Commandant

I've thought a lot about this, and I really think we need to do what the Leafs did with Burke. Not that I want Burke, but I want to go out and find the best guy available, throw money at him, whatever is necessary, and restore credibility to the franchise for the media, fans and the league. 1) lure Pierre Lacroix away from the Avalanche President position... put whatever money/job titles on the table that are necessary.... put him in Charge. 2) sign Patrick Roy as coach... let Lacroix (65 years old) start training him to eventually take over as GM 3) draft Roy's protege #2.... Grigorenko. 4) trade with Nashville for the rights to Roy's protege #1... Radulov. Give this ruderless ship an instant rudder and some direction going forward. Savard and Carbo are gonna be seen as having ties to the current administration, I dont think we can have that. Put a whole new direction in charge.

41 career playoff games.... 11 career playoff goals. on about the same pace he puts up in the regular season. he is what he is... a 20-25 goal scorer. A guy who looks great on some nights and awful on others. And a forward who is willing to go to the net and brings a physical presence. I'm careful not to overpay him, but he does bring good things on a 2nd/3rd line. We've just expected more because of his history (draft year and rank) and we're never gonna get this.

Keep doing them. Losses are better than wins now. This is the opportunity to get the franchise forward the team has lacked for over 20 years.

On top of that.. what guarantee do you have of even acquiring that stud D. Stud Ds cost a ton in a trade. Or if we are talking a UFA like Suter.... he'll be highly sought after. Like Brad Richards who was alway going to NewYork there is no guarantee that he hasn't already made up his mind and we'll even get a chance. Its fun to play fantasy GM, but just having freed up money might not be enough to get a D better than Markov.

The post is more a criticism of the whole way the team handicapped Cunneyworth and didn't give him a real chance wit the team on the day he took over than it is about Martin. Martin was fired, fine... but the timing of the actual firing, and the press release from Molson the next day, gave Cunneyworth zero chance from day 1. Put him into a long road trip with games every other day.... then christmas break... then more road games, before he could even come back to montreal and have two days of practice. The day to fire him was either after the November 26th game vs Pittsburgh (before the west coast trip and when there were 4 days off between games) or December 31st after the Florida game (again the break). Lets also remember that Martin went got 9 pts in his last 7 games behind the bench, he was fired for overall performance, not his most rcent games.

JM's firing changed a lot.... we still had a chance at the playoffs on the dy JM was fired... now we've been sewered... 3-8-0 since then. The fact he was fired on a game day, the last home game before the long christmas trip with Cunneyworth having zero practice time with the team.... huge mistake. How do you put a new coach in place, with no opportunity in the schedule to put his stamp on the team. Then you had Molson come out the next day and issue that press release, they cut the legs off the coach, made him a lame duck his second day on the job. The players knew then, he had no chance of being hired long term and as such any attempt to install discipline in the players would fall on deaf ears. The way this was handled was a gigantic error on management's part... probably their biggest all season

We have a ton of 2nd line talent now, but a massive dearth of first liners. Hence the real need to get to the top of the draft.

Gallagher apparently injured by a big open ice hit tonight.... MIA in the 2nd period. The hitter... Patrick Holland. DUN, DUN, DUN.... Edit: Gallagher done for the night. Holland ended the night with 2 assists in an 11-4 win.

Why do we always agree 100% on these things? Are you a long lost brother?? Gauthier's moves taken in a vacuum are good, but the way he is running the organization and the timing of everything sucks now. He needs to go. Hve to admit though, the last sentence scares the hell out of me.

Steve Quailer extends point streak to 10 games with one asslst

Kristo news. The Good: Former Habs Scout, and current McKeen's Editor and TSN correspondent Grant McCagg on HF was saying that he's heard Kristo is going to turn pro at the end of the year The Bad: Kristo was given a 5 minute major and Game Misconduct for a hit from behind tonight. The Ugly: The video <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_EYSOBZ5XXU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Yeah, this never happens in teh NHL.... noone talks before noon, but players like Martin Biron negotiate an entire contract are are ready to sign at 12:15 PM.

Cammalleri is a diva.... like an elite NFL WR, there is no doubt about that in my mind. He wasn't coddled and wasn't producing and shit blew up. He's Terrell Owens in a hockey jersey. High maintenance? yes, but worth it when he's producing.

I want a person with the personality of Burke; but I disagree with Burke's method. Yes, hes done all those things, but the way he's built his team, I don't think they have the assets to take the steps between playoff contender and cup contender. He's backed himself into a corner cap wise, gave away Seguin and Hamilton, the elite young talents they'd want to add to the roster and is still missing key parts such as a number 1 centre. I dont thnk the future of the Leafs is as rosy as the Toronto media portrays.

Just guessing, if they don't break up the DD or Eller lines. Bourque of course is ineligible to play tomorrow.

Bournival 1 goal 2 assists last night as Shawinigan beat St. Johns, meanwhile teammate Ellis' point streak ended. Tonight Bournival right back at it 2 goals 2 assists in Shawinigans win over PEI... and Ellis with 1 goal 1 assist

Phantoms win 5-4 First goal was weak under Mayer's blocker Second goal was weird, landing on top of net, bouncing off, hitting mayer in the back and landing in the back of the net.

Gomez - Plekanec - Blunden. What a line.

When we traded for Gomez, other NHLers still believed he was a premier playmaker who would help them score goals. He gave us some credibility. He doesn't do that anymore obviously.

Ruin his stats and negotiating value for the RFA deal. Lol.

I agree, The key to the next GM is that he must a) have that credibility that gets the media off his back at first. b) crave the spotlight c) be willing to tell the media to screw off when necessary. Burke is a blowhard, but I think we need someone like that in Montreal to deal with this crap.

4-3 Dogs now... two each for Leblanc and Palushaj Engqvist assisting on both Palush goals. Those two are ridiculously hot. End of the 2nd.

One thing that CC i think brought up, but kind of got lost in the thread is that Cammy is a PP specialist with a great one timer, who unfortunately was only able to play about 20 games with Markov in 3 years. Markovs 40 games of health in 2010 were at the same time Cammy went down with the sprained knee.

The same players haven't seen an explosion in points under cunneyworth though. Only Eller has really seen a jump in his numbers and that was all one game. (small sample I know). Two things have jumped under Cunneyworth though... Goals Against and Losses.... 3-8-0.

Again though there are 7 teams who Cammy could block a trade to. What are the chances that the the GM who didn't know he was available was the GM of one of those teams. Until we know what GM is saying this, we don't know that Gauthier didn't explore every option. I agree completely that PG got what Cammy was worth today. The issue I have is trading him today. The more I look at PG the more I see that individually the moves are for the most part good (kostitsyn excepted) but the whole is less than the sum of the parts acquired, and the timing on the deals is bad. He's a good hockey guy, and a smart hockey guy, but he doesn't play the management game very well. Cammalleri is a streaky scorer, has been his whole career... eventually he would have got on a streak.