Recrutes: Hockey scouting from a professional perspective from Grant McCagg and Habs coverage from a 33 year veteran covering the NHL from Brian Wilde.
December 30, 2017
By Brian Wilde
The Montreal Canadiens ending a seven game road trip in Sunrise, Florida. They entered 2 and 4 with this one deciding how to view the trip overall.
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Blame to go around. MB for bad off-season and lack of vision on building this team, failure to get a centre. Star players for having carer worst years in many cases. Coach for implementing a system that doesn’t work for this group of players. Big Geoff for allowing it all.
I like danault and Drouin. I honestly don’t care what they do with anyone else. This is like watching paint dry. I love the habs……but I am glad they lost. I want them to lose every game til April. At least we might have something to look forward to if they get a good pick.
There is no quick fix here. So I agree. Reboot, make changes, and spend the money wisely next Summer.
Brian, yes all GM’s make mistakes, but Bergevin’s, throughout his tenure, have included some really dumb ones that are hard to rationalize. Hiring a dinosaur coach, ignoring Larry Robinson’s interest in the defense coaching position, trading Subban, not showing any interest in Radulov or Markov (“take it or leave it”) signing a bunch of 3rd pairing defensemen, one to a 5 year expensive contract are all massive examples of poor judgement. Hiring friends for jobs within the organization instead of quality candidates is another example of poor management. These are not ‘occasional’ decisions which just don’t turn out. They are deliberate moves which lead to inevitable consequences. He is the architect of this boring, black hole of an offensive team. You can’t expect him to correct it. He will likely make yet another poor decision. He’s used up his inheritance as the day about the foolish son.
Actually offering Radulov the same money and not choosing here is a small error that he can’t conteol as that player was a UFA.
Here are huge mistakes …. 15 years for Dipietro, 15 years for Yashin, trading for a washed up Gomez, huge full length terms for aging and ineffective like Lucic, many more deals of poor evaluating like Moulson, MacDonald, Finger in Toronto 4 years remember him?, Gaustad who retired 4 months later that’s by the genius Poile, McPhee the latest genius trades Erat for Forsberg….. and on and on and on
All the GMs make catastrophic mistakes. Bergevin not owning a UFA is not in that category. What happened to Bergevin on two UFA exercising their freedom happens 60 times each season. It’s written into the CBA.
So yes sure some errors like all of them. But if we are comparing, you can’t say Gaustad or Erat or MacDonald or Finger is even close to Radulov exercising his freedom saying no to the same offer.
Now Alzner for 5 years in hindsight is looking like his worst contract in his career
And with that move he finall becomes like all the other GMs with a big booboo not worse.
Great read. Thanks as always. Honest question: how do you know Bergy is aware of the mistakes he made in the off-season? Same for re-tool: how do you have every confident that he sees Max and Pleks as part of a necessary re-tool? Again, thanks as always
I just don’t think these guys are stupid. They have all made errors. If the errors that Bergevin has made here were errors never before made, then yes be very worried. But as I say….. Lucic Gomez Macdonald Gaustad Erat Moulson amd on and on and on ….
If you look at the history, a guy not getting Radulov to stay for the same offer as elsewhere is actually a small mistake among the judgments of an Alexei Yashin. Remember that Maple Leafs defenceman they watched for 3 games and then gave him 4 years? Yeah, neither can I.
So am I in knowledge? Nope. I just try to take this in the context of the greater view …. and the greater view among other GMs and even among his own actions, this GM doesn’t stand out as a weak link.
On point Brian, but I’m sorry, this “is” squarely on MB!
I’m no big fan of 67 but cmon man, was David Desharnais the best center he could provide Max Pac in 6 years?
In an era of fast puck moving Dmen you trade a stud 4 years younger and much faster outta here cause your coach at the time had a personal vendetta against him?
Horrible contracts, extremely poor drafting and zero player development in the minors coupled with 4th and 5th line trades throughout his tenure is reason enough at this point to be shown the door!
This situation will get worse before it gets better and may last quite a long time, not to mention the below zero entertainment they provide to us.
As a holder of 4 Prestige seats that have been in the family since 1974 I am seriously considering cancelling them after 43 years! As I’ve had enough
Sure it is. It’s always on the GM. Didn’t say it wasn’t but you’re not going to be able to say he isn’t in the same boat they all travel in.
He’s exactly the same. In fact he finally just got in their same boat with a number of failed moves.
Just like all the others. Watch the rest of the league is my motto for all that I say mostly. If you don’t know about Paul Gaustad you really can’t tell someone about Alex Radulov
Lose baby lose. Right on track.
Kudos to the guy behind julien wearing the fire bergevin hes a bum tshirt. Dudes got balls.
Watching the Habs play has become similiar to watching a stoned octopus trying to eat rice with chopsticks.
The Draft System is set up WRONG
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The way the whole draft system is set up currently is flawed and should be revamped.why you ask? Because the way its set up now the bottom 5 teams in the standings at seasons end go into a lottery to pick who drafts 1st to 5th.
This system allthough im sure it wasnt intended this way it lends itself to “tanking”. Yes folks it happens,yes it is still happening.our habs are doing it now.oh yes they are.why not its a loophole in the current system that a team can ice the worst team possible,and veteran players “slack off” to ensure losing.
So how do you fix this? Simple: the day after the regular ssn ends the league put the names of ALL 31 teams,yes ALL 31 teams into a hat,then draw a paper out,the first team of ALL 31 gets the number 1 draft choice in june,and the next picked gets the 2nd,and so on. This would give ALL 31 teams a fair shot at drafting high and inturn would close the tanking loophole.thus leading to fair,honest 100% effort by all teams during the ssn,fairer for the fans,owners,league everybody. Imagine matthews in montreal,or mcdavid in pittsburgh,couldve happened.
Change the drafting system make it fair to ALL 31 teams and eliminate tanking.
I agree with you Brian that Bergevin’s record as a GM is average, middle of the pack, just like the team he has built in the last six years. However, what I believe, and I mentioned this in the past, is a fireable offence is not having a plan B when Markov & Radoluv didn’t sign and leaving 9 million on the table.
Happy New Year Brian, and looking forward to continuing to read your analysis, hopefully we’ll have more positives to discuss in 2018.
I think if you aren’t putting some of the blame on Julien and his system, you aren’t looking at the eerily similar numbers as last years ineffective Bruins team.