How do you Rebuild... The Montreal Canadiens?

[MSSLYNX]

This. Hire the best talent available even if they only speak English. Limiting yourself to bilingual candidates will also limit your team's opportunity for success.

What if the new anglophone coach from Ontario or the East coast simply understands that talking to an important part of your fanbase is important and decides to do a crazy thing like learning basic French?

A few hours a week. A weeklong stay at Bergevin's cottage with no English allowed.

And Drouin was not traded for because he is speaking French. This is only brought up because he did not live up to expectations.

 

[tony d]

Fire Bergevin
Trade Patches
Sign a good #1 centre
Increase your scouting so that you can draft better

 

[Peiskos]

It starts with a culture change first and foremost.

End the idiotic discrimination against GM's and Coaches who don't speak French.

 

[Castle8130]

Hire an assassin to take out Bergevin. Theres some Montreal disease that doesn't let you fire him.

 

[BlueBull]

Stop giving preferential treatment to French Canadiens, this is the only reason why Drouin is on Montreal right now and they'd be better off with Sergachev learning from Weber than playing Drouin at center for some reason.

The Habs need to do that, but not full on.
If the habs do that completely, the fans would want the GM's head, the Coach's head... basically, the entire staff's head. What I think a good starting lineup would be is a mix of Francophones and others. Better players can be the Others so that the habs can contend whilst not having a riot in montreal.

We want that to wait until we win the cup again.

 

[GodEmperor]

Fire Bergevin
Trade Weber/Price and Patches
Sign some decent vets
Build around the kids

1 and most of 2 won't happen, so they'll be stuck being 10-12 as opposed to 13+ in the coming years.

 

[57special]

Fletcher must speak at least a bit of French, and he is very familiar with the city. He's a decent GM...the Wild are in much better shape than they were after firing Risebrough.

 

[EakinsMVP]

Trade for/draft players with attitude, obviously

 

[Bouboumaster]

1- Fire everyone not named Claude Julien, Stéphane Waite, Trevor Timmins and Kirk Muller.

2- Hire Patrick Roy as the President of Hockey Operations. Why? Because you don't want him to work as the GM, since he's madder than a hornet nest, but the guy HATES loosing. So you want him to keep everyone in check, without him taking any decisions. Heck, you can even hire him before firing Bergevin, just for the lolz.

3- Hire Julien Brisebois as the GM. French or english, he's probably the best soon-to-be GM right now.

4- Find a way to dump Carey Price, and Karl Alzner. Shae Weber with a cap hit of 7M$ is ok I guess right now. I LOVE Carey Price, but you just can't pay him that money for that many years. And Alzner is just goddawful.

5- Trade Pacioretty for something good. You won't get a center I guess, but another hole we have is on the LHD. So maybe we can do something here.

6- Throw money at Tavares. If he don't take it, try to throw some at Paul Statsny.

7- Hire Plakanec back at 3M$ for a year or two max.

8- Maybe we would need a human sacrifice.

9- Hope that Mete and Juulsen are ready for next years, because a lot will depends on them.

 

[CDN24]

1- Fire everyone not named Claude Julien, Stéphane Waite, Trevor Timmins and Kirk Muller.

2- Hire Patrick Roy as the President of Hockey Operations. Why? Because you don't want him to work as the GM, since he's madder than a hornet nest, but the guy HATES loosing. So you want him to keep everyone in check, without him taking any decisions. Heck, you can even hire him before firing Bergevin, just for the lolz.

3- Hire Julien Brisebois as the GM. French or english, he's probably the best soon-to-be GM right now.

4- Find a way to dump Carey Price, and Karl Alzner. Shae Weber with a cap hit of 7M$ is ok I guess right now. I LOVE Carey Price, but you just can't pay him that money for that many years. And Alzner is just goddawful.

5- Trade Pacioretty for something good. You won't get a center I guess, but another hole we have is on the LHD. So maybe we can do something here.

6- Throw money at Tavares. If he don't take it, try to throw some at Paul Statsny.

7- Hire Plakanec back at 3M$ for a year or two max.

8- Maybe we would need a human sacrifice.

9- Hope that Mete and Juulsen are ready for next years, because a lot will depends on them.

I agree with most of this, that said Patrick has to be in charge or not there. Not sure I guy like brisebois or anyone competent can work with Patrick. I'd keep Price for the time being and dump Alzner even if I have to retain some $. Pacioretty for a LHD.

 

[Nadal On Clay]

Trust the process

 

[Nadal On Clay]

Fire Bergevin
Trade Patches
Sign a good #1 centre
Increase your scouting so that you can draft better

That’s a problem since 2005 lol

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

bite the bullet and finally do a full retool/rebuild

identify the young players you want to build around, deal off your overpriced vets, focus on scouting and drafting. Refill the system internally and then you can sprinkle in some vets for leadership

 

[DowntownBooster]

What if the new anglophone coach from Ontario or the East coast simply understands that talking to an important part of your fanbase is important and decides to do a crazy thing like learning basic French?

A few hours a week. A weeklong stay at Bergevin's cottage with no English allowed.

And Drouin was not traded for because he is speaking French. This is only brought up because he did not live up to expectations.

Not that I disagree with your suggestion but the priority should be building a winning team. If that can be accomplished without a bilingual coach or gm then that should be the number one goal for the organization. It might not be the preference for the media in Montreal to have a unilingual coach or gm but they do manage to communicate with the visiting teams that generally have unilingual staff members and players. I know that the language issue is more important in the province of Quebec than anywhere else in North America so I don't want to downplay it's significance but if we are looking at the most expedient way to get the Canadiens winning on a sustained basis then they might have to take a different course of action that they previously may have been reluctant to consider.

 

[McDLT]

Trade away everyone over the age of 25 with any value for picks. Don't sign any high-priced UFA's or give out any stupid contracts. Invest in scouting and be prepared to miss playoffs for at least 5 years.

 

[Shad]

Lol at trading Patches/Chucky....buy high sell low right?

 

[Martin Skoula]

What if the new anglophone coach from Ontario or the East coast simply understands that talking to an important part of your fanbase is important and decides to do a crazy thing like learning basic French?

A few hours a week. A weeklong stay at Bergevin's cottage with no English allowed.

And Drouin was not traded for because he is speaking French. This is only brought up because he did not live up to expectations.

They're hockey interviews, you have to learn like 3 sentences in French.

"We're looking to improve our team in the short term and the long term"
"We'll make a move if it makes sense for us"
"Our goal is to win the cup"

What else do you really need to learn?

 

[Bieber fever]

Draft Dahlin

 

[General Disarray]

Few trades/moves:

Weber+ for Subban
Drouin+ for Sergachev
Shaw for late picks
Alzner for late picks
Price for anything
Galchenyuk play center

But seriosuly, fire Bergeron, hire the best possible GM regardless of language. And rebuild. Everyone over 28 should be traded.

 

[SlapshotTheMovie]

Habs need to trade off most of their team for cap dump players. It wont help them but atleast the 30 others teams will be good. Then the habs wont need excuses for being bad.

 

[Rorschach]

1) Hire Dean Lombardi as President and GM (fire whoever needs to be fired)
2) Overhaul the minor league teams
3) Hire a new coach, make sure the minor league and the NHL team all play the same system and has developmental staff to train players that way
4) Trade everyone of value for future picks
5) Convince owner and fans of 5 year rebuild, convince owner of retention for futures
6) Trade Price and Weber with major retention, mop up on futures
7) Start taking short term cap dumps for futures
8) Draft defensemen (especially RHD) and centers with all top picks
9) Sign as many prospect UFAs as possible
10) Get multiple prospects competing at every position and role
11) After a couple of years, sign key vet free agents and acquire a few key leadership vets.

 

[TheGoldenGod]

It's a crime what Bergevin did to that franchise. Feel for that fan base.

Marty Brodeur is currently the Blues assistant GM and it's known that he eventually wants to run his own team. He may be a good fit.

Idk how but the 1st step is getting that man out of there. Can only go uphill from there.

 

[BoltSTH]

1 Owners that will have no internal cap, and leave GM to do what he thinks right
2 Hire the best GM available, regardless of langues spoken
3 Hire the best head scout. Double or triple the scouting budget.
4 Get the best coaches for the AHL team, and make sure they play the same system as the Habs.
4. Identify the core 5 or 6 players and build on that from the draft.
5 Be patient. It takes 4 or 5 years to do a proper rebuild.
6 Build from the net out.

 

[ijuka]

It's too late for Canadiens.

You are supposed to sell off your valuable assets before you give them contracts that cannot be moved. The decision to rebuild should have been made before Price signed this extension and when he still had 2 years or so left on his contract. Selling high at that time could have significantly accelerated the rebuild.

As is, they have barely anything of value and won't be able to perform a proper, accelerated rebuild. If they go ahead with it now, it's going to take forever until they get a decent team.

 

[RalphyDanger]

Trust the process