Commandant

Everyone should have known this in the summer.

Bourque - Plekanec - Cole Pacioretty - Galchenyuk/Grigorenko - Gionta DD - Eller - Leblanc Moen - Geoffrion - White Blunden, Palushaj Markov - UFA/Gorges UFA/Gorges - Subban Kaberle - Emelin Diaz Price Budaj Boom done.

He doesn't have the speed of say St. Louis, but I don't think thats an issue in converting him to Wing vs Centre. I just think his game is so much more suited to the wing in the defensive zone where he is covering the pass back to the point and watching dmen, instead of trying to contain a forward down low. This is why he's a better PKer than 5 on 5 defensive guy, because he isnt working down low. His speed has been good enough for him at centre, I don't see where its a liability when he moves to wing. Typically Centres need to be better skaters than wingers.

All the guys his size end up on wing. LA converted Cammallari from Natural Centre to wing. Buffalo converted Ennis and Gerbe both natural centres to wing. Gionta and St. Louis are wings. Fleury was converted from centre to wing. If we look at the really small players (5'8" and lower) the long term position for nearly all of them (exception Cliff Ronning) ends up being at wing. The reason for this is all the down low work in your own zone, playing defensive hockey. The centre has to support the D when defending against the cycle, the Centre is the guy who has to do the board play behind his own net and in the corners, and who has to cover guys in the slot or side of the net. This is the area Desharnais gets killed. Offensively his board play will all be chasing loose pucks, digging them out in the corner and getting them to the front of the net. He actually is very, very good at doing this. That type of board work is a strength of his game. The board work in the defensive zone where he has to contain a guy bigger than him from carrying the puck out of the corner and driving the net, is where his lack of size is exploited.

The D in the pipeline is already loaded. Yes we need two NHL caliber D today, but our D prospects are the strongest part of our organization right now. You can't take a D ahead of a forward unless you are picking 5th and all 4 forwards are gone, but the top 3 D are still available. IMO. As for Pleks and DD, move DD to wing. Easy. Exactly. Though my gut feeling is that Grigorenko is more likely to be ready than Galchenyuk just due to the development time he lost due to the injury, but even then we won't know til Camp. Still being NHL ready faster isn't my criteria for drafting. Its getting the guy who will be the best player in 3-4 years from now, not who will have the best season as an 18 year old.

Both are centres. Yakupov is the winger, but to me if you get a chance at Yakupov you take him because he's head and shoulders ahead of both centres. He's the best player available no question in my mind. The other guys are very good prospects, but Yakupov is a special talent you can't pass up even if he's a wing not a centre. Guys number 2 and 3 are Grigorenko and Galchenyuk... both centres, both very close IMO.

The problem with the goon is that he sits on the bench and never gets a shift with your star player. If someone like Malone, Ott, Avery, Cooke, targets your star, he can't jump off the bench to fight him (thats a ten game suspension) and if the other guy isn't willing to fight we've got the instigator rule too. The goons might have been effective when Semenko was protecting Gretzky, but the rules have neutered this aspect of the game. There is something though to be said for team toughness. There is an aspect to team toughness as well that was lost when we signed Laraque IMO. The 07-08 team was l of the closest and actually toughest Habs teams since the early 90s IMO, even if they didn't fight a lot. Think about all the blowout regular season games with Boston that year and what happened when the Bruins started gooning it up late. Even if we had Kostopolous and Begin losing fights, the rest of the team stood up for themselves too, I remember Latendresse, Lapierre, both Kostitsyns, Gorges, Komisarek, Higgins, etc... all these guys getting into fights that year even if we lost them. It means a lot know your linemate will stand up for you rather than walking away, even if he's likely to lose the fight. When we got Laraque it was like all these guys now looked at the one guy to handle everything and they weren't gonna be bothered anymore. It was an identity of that 07-08 team that was lost, and its never fully come back. I think thats what the team has to develop going forward, not necessarily look for a Staubitz or Laraque to save them at every opportunity. Guys like Tinordi, Beaulieu, Dietz, and even Gallagher despite his small size, have shown the ability to do that in their junior leagues, so I think its also something we are starting to see happen in the organization.

As soon as the leafs are realistically eliminated, but not mathematically eliminated, they'll go on a late season run to try and get in again, only to fall short and finish in 10th-12th. Its the M.O. of that team. As soon as the pressure of the playoff spot being on the line hit, they went 1-9-1 in their last 11. As soon as the pressure is off, and playoffs are no longer realistic, they'll win some games, and everyone will talk about how Next Season they will break the playoff drought FOR SURE. The arguments will be, "if you eliminate february and early march, we are a top 5 team in the NHL. Next year when Burke puts in his special 10 day early trade deadline for the Leafs only and takes away the deadline pressure, we'll be cup contenders and Kessel will score 40 goals."

Tagging him as interim was fine, as long as it was known this was an audition for the full time job. The moment Molson sent out the press release that being bilingual will be an important consideration for our next full-time coach, and Pierre apologizing for hiring him, Cunneyworth was sunk.

Per Yahoo Montreal interim head coach Randy Cunneyworth said Markov is nearing the point when he's cleared for contact, the Montreal Gazette reports.

Commodore wasnt dealt for a 7th though, it was a conditional 7th if Tampa makes the playoffs. Detroit gets nothing if they miss the playoffs. Basically gave him away for free. My theory on that trade is that it was connected to the Quincey deal. Detroit wanted to dump him in that deal and Yzerman said "try and deal him for a 6th or 7th and if you cant i'll take him if I have to" The only market Commodore set is that he wasn't even tradeable. With Tampa is that the pieces they actually sold are lineup regulars on their new clubs. None are 7th D or 13th forwards. The press box guys didn't move this year with only a couple exceptions.

I dont, we saw the Sens package the picks last year and it only got them to 23 overall. The cost of top 10s is huge. What we could do is package a couple seconds with our first to move up 1 or 2 spots if we need to.

Taking Slaney and freeing a spot for them was the price of Geoffrion and the pick. I dont blame him for that. But when Kosty was the only guy he could move by noon to grab Staubitz he shouldve seen the writing on the wall that moving Campoli and Darche werent sure things.

Scraps just didnt move this year like previous ones, but yeah Gauthier needed to see that based on discussions he was having

Thats a prime reason to hate this move.

Pittsburgh, Florida and one of Washington/Winnipeg/Toronto will make the playoffs in the East. 3/8 Eastern playoff teams will have less fights than the league average. Last year Tampa was in the ECF and one goal away from beating Boston and was bottom 3 in fights. Washington had the most points in the Eas but was 15th middle of the pack in fights. The Isles were a shit show last year and didn't win a damn thing. Fighting and wins are not correlated. The reason Tampa sucks has nothing to do with fights, its cause they have no goaltending and defense.

McCagg is putting this out everywhere he can Now weve got this (Not Eklund, just his site) http://www.hockeybuz...ctive/155/42700 Personally as I said yesterday, Galchenyuk if healthy is the prototype of the forward Trevor Timmins will fall in love with. The attributes he's better than Grigorenko at (skating, two-way play, tireless worker, laser wrister) are Timmins top 4 attributes in a forward.

Training camp. Blew out his knee. Also all day Grant McCagg keeps hinting on hfboards that Trevor Timmins hates Grigorenko as too risky and would like Forsberg or Galchenyuk. What we know, McCagg is an editor/scout for McKeen's and a scout for tsn.ca He's a former Habs part-time scout who is still in touch with Trevor McCagg just wrote that scathing article on Grigo for tsn.ca Now, I'm sure he's got good info. But at the same time the draft is a game, this could be Trevor's true feeling, or it could be him planting a story with a guy he knows 30 NHL scouting departments look to for clues about what the other teams are thinking. Teams are always trying to learn if they need to trade up to get their guy. Remember when Burke learned Murray wanted Kadri and walked over to the Sens table pretending to want a trade and then laughed and said we're taking him? Thats the espionage at the draft. So is this real or a false story? Adds to the drama And as I said yesterday, if not hurt Galchenyuk fits the mould of forward Timmins loves.

Brendan Ross ‏ @RossyYoungblood Sting Coach/GM Beaulieu says Galchenyuk is skating w/ team. Dr appt Thurs @ 3 to see if he'll be cleared 4 contact. Hopes 2 get in 3-4 gms

For every Rangers at the top of the league there's also a Detroit last in the league. For every Rangers there is Columbus 4th overall in fights this year. Studies have been done. Over the last decade there is zero correlation between # of fights in a season and # of wins There is also zero correlation between fights and man games lost to injury. This is how I feel every time someone brings up reasons fighting is necessary. <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/npSWe5Waqdc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> You like fighting, I don't but dont try and convince me its integral to the game because its not. The best hockey is playoffs, olympics, and world juniors when there is no fights pretty much. Sure I like a guy who can play a regular shift and be physical on the boards not a goon

Wont prevent a thing but if someone gets injured he'll go out and get revenge by punching someone a couple times which will accomplish nothing. See Matt Hendricks vs Rene Bourque while Backstrom is still hurt; or Shawn Thornton vs Matt Cooke while Marc Savard's career is over.

If toughness is so important to wins.... why have 5 of the last 6 Cup Champions played their goons a grand total of 0 NHL Playoff games in the year they won the cup. Why bench the toughest guy, the guy who deters the other team taking cheap runs at your guys in the most important games of the year, when you are playing the same team back to back for 7 games, when an injury to a star player can change a series? (I don't believe it deters anyone, but you are saying Price will get run less if we have Staubitz or a similar player all season).

I agree. I'd love Scotty to leave his job with the Hawks to be president/GM of the Habs, but its a pipe dream so I don't even think about the possibility.

Yeah cause all he needs is one punch in the head and he'll calm down. Its a fallacy. The Claude Lemieuxs, the Steve Otts, the Brad Marchands, they've all been beat up on occassion but they still come back and do their stupid shit. Heck all the tough guys on the Bruins didn't prevent Cooke killing Savard, or Rome concussing Horton, or Jones concussing Bergeron.

I think you are grasping at straws here to confirm a theory that Molson is a penny-pincher. If your theory is correct, and it might be, its not these moves that prove or disprove it. These are hockey moves first and foremost. Moves any last place club should do. The real test is what happens to Gomez in September.