Speculation: Are the Habs imitating Vegas?

the valiant effort

settle down, bud
Apr 17, 2017
3,706
4,221
Last year was Julien's first losing season over a full schedule, so I don't think he's on the cusp of being squeezed out of the league...
 

CristianoRonaldo

Registered User
Apr 7, 2014
19,535
15,753
In your head
Looser attitude.... Way better to play the best you can, give the best show you can for your paying fans, make players evolve in a winning environment. Why did Vegas did not suck bad last season. They had all the rights to do it and grab Dahlin at the end. No, they decided to compete from Day ONE and never let go.

Vegas was full of reject who had something to prove, not the same context as MTL, and those Cinderella stories happens once in million year...


Who is our Karlsson ? Our Perron ? Our Smith ? Who is our Marchessault ? Our Schmidt

"Once you are in the playoff, everything can happen" It's because of that stupid mentality that we are sucking/giving false hopes to the fans since 1993.
 

1909

Registered User
Jul 6, 2016
20,528
11,139
[QUOTE="Kaperi Spacey, post: 150412675, member: 224371"]Vegas was full of reject who had something to prove, not the same context as MTL, and those Cinderella stories happens once in million year...


Who is our Karlsson ? Our Perron ? Our Smith ? Who is our Marchessault ? Our Schmidt

"Once you are in the playoff, everything can happen" It's because of that stupid mentality that we are sucking/giving false hopes to the fans since 1993.[/QUOTE]

How come every single new expansion teams sucked so hard since decades ? Do you think these players were not feeling "reject" ?

Karlsson was a 4th liner in Colombus the year before. Perron is an average player with lots of shortcomings in his game. In the Playoffs he was their worst forward. Smith is another dime in a dozen second line player. Marchessault is possibly the best of the bunch and the reason why this expansion draft was tilted towards Vegas badly. Florida had no place to hide him and they decided to protect 4 d-men instead of 9 forwards.

Many of our players have as much if not more potential than the first three players.
 

JianYang

Registered User
Sep 29, 2017
17,753
16,114
Vegas is a great story
[QUOTE="Kaperi Spacey, post: 150412675, member: 224371"]Vegas was full of reject who had something to prove, not the same context as MTL, and those Cinderella stories happens once in million year...


Who is our Karlsson ? Our Perron ? Our Smith ? Who is our Marchessault ? Our Schmidt

"Once you are in the playoff, everything can happen" It's because of that stupid mentality that we are sucking/giving false hopes to the fans since 1993.

How come every single new expansion teams sucked so hard since decades ? Do you think these players were not feeling "reject" ?

Karlsson was a 4th liner in Colombus the year before. Perron is an average player with lots of shortcomings in his game. In the Playoffs he was their worst forward. Smith is another dime in a dozen second line player. Marchessault is possibly the best of the bunch and the reason why this expansion draft was tilted towards Vegas badly. Florida had no place to hide him and they decided to protect 4 d-men instead of 9 forwards.

Many of our players have as much if not more potential than the first three players.[/QUOTE]

There's a reason why the knights were considered a great story last year.

Sure, bottom dwellers can aspire to be the next golden knights, but the fact rains that it's highly unlikely to happen. If it was something more likely to repeat itself, the story wouldn't have been so good in the first place.
 

Phil Parent

Sorel, 'fant d'chienne!
Feb 4, 2005
15,833
5,666
Sorel-Tracy, Quebec
For all the talk of the Golden Knights being rejects wanting to prove their previous teams wrong, who's to say that CJ didn't walk in the Habs locker room and call on the pride of these guys using the fact that the Habs were projected by a lot of people to finish last?

Proving people wrong for proving people wrong, it's pretty much the same thing.
 

JianYang

Registered User
Sep 29, 2017
17,753
16,114
This xpac draft was a lot more generous than the past ones.


I'm not sure what happened here but my quote didnt come out right.

Sure, Vegas had more generous draft terms, but I'll bet you seattle with similar rules does not get near that level of success in the first year. You can do this 99 more times, and I feel like you will strike gold, like once.

I always refer back to this.... who expected vegas to be great when the expansion draft just took place? Generous draft rules or not, that was totally out of left field.
 

calder candidate

Registered User
Feb 25, 2003
4,696
2,594
Montreal
Visit site
I don’t think we are coping Vegas at least I don’t think they went in trying to copie them or that Vegas has the copy right for hard work and speed... we are just playing to our strength which are pretty much the same lot of depth no a lot of stars.
 

Bacchus1

Fill the net!
Sep 10, 2007
3,118
1,150
Montreal
Habs are definitely playing a high tempo game. The players are buying in to the system, but they haven’t mastered it yet. I am expecting some bumps in the road ahead, but I am also expecting the team to improve ... especially after we get Weber back.

My only concern is that if we start to pile up some losses, that Julien gets timid, and re-deploys his sucky system. It happened to our team back in the Subban days. There was about a 1 month period where we played exciting hockey, but we got a few losses, and we went back to dump and chase.

Is this the LV system? I don’t know. They were a tight knit high confidence team by the end of the season. They had a system and they stuck to it. I’m sure their story inspired many people, but that is probably as far as it goes.

Looking forward to Drouin getting in to the groove and playing well. He has been sucky so far. Also, when game 9 rolls around, we will have the KK question to answer. Our team’s success, and whether we emulate the LV mold will depend a lot on what happens in the next 20 games .... what we are doing now may not be sustainable for long ... or it may work super well. We don’t know what is happening in the locker room ... so, who knows.
 

LaP

Registered User
Jun 27, 2012
24,283
17,385
Quebec City, Canada
I'm not sure what happened here but my quote didnt come out right.

Sure, Vegas had more generous draft terms, but I'll bet you seattle with similar rules does not get near that level of success in the first year. You can do this 99 more times, and I feel like you will strike gold, like once.

I always refer back to this.... who expected vegas to be great when the expansion draft just took place? Generous draft rules or not, that was totally out of left field.

Unless they find their own William Karlsson and can grab an almost HOF level goalie at the end of his career (like Price) nope they probably wont. I don't want to diminish McPhee success (even though i'll admit i don't like him at all) but i highly doubt he (or anyone else) foresaw William Karlsson blossoming into an elite player. I did not watch Vegas much last season and when the playoffs started i was ready to watch them crumble like a card castle. Then by watching them i realized William Karlsson was legitimately playing like an elite player (up until the scf where he was meh).

I think people don't give Karlsson and Marchesault enough credit. Both of them last year played like elite talents. Will they be able to bring this level of play back this season? I don't know but if they can't it will be a lot harder for Vegas. Depth is not as great as some people think it is imo. We've been playing the depth card for 25 years without any success.

I did not follow the draft much but did not Florida had the option to protect one less dman and one more forward? They apparently protected Mark Pysyk and Petrovic and exposed Marchessault ...
 

JianYang

Registered User
Sep 29, 2017
17,753
16,114
Unless they find their own William Karlsson and can grab an almost HOF level goalie at the end of his career (like Price) nope they probably wont. I don't want to diminish McPhee success (even though i'll admit i don't like him at all) but i highly doubt he (or anyone else) foresaw William Karlsson blossoming into an elite player. I did not watch Vegas much last season and when the playoffs started i was ready to watch them crumble like a card castle. Then by watching them i realized William Karlsson was legitimately playing like an elite player (up until the scf where he was meh).

I think people don't give Karlsson and Marchesault enough credit. Both of them last year played like elite talents. Will they be able to bring this level of play back this season? I don't know but if they can't it will be a lot harder for Vegas. Depth is not as great as some people think it is imo. We've been playing the depth card for 25 years without any success.

I did not follow the draft much but did not Florida had the option to protect one less dman and one more forward? They apparently protected Mark Pysyk and Petrovic and exposed Marchessault ...

Karlsson probably wasn't even slated to be their #1 center imo. That was probably supposed to be Schipachev (sp?). Funny how that worked out.

As for MAF, yeah he had a strong season, but here's another crazy thing. MAF missed significant time. The club went through 5 goalies, and still managed to post a 22-11-3 record without him.

I mean, you can't write this stuff.
 
  • Like
Reactions: MordredGK

BaseballCoach

Registered User
Dec 15, 2006
20,496
8,804
I did not follow the draft much but did not Florida had the option to protect one less dman and one more forward? They apparently protected Mark Pysyk and Petrovic and exposed Marchessault ...

One less D and THREE more forwards
 

LaP

Registered User
Jun 27, 2012
24,283
17,385
Quebec City, Canada
Karlsson probably wasn't even slated to be their #1 center imo. That was probably supposed to be Schipachev (sp?). Funny how that worked out.

As for MAF, yeah he had a strong season, but here's another crazy thing. MAF missed significant time. The club went through 5 goalies, and still managed to post a 22-11-3 record without him.

I mean, you can't write this stuff.

Subban is a good young goalie though. He had a very good junior career and his stats in the AHL are very good too. He always projected as a guy who would become a number 1 eventually. I would not be surprised at all if Subban steals MAF's job in the next 2 years. The team actually struggled with Lagace in the net posting a 6-7-1 record. The other two goalies did not play enough and the sample size is too small to conclude anything about them.

But yeah there was a little something not explainable with Vegas last year. But like you said you could try to replicate that 100 times and your success rate would probably be around 1% to 3%. So not really a good plan at all. Skills still trump everything. Skills is a proven way to win a cup. It's been one since like forever.

We won in the past not only because guys bled for the jersey but also because a lot of them are in the HOF today (while pretty none of our players in the last 25 years will be in the HOF outside of maybe Subban and Price depending on how they finish their career).

Skills is not a guarantee and you still need kiriktr, lideurship and attitude but without skills you'll go nowhere. You can change your attitude as you get older and acquire more life experience but you can't buy skills.
 

CupInSIX

My cap runneth over
Jul 1, 2012
26,283
18,254
Alphaville
Marchessault was left exposed as part of the trade to take Smith. It was never announced that way, but that's the only thing that makes sense.

Otherwise Florida exposed him for no reason (either way: dumb)
 

LaP

Registered User
Jun 27, 2012
24,283
17,385
Quebec City, Canada
Marchessault was left exposed as part of the trade to take Smith. It was never announced that way, but that's the only thing that makes sense.

Otherwise Florida exposed him for no reason (either way: dumb)

It's a pretty bad move either way. I mean i'm not a big fan of Smith but if he is the biggest problem your team have then you don't really have a problem at all. I'm still not sold 100% on Marchessault but it's a big price to pay to get rid of Smith.

If the move was made to protect someone else by making them draft Smith then i don't know who it is. I mean they protected two very average dman (in my book i know some people see Petrovic in their soup).
 

CupInSIX

My cap runneth over
Jul 1, 2012
26,283
18,254
Alphaville
It's a pretty bad move either way. I mean i'm not a big fan of Smith but if he is the biggest problem your team have then you don't really have a problem at all. I'm still not sold 100% on Marchessault but it's a big price to pay to get rid of Smith.

Marchessault will be a star and Smith should have been in the conversation for Selke last year.

Some players just bloom late (like LeClair and Desjardins)
 

Grate n Colorful Oz

Hutson Hawk
Jun 12, 2007
35,310
32,163
Hockey Mecca
Habs are definitely playing a high tempo game. The players are buying in to the system, but they haven’t mastered it yet. I am expecting some bumps in the road ahead, but I am also expecting the team to improve ... especially after we get Weber back.

My only concern is that if we start to pile up some losses, that Julien gets timid, and re-deploys his sucky system. It happened to our team back in the Subban days. There was about a 1 month period where we played exciting hockey, but we got a few losses, and we went back to dump and chase.

Is this the LV system? I don’t know. They were a tight knit high confidence team by the end of the season. They had a system and they stuck to it. I’m sure their story inspired many people, but that is probably as far as it goes.

Looking forward to Drouin getting in to the groove and playing well. He has been sucky so far. Also, when game 9 rolls around, we will have the KK question to answer. Our team’s success, and whether we emulate the LV mold will depend a lot on what happens in the next 20 games .... what we are doing now may not be sustainable for long ... or it may work super well. We don’t know what is happening in the locker room ... so, who knows.

The rift between Therrien and Subban started there. You could see Subban didnt like the direction and played against his coach's orders.
 

habsfan909

Registered User
Feb 20, 2018
964
959
We still have the same record as Ottawa this season. Maybe lets wait a bit before we start the Vegas comparison talks.
 

THE HOFF

Registered User
Sep 26, 2007
4,767
1,083
it was years ago, we had just missed the playoffs the year before. And there it was; the panel of idiots making general assumptions about what was going to happen, covering all the ''ifs'' and ''maybes'' on TSN prior to the season. Giving props to the teams that looked good on paper (like the leafs this year) ... it was sickening as a fan, the ultimate torture. Then they were asked which team that they thought would get back in the playoffs. Bob Mac confidently picked Montreal, making the others laugh. What he said was that its not tolerable to consistently miss the playoffs in Montreal, and that we had a solid track record of being able to bounce back and at least make the playoffs. contenders ? not even by a stretch.

''we are in the business of winning hockey games''

well, not anymore, no. Habs are in the business of entertainment and if that can finally reach the front office's line of thought - to realize that the way we win (or lose) matters - then this organization will make a giant step forward.

My point is that it was always in our DNA in the last decades to overachieve with average teams, if we can keep our fighting spirit WHILE getting fresh talent like Kotkaniemi, we can turn things around. Talented players need to play our way, not wonder around with the puck while everyone else ''wait'' for them to create. So far, I like what I see and most importantly... I enjoy watching the team, win or lose.
 

the

Registered User
Mar 2, 2012
13,192
17,581
Montreal
Storyline wise every year there’s a team or two who shock the league and overachieve by making the playoffs. What the Golden Knights did is much much deeper than that.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Kaperi Spacey

Kriss E

Registered User
May 3, 2007
55,329
20,272
Jeddah
it was years ago, we had just missed the playoffs the year before. And there it was; the panel of idiots making general assumptions about what was going to happen, covering all the ''ifs'' and ''maybes'' on TSN prior to the season. Giving props to the teams that looked good on paper (like the leafs this year) ... it was sickening as a fan, the ultimate torture. Then they were asked which team that they thought would get back in the playoffs. Bob Mac confidently picked Montreal, making the others laugh. What he said was that its not tolerable to consistently miss the playoffs in Montreal, and that we had a solid track record of being able to bounce back and at least make the playoffs. contenders ? not even by a stretch.

''we are in the business of winning hockey games''

well, not anymore, no. Habs are in the business of entertainment and if that can finally reach the front office's line of thought - to realize that the way we win (or lose) matters - then this organization will make a giant step forward.

My point is that it was always in our DNA in the last decades to overachieve with average teams, if we can keep our fighting spirit WHILE getting fresh talent like Kotkaniemi, we can turn things around. Talented players need to play our way, not wonder around with the puck while everyone else ''wait'' for them to create. So far, I like what I see and most importantly... I enjoy watching the team, win or lose.

Ya I really hate watching all those very skilled guys create things on the ice...
How does that make the slightest bit of sense..:biglaugh:
 

THE HOFF

Registered User
Sep 26, 2007
4,767
1,083
Ya I really hate watching all those very skilled guys create things on the ice...
How does that make the slightest bit of sense..:biglaugh:

I was obviously referring to the pace of the game and for players to be proactive without the puck, I could have said it better, i agree.
 

Clumsyhab

Registered User
Feb 22, 2004
8,062
1,175
Montreal
Habs definitely change the system. Most of the players lost weight during the summer and it is now all about speed. Our line-up in the first two games only had ONE player over 200 pounds (Joel Armia). I don't think that ever happened in the Habs history. We are smaller than during the smurfs era. Biggest d-man is Benn at 6'2 199 pounds. I don't have the official stat, but I'm pretty sure this line-up is at least 10 pounds under the league's average. I just hope they can keep it up as the season goes on.
 

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Ad

-->