Where are they now? News on past Habs prospects and players

[hab29RETIRED]

8 hours ago, Habs Fan in Edmonton said:

 

i would say the same thing. If Kevin Lowe hadn't played on the Edmonton Oilers would he be in the Hall of Fame. Not a chance. 

You could say the same thing about Steve Shutt, and that Mogilny should be in ahead of him. Ditto with Lapointe. But bottom line is cups count. As should gold medals. I have a hard time with Weber in the Hall, with no individual awards, or cups - at least he does have the Olympic medals.
 

i whole heartedly agree though that the NHL hall of fame is watered down. Lots of average players in. Having said that, it's not only simply good players elected into the hall, but also builders and media as well (media/broadcasters in particular seems to be based on longevity, rather than actual talent).

 

there should be years when no one gets elected. Like baseball. There should also be more visibility on who is voting, and how they voted. There is  zero accountability by the HOF selection committee on either there selection process, criteria, or how they voted.  They operate very much like a banana republic.

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

36 minutes ago, hab29RETIRED said:

You could say the same thing about Steve Shutt, and that Mogilny should be in ahead of him.

 

Steve Shutt scored 30 goals or more 9 years in a row, scored 60 once, bad comparison, he should be in. Mogilny should be in. A bad comparison for my Kevin Lowe example. 

[Commandant]

At the time he was elected, shutt was the highest goal.scoring left wing of all time.  If thats not hall worthy, what is?

[hab29RETIRED]

8 hours ago, Habs Fan in Edmonton said:

 

Steve Shutt scored 30 goals or more 9 years in a row, scored 60 once, bad comparison, he should be in. Mogilny should be in. A bad comparison for my Kevin Lowe example. 

Oh, I loved Shutt as a player, but he was a 400 goal scorer and didn't reach 1000 points. By todays standards, there plenty of players like Roenick and Mogilny not in.  Lapointe also got in a lot faster than Doug Wilson, despite Wilson having better stats and winning a Norris. My point is cups do make a big difference in getting in.  There are other guys who didn't have the stats and longevity because of injuries that are in (Neely), so there is no real standard threshold in hockey like there is in baseball.

[hab29RETIRED]

14 minutes ago, Commandant said:

At the time he was elected, shutt was the highest goal.scoring left wing of all time.  If thats not hall worthy, what is?

I didn't say he shouldn't be in. What I'm saying is there are guys with better stats - but lack cup rings - or in Mogilny's case that don't have as many cups that aren't in. There are other guys with similar career totals, cups and Conn smythe trophies like Lemieux that aren't in.

The NHL has no standard, transparency or legitimate process of electing players to the HOF. I don't see how Weber is a first ballot HOF player, or even HOF worthy based on his career totals or awards. What got him in is is that the election committee likes him.

 

 

 

 

 

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

4 minutes ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Oh, I loved Shutt as a player, but he was a 400 goal scorer and didn't reach 1000 points. By todays standards, there plenty of players like Roenick and Mogilny not in.  Lapointe also got in a lot faster than Doug Wilson, despite Wilson having better stats and winning a Norris. My point is cups do make a big difference in getting in.  There are other guys who didn't have the stats and longevity because of injuries that are in (Neely), so there is no real standard threshold in hockey like there is in baseball.

 

You can't use standards of today to judge the accomplishments of players who played in much earlier decades. That wouldn't be fair. 

 

Obviously cups count, my point is, how much you should it count? Hence my question about Kevin Lowe. He had many cups and longevity, but he was far from a great player. Decent, but hardly great. 

[Commandant]

40 minutes ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Oh, I loved Shutt as a player, but he was a 400 goal scorer and didn't reach 1000 points. By todays standards, there plenty of players like Roenick and Mogilny not in.  Lapointe also got in a lot faster than Doug Wilson, despite Wilson having better stats and winning a Norris. My point is cups do make a big difference in getting in.  There are other guys who didn't have the stats and longevity because of injuries that are in (Neely), so there is no real standard threshold in hockey like there is in baseball.

 

You can't judge guys who played in different eras by counting stats only. 

 

You judge were they one of the best players vs their peers. 

 

Shutt was the best LW in the game. 

 

Mogilny deserves to be in, that's a mistake. 

 

What was Roenick for his era though.... A top 20 Centre?  Was he ever in the conversation as the best at his position, competing for Harts? Selkes? Art Ross? any major trophy?  Didn't win cups, didn't win olympics.

[GHT120]

59 minutes ago, Habs Fan in Edmonton said:

You can't use standards of today to judge the accomplishments of players who played in much earlier decades. That wouldn't be fair. 

Exactly ... and it applies to all eras ... for example, in the 1980s the average number of goals per game was 3.83, well above the norm; so numbers for many players were inflated compared to their equivalents in other eras ... the real standard, I-M-O, should be whether or not the player was one of the best at their position for an extended period in their career.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

1 hour ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Oh, I loved Shutt as a player, but he was a 400 goal scorer and didn't reach 1000 points. By todays standards, there plenty of players like Roenick and Mogilny not in.  Lapointe also got in a lot faster than Doug Wilson, despite Wilson having better stats and winning a Norris. My point is cups do make a big difference in getting in.  There are other guys who didn't have the stats and longevity because of injuries that are in (Neely), so there is no real standard threshold in hockey like there is in baseball.

 

The “standard” is partly, I suspect, how beloved you are within the NHL old boy network. 

 

We can argue about this or that guy, but it’s too bad that, on the whole, membership in the HHoF is not closer to the baseball model.

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

29 minutes ago, GHT120 said:

 ... the real standard, I-M-O, should be whether or not the player was one of the best at their position for an extended period in their career.

 

Agreed, Sprague Cleghorn is a great example of this.  They didn't play a lot of games back then but he scored 17 goals in 24 games one year playing defense. He was dominant. He deserved to be in the HOF. How could you possible compare what he did by the standards of today. You can't. 

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

On the specific case of Weber, he never won the Norris, never won a Cup, and only had one deep playoff run despite supposedly being this super leader - but he was generally regarded as a top-10 defender in his era. By the limp standards of the HHOF he deserves to be in. 

[alfredoh2009]

1 hour ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

On the specific case of Weber, he never won the Norris, never won a Cup, and only had one deep playoff run despite supposedly being this super leader - but he was generally regarded as a top-10 defender in his era. By the limp standards of the HHOF he deserves to be in. 

Agree

[DON]

I remember when we found out Rod Langway was being inducted, what a joke.

Now thats a low bar.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

20 minutes ago, DON said:

I remember when we found out Rod Langway was being inducted, what a joke.

Now thats a low bar.

 

Wasn’t he a two-time Norris winner? That warrants consideration, surely

[Prime Minister Koivu]

I knew that Weber was busted up but I didn’t know the extent of it. 

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

3 minutes ago, Prime Minister Koivu said:

I knew that Weber was busted up but I didn’t know the extent of it. 

 

I remember when, toward the end of the Vegas series (I think it was), he made a simple puck-clearing play, dumping it out of the zone, and screamed in pain as he did it. That’s when I fully realized that this guy was an absolute wreck physically.

 

Although I said earlier in this thread that I have no real warmth for Weber, he has certainly earned our undying respect for the way he ground out that playoff when he should not even have been on skates. Same is true for Price. Both guys were held together with duct-tape and yet were two absolute keys to a Cup run. They truly left it all on the table.

[GHT120]

https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2024/11/22/voici-ce-que-fait-tomas-plekanec-a-montreal

 

While Pleks is still playing with Kladno (9 gms, 1 g, 3 a, 4 pts, 14 PIMs) he is also apparently an assistant coach ... he spent the week in Brossard observing the Habs practices ... the JdM story didn't even hint there was a whisper of Pleks rejoining the Habs as a coach.consultant so I tend to take the story at face value ... but he was always a smart player so he might have a future in coaching ... but does he want it to be in the NHL or the Czech Republic (Czechia).

[GHT120]

Since this deals with the past, thought it fits best here.

 

LeBrun in The Athletic (link embedded for subscribers) got Bergevin to finally talk about his departure:

 

Bergevin says Habs owner Geoff Molson approached him with a contract extension right after the team reached the ’21 Cup Final. His contract was expiring a year later.

 

“I decided that for me, it was best to move forward,” Bergevin said. “Time had come. It was good for both of us to move in a different direction. Geoff was very good, very fair. But I told him, ‘Geoff, I’m going to finish my last year that’s left and then I’m going to move on.’ He was good with that. He understood.”

 

I-M-O Molson blew it ... I generally have issues with coaches and GMs being in the final year of their contract, they can do silly desperate things ... but, no matter their character, can ANYBODY who has decided to leave as GM at the end of the next season really make major decisions that are beneficial to anything but those next 10-12 months?  

 

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

11 minutes ago, GHT120 said:

I-M-O Molson blew it ... I generally have issues with coaches and GMs being in the final year of their contract, they can do silly desperate things ... but, no matter their character, can ANYBODY who has decided to leave as GM at the end of the next season really make major decisions that are beneficial to anything but those next 10-12 months?  
 

 

Fair point. Trying to think of what moves Bergevin made in his last year. Did he sign Gallagher then or was that before?

[GHT120]

8 minutes ago, Habs Fan in Edmonton said:

 

Fair point. Trying to think of what moves Bergevin made in his last year. Did he sign Gallagher then or was that before?

Gallagher was signed at the beginning of the 20/21 Cup Run season ... but that MB had already decided to leave gives context to the Hoffman signing and the Dvorak trade.

 

BTW: Regarding Kotkaniemi MB said “He wasn’t going to do a long-term deal with us because he wanted a change of scenery”.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

I don't think it's a "conflict of interest" situation, unless MB already had feelers out to other organizations.

 

The decision to not tank, but rather try to stay competitive despite the loss of our #1G, our captain and top-pairing D-man, our best two-way C, and our best depth player (Perry), was probably not MB's alone. Like so many organizations, we fooled ourselves - only briefly - that we could somehow sustain a competitive peak against all odds.

 

Molson's real error was in offering to re-sign MB (understandable under the circumstances but short-sighted). No doubt MB not having renewed made it easier for Molson to throw him overboard, fortunately.

[GHT120]

1 minute ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

I don't think it's a "conflict of interest" situation, unless MB already had feelers out to other organizations.

 

The decision to not tank, but rather try to stay competitive despite the loss of our #1G, our captain and top-pairing D-man, our best two-way C, and our best depth player (Perry), was probably not MB's alone. Like so many organizations, we fooled ourselves - only briefly - that we could somehow sustain a competitive peak against all odds.

 

Molson's real error was in offering to re-sign MB (understandable under the circumstances but short-sighted). No doubt MB not having renewed made it easier for Molson to throw him overboard, fortunately.

Never suggested it was a conflict of interest ... just that when he knew he was leaving his decisions were SOLELY focused on 21/22, without any regard to the longer term; despite the odds of even making the playoffs sans Price and Weber remained as thin as a book entitled Great Trades by Mike Milbury unless he performed miracles.

[hab29RETIRED]

3 hours ago, Habs Fan in Edmonton said:

 

Fair point. Trying to think of what moves Bergevin made in his last year. Did he sign Gallagher then or was that before?

Armia deal. Dvorak.

[tomh009]

1 hour ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Armia deal. Dvorak.

Dvorak was pretty much a panic deal once he lost Kotkaniemi.

[GHT120]

58 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

Dvorak was pretty much a panic deal once he lost Kotkaniemi.

And likely highly influenced by the need to IMMEDIATELY replace Kotkaniemi because it was MB's final season?