De Montreal
help
At the times, it was considered a good move by Bob Gainey and with good reasons. The team was heading it's centennial year, coming off a pretty good season in 2008. Expectations were high and it was a good idea to add firepower to an already good offensive team.
Tanguay played to it's expectations, with 41 points in 50 games but then he got injured and played hurt in the playoff. We all know how it ended.
Still, looking back at the day of the trade, on draft day, I cant help but wonder what could have happened if we didnt trade for Tanguay. We gave up a 1st and a 2nd round pick which didnt amount to anything (Greg Nemisz and Stefan Elliott) but lot of good players were picks right at those ranks : John Carlson, Roman Josi, Vyacheslav Voynov in 2008 and Brian Dumoulin, Dimitry Orlov, Tomas Tatar, Tyson Barrie, Bryan McNabb and Reilly Smith in 2009.
We just drafted Subban, McDonagh and Fischer so it's unlikely we would have went for a dman with those picks. With Leblanc drafted in 2009, it's likely we would have went with Nemisz or another centreman in 2008 (Deschamps? Leveille?). In 2009, in the 2nd round, we might have went with the BPA which made me believe we could have gotten Panik or Dumoulin.
All this is under the assumption that we don't trade those picks for another player. Other players made available this summer were Mike Cammalleri (ironically), traded as well for a 1st and a 2nd, Olli Jokinen (traded for a 2nd, Ballard and Boynton), Erik Cole (traded for Pitkanen), Rene Bourque (this is getting weird), and Robert Lang (which we also got anyway).
It's also the summer we traded Grabovski for Pateryn and tried to sign Mats Sundin.
Let say it work differently, that we trade our picks for Cammalleri instead and keep Grabovski. We also keep our 2010 2nd round pick instead of trading for Robert Lang and with that pick we select Tyler Toffoli.
A. Kostitsyn - Plekanec - Kovalev
Higgins - Koivu - Cammalleri
S. Kostitsyn - Grabovski - Latendresse
I think this help us being a better team in 2008 (Tanguay and Koivu didnt mesh that well except for a stint at the end of the season, and with Cammalleri Koivu finally get a real sniper to play with) and in the future (with Grabovski and Toffoli being 2nd line centre on this team for the next 5-6 years). This is obviously just speculation but it's summer and I have nothing to ponder about some of those what if scenarios and share them with you.
Tanguay played to it's expectations, with 41 points in 50 games but then he got injured and played hurt in the playoff. We all know how it ended.
Still, looking back at the day of the trade, on draft day, I cant help but wonder what could have happened if we didnt trade for Tanguay. We gave up a 1st and a 2nd round pick which didnt amount to anything (Greg Nemisz and Stefan Elliott) but lot of good players were picks right at those ranks : John Carlson, Roman Josi, Vyacheslav Voynov in 2008 and Brian Dumoulin, Dimitry Orlov, Tomas Tatar, Tyson Barrie, Bryan McNabb and Reilly Smith in 2009.
We just drafted Subban, McDonagh and Fischer so it's unlikely we would have went for a dman with those picks. With Leblanc drafted in 2009, it's likely we would have went with Nemisz or another centreman in 2008 (Deschamps? Leveille?). In 2009, in the 2nd round, we might have went with the BPA which made me believe we could have gotten Panik or Dumoulin.
All this is under the assumption that we don't trade those picks for another player. Other players made available this summer were Mike Cammalleri (ironically), traded as well for a 1st and a 2nd, Olli Jokinen (traded for a 2nd, Ballard and Boynton), Erik Cole (traded for Pitkanen), Rene Bourque (this is getting weird), and Robert Lang (which we also got anyway).
It's also the summer we traded Grabovski for Pateryn and tried to sign Mats Sundin.
Let say it work differently, that we trade our picks for Cammalleri instead and keep Grabovski. We also keep our 2010 2nd round pick instead of trading for Robert Lang and with that pick we select Tyler Toffoli.
A. Kostitsyn - Plekanec - Kovalev
Higgins - Koivu - Cammalleri
S. Kostitsyn - Grabovski - Latendresse
I think this help us being a better team in 2008 (Tanguay and Koivu didnt mesh that well except for a stint at the end of the season, and with Cammalleri Koivu finally get a real sniper to play with) and in the future (with Grabovski and Toffoli being 2nd line centre on this team for the next 5-6 years). This is obviously just speculation but it's summer and I have nothing to ponder about some of those what if scenarios and share them with you.