Alexei Morozov

[Den]

I second VladNYC wholeheartedly

 

[hototogisu]

I second VladNYC wholeheartedly

Then you're welcome to refute any of my points instead of chirping in with meta-comments...

I think you guys just don't like that two Russians, justified or not, are under heavy fire from Montreal fans/media so you're turning it against the team instead to displace the blame.

Mind you, I don't think Kovalev and Samsonov should share the full brunt of the blame either, but at least a decent-sized portion of it.

 

[Den]

Then you're welcome to refute any of my points instead of chirping in with meta-comments...

I think you guys just don't like that two Russians, justified or not, are under heavy fire from Montreal fans/media so you're turning it against the team instead to displace the blame.

Mind you, I don't think Kovalev and Samsonov should share the full brunt of the blame either, but at least a decent-sized portion of it.

I don't get it: you admitted yourself that they are missused. What there to refute?

 

[Blind Gardien]

What are you a PR Rep for the Canadians? Do you still believe any of that after this season? No offense but your Coach is garbage, and so is your hockey system. There is NO way Lats out played Kosty, you guys caved into the fans and the media wanting more French people on the team. The Habs are down right Pejorative Slured. ...

Well, in the interests of not adding any more unnecessary bandwidth to a thread on Alexei Morozov, feel free to bring the debate to the Habs forum... and hope that somebody quotes you there. <plonk>

 

[hototogisu]

I don't get it: you admitted yourself that they are missused. What there to refute?

That the Habs system isn't a waste of talent and that Kovalev and Samsonov aren't as blame-free as VladNYC would like everyone to believe. That's what you agreed wholeheartedly with, right?

 

[VladNYC*]

Lindy Ruff, that's the guy who scratched Tomas Vanek in the playoffs last year, right? And Afinogenov spent five seasons with the Sabres before he exploded - would you say his development was stunted at all?

So somehow we turned a couple of world-class players into garbage, yet players like Koivu, Higgins, Souray, Plekanec, Markov, and Komisarek all acheived career highs last year. That's weird.
And shouldn't the fact that Guy Carbonneau is a rookie head coach be taken into consideration?

Vanek got benched because he didn't have confidence in him self nor did the coach have confidence in him. IMO its is ok to bench a Rookie. The Reason Max exploded was because of the new NHL and the sabres new system. Buffalo was a defensive team before the lock out. Slava Kozlov called his time in Buffalo during this time the worst year of his life. The only reason Max exploded and Vanek exploded and Roy exploded was because Lindy saw that he has a bunch of very fast very offensive minded players and he went with it. Max would have been a bust had he played in Montreal right now. A no vision coach like Carbs would never let Roy-Vanek-Afinogenov happen because they seem like a liability together but they work. Why? Because Lindy trusted them and let them do their thing. He didn't try to put square pegs in round holes like they do in Montreal. Sure there are some utility players that can play any where and just do an ok job but that is not the kind of thing you make a system around.

Pleks had 47 points
Higgins had 38 points

I would think the zamboni should be able to get atleast that from the players on a team's top 2 lines.

There are a ton of defensemen with more points then that, Cambel, Souray etc.

Koivu had a great year- he is a great great player, imagine how much better it would have been on an offensive team.

So what if Carbs is a rookie coach, either you can coach or you can't. Is this his first time behind a bench EVER?

 

[Zine]

So somehow we turned a couple of world-class players into garbage, yet players like Koivu, Higgins, Souray, Plekanec, Markov, and Komisarek all acheived career highs last year. That's weird.
And shouldn't the fact that Guy Carbonneau is a rookie head coach be taken into consideration?

Plekanec/Higgins career high 47 and 38 points.......lol. Those guys have the talent to be much better than that.

Fact is, those guys fit in best to Montreals system - but they're still being misused. If they were on another team they would have been developed MUCH better. Same goes for Kostitsyn, Perezhogin, etc.

 

[Riggins]

Look at the second half of Plekanec's season, he was lights out. There is no coincidence that it happened when he was no longer burdened with the Russian super-duo of Kovalev and Samsonov any more. Higgins started out on fire but was injured for 21 games and struggled after his return. If you think the Habs had the horses this year to play run and gun hockey, you're wrong. Claiming they have more potential talent at forward than Buffalo is laughable. I would however like to see things opened up for three offensive lines next year if we can land a big time UFA scorer. Kovalev, though super talented, is a discontented lazy bum and should be gone as soon as possible unless you like players who don't try and hit the post more than they score. Samsonov despite his small stature is one of the biggest wastes of space in the NHL. All he does is skate around in circles like a figure skater and throw an insanely weak wrister at the goalie's chest every once in a while. Anyway, this certainly went off topic and should be on the Habs forum.

As far as Morozov goes, why would Pittsburgh not want to bring him back? They need wingers. The question is whether they would be willing to pay enough for Morozov to want to make the trip back to North America instead of collecting a paycheck in Russia.

 

[Den]

Morozov probably won't go to the Pens. He wants a "Cup contender"

 

[Den]

I guess what I am observing here is "their portion of blame". There must be several longer posts that place the rest of blame. Looking... Looking... Still looking... Hmm

 

[Blind Gardien]

As far as Morozov goes, why would Pittsburgh not want to bring him back? They need wingers. The question is whether they would be willing to pay enough for Morozov to want to make the trip back to North America instead of collecting a paycheck in Russia.

I imagine that lots of scouts from lots of NHL teams have seen the "new Morozov" by now, so they'll have some good ideas about how he might transition back into the NHL. I certainly don't have any idea. But I do notice that guys like Ville Peltonen, Tony Salmelainen, Glen Metropolit, Randy Robitaille, Petteri Nummelin, Denis Arkhipov, Vladimir Orszagh... well, you can probably dig out a fairly length list of guys who came to the NHL, went (back) overseas, came back again... all signing for $1Mish or less. Nobody was risking $3M+ on them, despite their respective levels of success overseas.

Now, granted, Morozov's numbers are more phenomenal than most. But still. It's going to be a pretty risky proposition. After all, you can pick over the NHL scrapheap at the end of the UFA signing extravaganza and get a Viktor Kozlov for $865,000 to score 25 goals/50 pts... who wants to gamble that Morozov is going to be more effective than Kozlov? Maybe he would be a star. Maybe he wouldn't, I don't know. But $3M+ is a big dice roll in the modern salary cap environment.

A team like Pittsburgh, or Washington, which might have some salary cap "slack" in the very short term, would be good teams to roll the dice I'd think, so long as Morozov can settle for a 1-year deal.

(I hope he does come over though, since I still have him lingering on my keeper league roster. )

 

[ForsbergForever]

Wow, how did this thread become all about how the Habs are wasting their prospects talent? Next season will be the real test of what kind of direction they'll go in, firewagon hockey or defensive doldrums...as for Morozov, he's a king in Russia, playing for a great team and making lots of money, why would he go to the NHL, just for the sake of it?

 

[VladNYC*]

Look at the second half of Plekanec's season, he was lights out. There is no coincidence that it happened when he was no longer burdened with the Russian super-duo of Kovalev and Samsonov any more. Higgins started out on fire but was injured for 21 games and struggled after his return. If you think the Habs had the horses this year to play run and gun hockey, you're wrong. Claiming they have more potential talent at forward than Buffalo is laughable. I would however like to see things opened up for three offensive lines next year if we can land a big time UFA scorer. Kovalev, though super talented, is a discontented lazy bum and should be gone as soon as possible unless you like players who don't try and hit the post more than they score. Samsonov despite his small stature is one of the biggest wastes of space in the NHL. All he does is skate around in circles like a figure skater and throw an insanely weak wrister at the goalie's chest every once in a while. Anyway, this certainly went off topic and should be on the Habs forum.

As far as Morozov goes, why would Pittsburgh not want to bring him back? They need wingers. The question is whether they would be willing to pay enough for Morozov to want to make the trip back to North America instead of collecting a paycheck in Russia.

Sorry to tell you but without Kovalev and Samsonov and the Russians on this team you guys wouldbe below Washington. You can spew bs from Racist french radio all you want, everyone else knows how good these players are and they have the stats from elsewhere in the league and international play to prove it. PLEASE PLEASE i hope you guys send all your Russians to a rival team, like the Islanders or something you guys will be biting your elbows and kicking your selves after the beating you get. The fact that you guys were even a contender to be in the playoffs despite everything the Habs organization does shows how good these players really are.

The only reason Buffalo seems "deep" is because of how well Lindy's system is designed for his players. He is a brilliant brilliant coach. Notice all the Sabres have had their best year post the new NHL and once the new system started. He really knows how to bring out the best out of his players, where carbs does the opposite. Danny Briere is a great player but no where close to Kovalev and Afinogenov had nothing on Samsonov. Look at how he handled his new guys, giving them chances and letting them be on the first line, constantly trying to change things here, calculate things here. Meanwhile Carbs wouldn't even put your best winger and center together.

Keep alienating your stars, see where it will get you.

 

[cska78]

I'm gonna try to comment on some of the earlier responses and tweak my thoughts, so they are more clear:

1) As for Grabovsky getting concussions on the NHL level, we all know that AHL is a meat grinder, and many times rougher than the NHL.
2) I've seen Lats play, he aint too bad, but so much playing time, I'd be getting goals and points and I can hardly skate I've seen Perezhogin, Kostyzin and Grabosky play, they can skate circles around Lats and the other guy whose last name is hard to spell
3) When the Habs got Sammy, I thought omg a line of Kovy-Koivu-Sammy would tear the East apart, yet that line got very little time to gell and was broken up, while the team was having them play a type of hockey which is against their believe. Now you add Grab, Kostizin, Perezhogin, Markov, Souray on D, and this has to be the highest scoring team in the east, instead, well we know what happened

Nothing against the Habs (except that I live in Boston and support a pitifull franchise called the Bruins), but they were just a good example of what I'm trying to express.

Same could be said of Morozov in Pittsbrugh, Oleg Petrov in Montreal, Kovalenko (he's so good and it took him years to get some playing time) and many others I mentioned earlier...

I kiinda hit a dead end in what I'm trying to say here, but basically there are two major factors:

1) Cold war is long like over (some would say it's coming back, but like I read in a good magazine (American btw)it's Westerner's fault, since instead of wellcoming Russia into the Western society, West infiltrated all the ex Soviet Union republics, expanded NATO to Russia's borders and etc), but in people's mind in NA too many Europeans is a bad thing, too many Russians - even worse (Unless it's Detroit's Russian five who were one of the best players ever, and came to NA already established)
2) Giving a local kid playing time, while he doesn't deserve it can be justified, giving a foreigner extra playing time to get used to the new rinks, and you get critisized left and right...

 

[hototogisu]

Sorry to tell you but without Kovalev and Samsonov and the Russians on this team you guys wouldbe below Washington.

That's funny, we played almost the entire season this year without Kovalev and Samsonov and finished above Washington. What was your point again?

Oh wait, you don't have one. You're just mad that your "countrymen" are being vilified, and it's not without just cause either. I don't know where you are or what kind of access you have to Hab games, but I can only assume you didn't watch many. To suggest that Kovalev and Samsonov are totally blameless is absolutely absurd in every sense of the word. While I don't agree with Carbo's system, it's also up to the players to conform to the team - not vice versa. The players who did buy into the system seemed to do pretty well this year, in fact.

And it's pretty convenient to point out that Higgins had "LOL only 38 points" without telling the rest of the story. Like the part where he got 38 points in 61 games this year when he played injured for a large portion of the season, compared to 38 points in 80 games last year. I'd call that a marked improvement, wouldn't you?
Anyway it doesn't matter HOW well he improved his totals, your argument appeared to be that the Canadiens were throttling all their offensive talent and everybody was wilting under Carbonneau - you've been grasping at straws ever since I disproved that.

I'll be willing to give your "Habs system = waste" theory a bit more thought when the Kostitsyns, Perezhogin, Grabovski, Emelin and Valentenko all bust or get shipped off somewhere else. Call me when that happens.

EDIT: and speaking of international play, I'm sure you noticed as well as everybody else that Kovalev didn't get so much as an invite to play for Russia this year. But I'm sure that was Carbonneau's fault too. Or our racist French media that you seem to be such an expert on. Boy, you've seen the games, you know our media...where in Quebec do you live?

 

[VladNYC*]

That's funny, we played almost the entire season this year without Kovalev and Samsonov and finished above Washington. What was your point again?

Oh wait, you don't have one. You're just mad that your "countrymen" are being vilified, and it's not without just cause either. I don't know where you are or what kind of access you have to Hab games, but I can only assume you didn't watch many. To suggest that Kovalev and Samsonov are totally blameless is absolutely absurd in every sense of the word. While I don't agree with Carbo's system, it's also up to the players to conform to the team - not vice versa. The players who did buy into the system seemed to do pretty well this year, in fact.

And it's pretty convenient to point out that Higgins had "LOL only 38 points" without telling the rest of the story. Like the part where he got 38 points in 61 games this year when he played injured for a large portion of the season, compared to 38 points in 80 games last year. I'd call that a marked improvement, wouldn't you?
Anyway it doesn't matter HOW well he improved his totals, your argument appeared to be that the Canadiens were throttling all their offensive talent and everybody was wilting under Carbonneau - you've been grasping at straws ever since I disproved that.

I'll be willing to give your "Habs system = waste" theory a bit more thought when the Kostitsyns, Perezhogin, Grabovski, Emelin and Valentenko all bust or get shipped off somewhere else. Call me when that happens.

EDIT: and speaking of international play, I'm sure you noticed as well as everybody else that Kovalev didn't get so much as an invite to play for Russia this year. But I'm sure that was Carbonneau's fault too. Or our racist French media that you seem to be such an expert on. Boy, you've seen the games, you know our media...where in Quebec do you live?

Hmm 73 games played by Kovalev and 63 by Samsonov 61 by Perezhogin is playing with out them? The 3 of them put together 15% of your points this year despite their awful year. They contributed to 16% of your game wining goals (6) meaning they gave you 12 points in that alone. Take that away and you would be with 30 games won at 66 points, right below Washington. Keep that in mind, that awful year Kovy and Samy and Perezhogin had is what separates you from Washington.

As for Higgins, how is that impressive for a guy on your top line?
Higgins has 0.62 points per game, if a Russian had that he would get run out of Montreal. How do i know that? Because kovy had 0.64 points per game and you guys are calling for his head on a pike. I wouldn't call that any thing to dance for joy about from a guy that some how got to play with your #1 center who has 75 points, i wonder how many of those 75 points would be shared with Kovy if he played on that line?

Your good players ARE Willting who cares about your AHL caliber players and their improvements?

Samsonov - Career 0.74 pts per game player. This year: 0.41
Kovalev- Career 0.78 pts per game . This year: 0.64
Bonk - Career 0.56 pts per game. This year 0.31

Average decrease in production rate from these guys in one year was 24%

The forwards that are doing well are Koivu and Ryder. One is a future hall of famer and the other is bred for Canadian old skool hockey.

Souray has 64 points, too bad as a defensemen he is -27 for the year and -28 for his career. Maybe you should put this guy on offense. A defensemen who is -28 is no defensemen.


As for Kovalev, we are the deepest team in the world at forward, the average age of our forwards is 24 and the oldest is 31. Kovalev would be 3 years older then our oldest forward, we can live with out this kind of experience on offense, Montreal cannot.

 

[ForsbergForever]

The forwards that are doing well are Koivu and Ryder. One is a future hall of famer and the other is bred for Canadian old skool hockey.

Souray has 64 points, too bad as a defensemen he is -27 for the year and -28 for his career. Maybe you should put this guy on offense. A defensemen who is -28 is no defensemen.

1) Saku Koivu-HoF? hmmm...
2) Didn't you say yourself that even the best Russian D-men can't defend worth a damn? Why shouldn't that apply to Canadian defensemen, he's putting up great numbers in a Sergei Gonchar-like fashion, maybe Gonchar or Zubov should be moved to foward too...

 

[VladNYC*]

1) Saku Koivu-HoF? hmmm...
2) Didn't you say yourself that even the best Russian D-men can't defend worth a damn? Why shouldn't that apply to Canadian defensemen, he's putting up great numbers in a Sergei Gonchar-like fashion, maybe Gonchar or Zubov should be moved to foward too...

1) Absolutly
2)

Gonchar is +39 career
Zubov is +146 career

They aren't a defensive liability. It's great when your D can contribute but it shouldn't be at the cost of defense. Trust me no one is harsher on our defense then Russian fans.

 

[Pica]

Morozov probably won't go to the Pens. He wants a "Cup contender"

If I was in Morozovs skates I'd ge me atleast 3 year contract with Penquins, then work my composite stick off to get to play with either Crosby (or Malkin) and win me some rings.

 

[Zine]

Boston still has the rights to Zinoviev. They should offer him and Morozov contracts.......their chemistry and talent is outstanding.

Morozov -- Zinoviev -- physical powerforward

great line

 

[Erika]

That the Habs system isn't a waste of talent and that Kovalev and Samsonov aren't as blame-free as VladNYC would like everyone to believe. That's what you agreed wholeheartedly with, right?

The Habs system sucks big time !! You guys drafted talented offensive dynamos like Perezhogin, Kostitsyn, Latendresse, Grabovski, Higgins, PLekanec, etc. and turn them into 3rd line grinders thanks to Bob Gainey and Guy Carbonneau as they are the main reason for this crappy system and talent killers. Bob Gainey and Guy Carbonneau are not fitting at all with the players they have in their hands.... which all came from Ex-GM Andre Savard. The youngsters they have now are the youngsters that were made to fit and succeed with Andre Savard, not Bob Gainey.

Back then, Ex-GM Andre Savard wanted to implant his own system based on talent and speed just like he did with Ottawa, but he got dumped by the organization before he could do anything. Now you guys have under your hands some good offensive weapons, but can't use them properly because of Gainey defensive philosophy.... sad.... The arrival of Gainey was the worst thing that happened to the habs in this decade. Andre Savard should've never leave. The habs would've been an offensive powerhouse just like Buffalo under Savard's Reign...

Seriously, do you believe that Kostitsyn, Latendresse, Perezhogin, Grabovski, etc. will become offensive threat under the actual defensive minded system of the Habs ? If yes, you'll be very dissapointed.

 

[Shack]

Unless he plays for between 1 and 2 million dollars, I don't think teams are gonna risk signing him, he's put up good numbers in the NHL, but not good enough to warrant him getting 3 million + IMO

How much does Ny Islanders pay to Yashin for example. So 3mil to Morozov would be small bill if referred to Yashin.

 

[Cors]

Morozov for 3+ mile real.

 

[cska78]

Morozov for 3+ mile real.

you got a sad logo...OUR Guy, our super star, our coach, and his son will be playing for the Swiss

 

[cska78]

I think it's stupid to argue that Europeans in NHL have to be much better than the local talent, and will have much less of a chance, as well as playing time to showcase that. It's a fact!