Machine of Loving Grace

I agree that we had a chance. To believe we didn't is ultimately to agree with Bergevin, who thought this was a long term rebuilding club who was surprised by how fast the team started competing because he thought he had one veteran defenceman in Markov and nothing else, and didn't think much to the offence of the club either. Always thought they weren't tough enough. 13-14 proved the club had the ability to make noise in the league. They got the ECF and with a better coach and a faster healing Price they should have beat the Rangers. Lost in the final, but got there. The summer of 2014, after making a great trade for Vanek, Bergevin should have started stacking the firepower on the club and either traded for a centre or surrounded Galchenyuk with elite winger. He did neither. He signed Tom Gilbert, Manny Malhotra, and Jiri Sekac while bringing in PA Parenteau for Danny Briere. That's it. And Montreal, despite having only the fifth most goals scored in their own division, won it due to having the best goalie performance in the past 10 years. He didn't make a significant top six forward trade all year. He only added a top deadline defenceman (Petry was a good trade) to the right side when the left side was the bigger emergency (Markov was getting older and Beaulieu hadn't broken out). But the Habs still made it to the second round and lost to the better team in Tampa. It happens. Happened to Nashville and Pittsburgh this year. But there was a lesson in the Tampa loss and that was Montreal did not have enough scoring. They needed more offence. They needed someone to score dirty goals in the crease, they needed another sniper, they needed something down the middle. 15-16 they had to show the league they could score goals and get better than the past two seasons. What does Bergevin do? You said it: Semin and Kassian. That's it. That's all. That is when I lost faith in Bergevin. It wasn't the Subban trade. Had this club gone all out for offence in 15-16 I would have been really sad to see Subban traded and would have grumbled a lot about it, but I would have still had faith that the management of the Canadiens could win a Stanley Cup. Two years of bringing in absolutely nothing for the offence when the team was in a prime period with good cap management and the best goalie in the world and they threw it away. Because unlike me, Bergevin didn't believe they were a Cup contender. He just wanted to make the playoffs and see what happens. And because of that, even bringing in Radulov, a guy I had talked up years prior to wanting on the Habs, and was pretty excited to watch him for one year, it didn't turn my view around. Signing him for one year and being unable to keep him just confirmed my feelings. And now the in prime young talent are now disappointing veterans, the top three pick has been traded for a Domi, the defence is an embarrassment, and the only thing anyone has good to say anymore is wait and see. Sorry if I don't have any hope for a club that has proven to me they don't know what to do with the hope they get.

Tampa needs to unload Callahan. If we're on his 16 team trade list, we should be also telling the Lightning we will take Coburn as well to alleviate more of their cap issue. To Tampa David Schlemko ($1M retained) or Jordie Benn Michael McCarron To Montreal Ryan Callahan Brayden Coburn TBL 1st Round Pick 2019 Gabriel Fortier and Boris Katchouk or Cal Foote or Taylor Raddysh Tampa Pros: Frees up $9M in cap space for Tavares and/or re-signing Kucherov. They get a bottom pair defenceman at a low price. Add McCarron for potential late bloom/fourth line grit. Montreal Pros: Coburn is trade deadline bait, Callahan is only for two years, gain a first rounder, gain a high quality Tampa prospect (or two if they go with Fortier/Katchouk) and yeah I'm high enough on Raddysh that I would take him solo but if we got more I'd be good with that too.

What makes him worse than Daigle is that if Daigle loved hockey and wasn't up his own ass he would have been one of the top five best wingers in the 90s. Daigle always had the talent, he just didn't care. When he did care, like when he walked onto the Wild at 28 and led them in scoring, he showed he had it in him. Just none of the passion. I would have to see adjusted for era stats comparing Wickenheiser and Yakupov on if he's the worst. In Wick's highest point season he was eighth in points on the Canadiens and his best season in the NHL, the 43 in 68 with the Blues, he was still only sixth in scoring. Wick played in a higher scoring era. But maybe even with adjustment Yakupov is worse. Dunno. Greg Joly and Brian Lawton make compelling arguments too. I like to give it to Lawton just because he's a tool.

I think whatever happened with Eakins and the freak outs that always happen when he's happy to score a goal killed his motivation. And he had bad advice from an agent not to escape to the KHL earlier and rebuild his game out there. He could still one day be a Radulov type story where he goes to the K, gets his motivation back, becomes a complete player, and comes back here in his 30s. But I wouldn't count on it. It sucks because I've only ever heard good stuff about him. He's gonna go down as an Alex Daigle bust.

I watched quite a bit of him in Sarnia and his first year in Edmonton. No way I thought he would be any less than a top six winger. I don't know what happened after the Oilers fired Krueger but he was never the same after.

That's great. But if he isn't paid like one, and he isn't played like one, it doesn't matter.

I looked back at the thread when the trade happened. I was cautious because I really liked Drouin from what I watched with him in Tampa, defended him when he was fighting with Cooper, but was afraid we would try him as a centre instead of a winger. I also hated when finding out it wasn't 1 for 1 and we offered an "insurance" policy pick to Yzerman if Sergachev didn't play the full season. I would still be defending the trade player for player if Drouin stayed on the wing, especially if Bergein found his wallet and paid Radulov $7M per season. We would have walked into next season with Radulov, Pacioretty, Drouin, and Gallagher at wing. That's top tier at wing. Just weak down the middle. The eternal problem. Also found this lovely tweet. "It wouldn't be fair to him."

Washington started their rebuild in the early 00s and didn't win a Cup until 2018. I don't think they would have ever won if they never got Backstrom and Ovechkin. Not only would they never have beaten Pittsburgh, they may have never been good enough to play them.

Yup. Set up front. You need other draft picks to be set in other places. Again, in a choice between treading water with the current club and rebuilding with fresh management and fresh players, I'll take fresh. Almost every Cup winning team has a Top 5 draft pick in the past 10 seasons. Even if you can guarantee no Stanley Cup for the next seven years, I'll still take it. Better that than another seven years of the same failed "make the playoffs and see what happens" strategy.

Next year is centre heaven for anyone with high picks. Hughes, Newhook, Turcotte, Cozens, Lavoie, and Dach will all go in the Top 15 unless one drops hard. Lavoie, Dach and Cozens are all big right handed centres while Hughes, Newhook, and Turcotte are smaller with high skill. It's a big reason why I've been screaming for first round picks in 2019 and 2020. If we finish bottom five the next two years and land Lavoie and Lafreniere or Cozens and Byfield or any combination of such, we're probably set up front for years.

Do you seriously believe Pacioretty and Panarin are equal players?

This is quite true. To be honest I don't think this was a bad draft for Montreal. Wouldn't be surprised if we land three NHLers out of it. But I think with the picks we had, we always had a good shot at three NHLers with 6 picks in the Top 70. I just question if we maximized by selecting the best players. I've been open to the idea of being wrong on this draft. Kotkaniemi might end up better than Hughes and Zadina. We saw with Puj and Dubois that so far Columbus looks like the smarter team. But I can only go by what I know of these players, and I watched Kotka early when he was recovering from injury and later when he was dazzling scouts, and whomever thought he could be Anze Kopitar I think needs some eye drops. But again, I'm no expert. I can only go by what I feel, and I feel like Montreal got 80% of what they could have got in this draft.

I wouldn't mind signing Grabner to a one year deal to trade him at the deadline.

I think Alzner is straight up awful. I rarely see him make a good play, his passes are bad, his acceleration is shot, he was constantly screening Price, and constantly bailed out. Alzner and Benn are some of the worst defencemen I've seen in Habs uniforms. Schlemko got a lot of hype and he met none of it. Turned out we traded for a cap dump.

I watched the free agency stream, TSN said Alzner was a top four defenceman who had a disappointing season but would add toughness to the blueline and it was basically Emelin out, Alzner in. Nobody was ripping like... well, like I was. Not until he started playing.

If Heponiemi ends up better than Poehling...

Yeah now that I recall most were pretty positive on the Alzner signing.

How many decisions in the past three years have been made that the media shouldn't have ripped? The media was generally positive on the Subban/Weber trade. It was the fans who were hating it. The only one I can think of is signing Radulov, since they acted like it was a redux of Semin.

Johnson is much better than Alzner and it looks like they are signing him for same years, $1M-1.5M less per year.

Panarin's last 3 seasons: 88 goals in 243 games Pacioretty's last 3 seasons: 82 goals in 227 games They are pretty close to the same level of goal scorer, but Panarin is a much better playmaker. But nah, same value.

According to human trashbag Mark Madden, Jack Johnson has already agreed to a five year contract with the Pittsburgh Penguins. Johnson was good friends with Crosby when they were at Shattuck St.Mary's.

Bergevin's masterplan for the week was to trade Pacioretty and acquire O'Reilly. When the Islanders deal failed (allegedly), he tried LA, but whereas Pacioretty had a deal ready with the Islanders, he couldn't come to an agreement with the Kings. Allegedly, he let go of Brisson because Brisson's main focus is Tavares and wanted someone ready to take a contract negotiation.

Yeah there was talk of a deal involving the Islanders. Lou and the scouting staff wasn't 100% on the players available for their picks so they were willing to trade one. One of the picks was going to Montreal in a package for Patches with an extension. But once Wahlstrom and Dobson fell, they decided to keep the pick. That was the rumour floating around.

Ouch.

Pittsburgh just cleared $5M in cap space. Wonder what they plan to do. Probably deciding between Skinner, Pacioretty, and Neal.