are obliged to 'overpay' - more like 'compensate' for onerous tax rates) 2the Habs' reputation as a crappy, losing team. This is where this disaster of a season desperately hurts us. Had we built on last season with another strong year, dollars to donuts UFAs would be lots more interested. 3 - legal requirements demanding that children, if they use the public system, must send their kids of French schools (this applies to Europeans, Americans, and francophones, not to anglo-Canadians); 4 -and wives and family who are scared of Quebec, thinking that it's 100% French or that English people get tarred and feathered. Say what you like, I guarantee you that this kind of grotesque cultural ignorance is a consideration for a significant percentage of players. Lindros was tip of the iceberg. 3 of these 4 issues are challenges that other franchises don't have to overcome. Having said all that, 1) can be partly addressed with through compensation; 2) is not unique to us and therefore not potentially fatal; 3) wouldn't bother every player; and 4) wouldn't apply to every player. So our talent pool is smaller than the rest of the league's, but if I'm right, there *will* be UFAs willing to come here if we make the best offer.

That's horrible. Just horrible. I'll concede that in, oh, five years that might be a really strong club (except that Hamrlik will be gone by then). But I'm too old to wait another five years! The good news is that I don't think Bob will walk, I don't think we'll lose all our UFAs, we might have the cap room to lure an external UFA, and I cautiously submit that most of your players will be better next year after regressing this season.

Good analysis. Assuming we do make the playoffs, the 'X' factor is the ghost of last year's squad. Remember that we have basically the same team. If these guys can heat up and really start to click like they did for most of last season - that is, if we don't just scrape into the playoffs but really start to find our A-game, rolling four lines, blinding speed, tape-to-tape passing - the Habs could be prime 'upset' material. What I'm imagining is basically the reverse of last year's fabulous season and bungled playoff. It could flip on its head this time around. That's a possibility. But my resolute optimism doesn't look that far ahead. This team will start to play better and will make the dance, I hereby declare. Beyond that? As another great prognosticator once said: 'difficult to tell. Always in motion is the future.'

I went through a phase of deep depression about this team, a phase which reached its nadir with the Devils game. Now I've basically decided to have blind faith that this nightmare will end. Rather than give up on the team, or Gainey, or the whole damned rebuild, I'm approaching the second half up to this point as just a really long, catastrophically dramatic slump. Teams DO get out of slumps. But, contrary media chatter about some win that serves as a magical 'turning point,' it usually works by baby steps. E.g.: -Players that were desperately struggling start to recover their games: we see this happening with Pleks and Price and maybe Kovalev. -Injured players return: Tanguay, Latendresse, plus the flu that's been working over our guys is bound to recede. -Overall team play begins to improve: the team is *beginning* to do little things better, and put in a solid 40 minutes against the Rangers instead of 30 (plus Gainey has clearly defined his coaching goal as getting the team to play sound fundamentals). -You win/lose a couple of squeakers before getting on a roll: we scrape by Edmonton, we lose lose to NY in a shootout. -Team confidence (maybe the most important thing) begins to recover. I don't know if we've seen signs of this yet, but it should follow on the other things. So I think we have a ways to go, but that the signs are pointing to an eventual turnaround and thus, a playoff berth. Maybe I'm kidding myself, but this outlook feels a lot better than the blues.

They're playoff bound. :hlogo:

I agree that it's foolish to pencil in Emelin or ANY young player. Remember the enthusiasm around here over D'Agostini and Pacioretty? So much for that. Rookies hardly ever make the difference. Beggars can't be choosers. We should look to sign ANY legitimate C we can, provided they can be had at tolerably sensible rates; with Koivu's ongoing decline our situation at that position is approaching crisis point. The Sedins would be a massive boost because you'd get two top-6 forwards with ready-made chemistry. Pony up the dough and save the money somewhere else. Cammalleri would be a straightforward Koivu replacement - certainly we'd be no worse off. Boumeester is the pick of this litter, but whether it makes sense for us to tie up massive dollars in four defencemen is a good question, especially if our system is as deep in defencemen as advertised. havlat! gaborik! Just what we need - NOT.

According to Habs Inside Out, a virus has been decimating the Habs' dressing room. Tanguay might not dress next game. To me, this is good news in a weird way. It explains at least some of the team's lacklustre performance of late. A sick team usually looks pretty horrible. Once the thing works its course, we could *suddenly* start to notice more consistency and energy from the Habs. (And of course everyone will start praising Gainey to the heavens ). Anyway, it's one reason not to be TOO demoralized by recent games - and Lord knows we need every straw we can grasp at!

I dunno. I seem to recall that Jean Perron 'lost the room' in 87 (a 'room' that included Gainey and Robinson and Carbonneau) and we fired him and brought in some new guy, Pat Burns, who did OK. Then Pat Burns was fired for 'losing the room' in 1992. We brought in some guy called Jacques Demers, who did...OK. It is frankly dishonest of Todd to end his list of examples at Jacques Demers. What that does is delude his readers into thinking that good teams (e.g., the Habs prior to 1995) don't fire coaches. The Perron/Burns examples shows that indeed they do. Each firing has to be taken in its own context. A further problem with Todd's argument (apart from Todd's longstanding general idiocy) is that he denies that losing the room should be the kiss of death for any coach. But it's ridiculous to deny that. I remember reading Steve Shutt on Scotty Bowman, saying that Bowman's genius was in handling the room so as to prevent a total rebellion. Shutt's underlying assumption was that if a coach loses the room, he loses his effectiveness, and ultimately his job. So this is not some novel theory in hockey circles. Other than 'stability' - valuable to be sure, but not as valuable as having a respected and effective coach who is not driving away veterans and (perhaps) making it even harded to attract UFAs - there really was no overpowering reason for keeping Carbo. It's not like he was the second coming of Toe Blake. People should get over this.

But see saskhabs' post. Koivu is just not good enough a player any more, if he ever was, to 'take care' of results on the ice. He is not that kind of dominating presence. But that just means he's not a great player - not that he's not a great leader. Anyway, this argument is like the moon - it goes round and round and round.

I agree, but you're describing this season, not 'the team' more broadly viewed. It's like Patrick Marleau. He had two straight seasons of 78+ points. Then last year he was universally derided as an overrated, overpaid piece of human excrement because he had 48 points (in fact, I was laughed out of town when I urged that we tried Koivu for him on the grounds that he was undervalued). This year, he is back on a PPG pace and is being universally praised for his play. So, was Marleau a 'lousy player' last year, or was he a good player having a horrendous season? Something like that is the situation our team is in. We have a raft of youngsters long viewed as 'blue chip.' Last year they stepped up and delivered. This year, as you say, they're 'shell shocked.' Which is the real team? That's the $50 000 000 question.

That sums up the Koivu situation as far as I'm concerned. I'd add 'necessarily' a bad leader. We don't really know, do we? Thanks, HABBER-oooooKNOWS, for your encouraging take. I know we should hold on and give Gainey several games to instil changes in this team. Damn but it's hard to do. I'm embarassed to admit it in a way, but after that Jersey game I've really down in the dumps (one reason why I've been surfing this board obsessively lately). It's not the loss, it's the 48 shots against, the lack of conviction, the confusion in the zone, the stupid penalties. Right now I see nothing before us but mediocrity. I believe(d?) in the rebuild. But it all seems to be coming to wreckage. Can we even say that the future looks bright? Do any of our 'young guns' really look like future stars? Will Gainey even be around next year to fix things? If he can't who can?? I can't face another decade of garbage teams and shi*ty hockey from my beloved Habs. I'm just completely bummed out.

The five year plan needs to be looked at more broadly. This season has been a disaster. But has the rebuild as a whole? We dominated the east last year with essentially the same team. So to me, the jury is still out on just how good this team *can* be, especially the cluster of young players from Komisarek on down. One of the things that just depresses me about this catastrophic second half is that people are now falling back on the old 'the Habs just suck' analysis. But there's a difference between having crappy players and having a bad season.

That's the only claim here that doesn't make sense. These guys think Pierre Gauthier is going to do a better job of luring UFAs than the universally-respected Gainey? Good luck, I say. Other than that, great info.

I don't think we can afford to be too fussy, to be honest. The Muller example proves that you don't need to have a completely dominant, world-beating 6'4 number one centreman to win. I'm no fan of this Superstar Complex. It would be nice, but we don't need a superstar. What we do need is a legitimate #1 C; if not a Lecavalier, then a Bobby Smith, a Kirk Muller, even a Pierre Turgeon, going forward. Spezza, the Sedins, Jokinen, they'd all be vastly better than what we've got (which is nobody). As long as we're not acquiring that player and annointing him The Saviour, asking him to single-handedly carry us to glory, and as long as we're paying a reasonable rather than ridiculous salary, there is no reason why those second-tier #1 C can't be major contributors on excellent, contending teams, especially since we seem to have a lot of good wingers on the team and in the system. The Sedins in particular would interest me. Two elite players, neither paid near the league maximum? And they'd work with Gainey's 'family' philosophy too. If Gainy, God help me, is still with the team when it's time to make the call. :puke:

But how come the team was so effective last season without Lang? I think the various situations over Koivu's tenure have varied considerably (e.g., players, management, coaches, injuries), and so I reject the idea that he is the key variable that explains everything bad that's happened from 1996 to the present. Nor do I believe that he is a bad leader. What might be true, though, is that Lang helped to shelter Koivu (and by extension the team) from Koivu's decline. It's clear that Koivu is no longer able to lead the offence, and maybe he really needed Lang to draw checkers, eat up some minutes, and otherwise take the heat off?

While I love Gainey and would be very disappointed if he leaves, I don't think we should panic if Gainey walks per se. No one is indispensable, and he has already overseen the re-establishment of the Habs' overall system, so the fundamentals appear to be in place. Gauthier may have sucked before, but people *do* learn. What would be cause for panic is if Gainey is forced out by interfering ownership, or -much, much worse - quits due to digust at ownership meddling with the hockey operations. That would mean that the team is being controlled by the equivalent of Harold Ballard, in turn suggesting that we will be condemned to erraticism and mediocrity for the forseeable future. After all, under these circumstances, there's no reason why Gainey's replacement would not also be forced into decisions by non-hockey people. This is the classic recipe for Total Disaster in hockey franchises. I'll therefore cling to Stephen Brunt's categorical statement that this was 100% Gainey's move, until I have clear proof otherwise. The alternative is too upsetting to contemplate.

That's the thing. Is there *anything* in the way the team has played and is playing to make us believe that these guys will sieze the opportunity being handed to them by the schedule? When you consider that they've recently lost to Atlanta and the Islanders, it doesn't seem to matter who they play. Right now they are one of the very worst teams in the NHL. (Talent wise, they're actually upper-ecehlon, but that's not the point is it?) So I take small comfort from the schedule. In fact, with these guys I take small comfort in anything. :puke:

Interesting analysis, Alexstream! Nicely done.

Off topic, but Bobby Smith was a good (not a great) #1 C. He has been unjustly forgotten by Habs fans. Muller, while not really 'big,' played big, and was also a terrific #1 C for three or four years. Again, people have forgotten just how devastating Muller was in his prime. We would not have won in 93 without him. We've had other legitimate #1 C since then: Turgeon was a legitimate #1C, idiotically traded away by that blithering orangutan Houle. And Koivu was emerging as a top-10 talent in the entire league before his knee blew out in 96. Having said all that, I'm beginning to wonder if Gainey has fully appreciated the gravity of our organizational situation at centre. That he made zero effort to get Jokinen still perturbes me. Koivu is very obviously on his last legs. This summer will be key.

Reading extracts from Gainey's post-game remarks, he suggested that the habs are struggling in their own end because some of the defencemen they rely on to be shut-down guys are just not doing the job. In other words: Hamrlik and Komisarek are just plain sucking ass. If we have a single biggest problem, surely this would be it? What's going on there? Is it possible that Komisarek really was broken by Lucic? That he used to think he was the baddest dude in town and he's been whipped, and is now like a beta dog with his tail between his legs? Has anyone ever seen anything like that happen in hockey? Just wondering. As for Hammer, did he just get old suddenly, or is he hurt, or are his mob connections distracting him? Hamrlik was the single biggest reason our D stabilized last season. And he is a big reason why it has destabilized this season. Speculation welcome. Because without these guys, our back end is hurtin' big time. (The 'good' news: IF they can get it together, it might make a real difference).

What I don't understand is that this team was NOT getting massively outshot for the first half of the season. At least not that I recollect. It really started after the All Star Break when Price began bombing out - the whole team suddenly began giving up 40+ shots a night. That being so, we need some sort of explanation other than that 'these guys suck.' Just a thought.

I dunno. If Halak hadn't 'saved the season' not a single soul alive would be questioning the Carbonneau firing. Maybe it'd have been better for everyone's long-term peace of mind (except his) if he'd lost those four games.