Post-Game Talk: Don't wanna let us wearing our Red Home Jersey? No Problem Mr Dundon... (Canes 4-6 Habs)

[Simarino]

How so? They got Kotka and Suzuki from one tanking year. Poe...he's got 3 goals man, I'll wait a bit before getting excited about him. Domi, got back to the press conference, Bergevin states that he could play center but he's most definitely a winger. So he just got lucky, it's not a strategy.

The goal is to make the PO and rebuild on the fly, or so that seems to be the feeling of some.

So drafting 6-7 centers last year is not a change of strategy, acquiring Domi is luck even if he didnt play one shift on the wing and was a PPG playing center the last 20ish game in Arizona,acquiring Suzuki, drafting bust or boom players instead of DLR type of players, playing a way more offensive style...I dont know, i hate Bergevin probably more then anyone on this board before this summer, but my hate for him dosnt blind me to the point that i cant see that the organisation at least evolve this summer and is going in another diection and is adopting a new strategy drafting wise and in his style of play on the ice.

 

[admiralcadillac]

So drafting 6-7 centers last year is not a change of strategy, acquiring Domi is luck even if he didnt play one shift on the wing and was a PPG playing center the last 20ish game in Arizona,acquiring Suzuki, drafting bust or boom players instead of DLR type of players, playing a way more offensive style...I dont know, i hate Bergevin probably more then anyone on this board before this summer, but my hate for him dosnt blind me to the point that i cant see that the organisation at least evolve this summer and is going in another diection and is adopting a new strategy drafting wise and in his style of play on the ice.

We need to just trade every veteran and hopefully luck out with lottery picks. Because that's what people who have never held management roles do because their jobs aren't on the line.

 

[scrubadam]

Why do you keep on bringing up worthless assets like Hudon and Lernout? Did you forget that Lernout cleared waivers? Hudon has taken himself out of the lineup. FWIW, 98.5FM today claimed repeatedly that Hudon is done in Montreal and that he's very likely to be waived. And you're making trade scenarios using these guys?

I've mentioned in several posts that what one believes will happen is premised on how one perceives what happened this past summer. I think MB is MB and the leopard you're talking about is hell-bent about fast-tracking the team into the playoffs this year and will be a buyer at the TDL. Same guy who I heard in pre and early season interviews continuing to claim that "anything can happen in the playoffs". That doesn't sound like a guy who will conduct a proper rebuild or reset or whatever option involves patience.

So you think MB is going to trade his 1st and top prospects like Phoeling/Suzuki/Brook at the TDL? Ya I don't think thats happening.

And there isn't anything to fast track, the team is sitting in a playoff spot right now.

 

[Le compétiteur]

You think a cap dump a late first and an avg prospect is all Petry would yield?
Well I think we could probably get a lot more than that.
Making the Habs worse today, so we can draft higher, while getting extra assets, is exactly what we should be planning for.

Most of this board was in agreement this summer, Habs need to rebuild. It was almost unanimous.
They have one good summer, are in a bubble position, and now forget it...we have to buy assets at the deadline, and are possibly a year from contention...lol

Most of this board was in agreement this summer that Bergevin was once more destroying this team by trading a proven C for a winger that was just good to score in a empty net, it was almost unanimous...

We don't need to burn down everything. The last thing this team need is to become the next Oilers ... even McDavid is not able to turn them respectable... and it just happen that trading Petry didn't help them. You really want to follow this path?

 

[Runner77]

So you think MB is going to trade his 1st and top prospects like Phoeling/Suzuki/Brook at the TDL? Ya I don't think thats happening.

...

What is this post?

You're pulling stuff out of your ass and then you're disagreeing with it.

Enjoy talking to yourself.

 

[sandysan]

We might be misunderstanding each other. I never advocated tanking or sucking. I've said multiple times how happy I am with this surprisingly good team. I have no wish to see Domi, Tatar and Drouin stop playing well, in the hopes of a lucky draft number. But if we want success, there will be risk. Thus far, no market has abandoned its team for taking calculated risks to pursue a Cup.

All I've been saying is pick a timeline and aim for it. If Kotkaniemi and Suzuki look to enter their primes in, say, two years, then build the strongest roster you can for that future date. Who will be better by then? Who will be declining? If we can acquire a great prospect for Petry, Byron, Weber, etc., then in two years that prospect will likely have a bigger impact than the two-years-older vet we traded away. Every recent Cup winner has a strong homegrown core of stars. Habs haven't had that in years. The approach of buying UFAs and trading for quick-fixes has left us nowhere. The team can remain fun and competitive while trading up for better picks or prospects.

again what you are asking the owner to do is to potentially forgo years of playoff revenue for the chance of potentially, possibly going further in one specific year provided everything (that he can't control) lines up perfectly to give us some amorphous " increased chance" of winning it all. its a moving target, shoot now and hope fore the best wont work.

We have some good prospects, but it is clear that the time they will take to develop, is completely uncertain. Things happen. We sign KK because we need a center, we trade for domi who was billed from the jump as a winger who has played really well down the middle. There is nothing wrong with having a plan, but having a plan that doesnt account for things which you cannot control makes no sense, especially when this plan is based on player projections. there are no takebacks in trades, you move a guy out and then realise with him back you are better positioned, you screwed yourself.

The best things the habs can do is 1) identify team strengths and weaknesses and try to increase the former and decrease the latter. Shipping out byron and weber NOW because you think that their replacements ( they will have to be replaced) will be ready in X time frame makes the team worse now for some potential gain at some later date. and if it doesnt work, we are bad immediately and bad in the future where we get to ship out a whole nother set of players for the " new plan" that will be implmented in some indeterminate time frame.

it would be great if we could, from here on out, exclusively sign players to short term deals so that if they DON'T work out we can jettison them. But the players you CAN sign to these terms, are not the players that are going to help you get over the hump.

I also think, that this notion of dumping players for some amorphous gains in the future kills team chemisty. Losing is a cancer, and once you get a team ok with losing because you are telling them than someday someone is gonna ride in on their white horse and reverse the teams fortunes, that this is actually PART of the plan, you are screwing the team and killing the players who hate losing to the point where even if they scratch an itch, you have to move them because they threaten your " hope for the best" plan.

Guys getting shipped because they said they didnt like losing, that would never happen in montreal now would it ?

 

[scrubadam]

What is this post?

You're pulling stuff out of your ass and then you're disagreeing with it.

Enjoy talking to yourself.

I said that MB will not trade the farm at TDL he will put later picks and low end guys in play and you disagreed with me. So what is MB going to do at TDL to fast track to the playoffs? I am arguing with you that MB isn't going to change his spots when the last TDL's he didn't move any big pieces, the biggest he ever did was a 2nd and bust in Collberg. Even this summer he held onto his 1st and Phoeling instead of trading it for ROR.

so I am talking to you since you disagreed with me that MB will not make any big moves at TDL, he will do what he does trade a B/C prospect and 2nd at most, more likely some 3rd or 5ths and guy who has been in the AHL for 3/4 years (so most likely Mac+3rd for a depth D man or 3rd line forward). So what is the move MB is going to do at TDL that will "fast track" this team to a playoff spot they are already in that will show he doesn't have patience?

 

[Runner77]

I said that MB will not trade the farm at TDL he will put later picks and low end guys in play and you disagreed with me. ...

Show me where I said that MB would trade his first round pick.

Welcome to Marwen.

 

[admiralcadillac]

Most of this board was in agreement this summer that Bergevin was once more destroying this team by trading a proven C for a winger that was just good to score in a empty net, it was almost unanimous...

We don't need to burn down everything. The last thing this team need is to become the next Oilers ... even McDavid is not able to turn them respectable... and it just happen that trading Petry didn't help them. You really want to follow this path?

Remember, Bergevin is always an idiot until he does something alright. In that case, he's lucky and it's definitely his entourage that made the decisions for him.

Keeping that frame of mind allows you to A). always appear to be right (the HFboards favourite), B). No credit need be given

 

[Runner77]

Remember, Bergevin is always an idiot until he does something alright. In that case, he's lucky and it's definitely his entourage that made the decisions for him.

Keeping that frame of mind allows you to A). always appear to be right (the HFboards favourite), B). No credit need be given

News item from this week: Google's CEO Explained Why Googling 'Idiot' Shows Donald Trump

Let's conduct the same exercise for Bergevin.

Google the words "NHL idiot general manager" and go to the images tab.

What is the first image you see?

You guessed it.

Please don't come in here pretending that Bergevin somehow earned the title by osmosis or infer that HF is somehow responsible for the label.

 

[Belial]

News item from this week: Google's CEO Explained Why Googling 'Idiot' Shows Donald Trump

Let's conduct the same exercise for Bergevin.

Google the words "NHL idiot general manager" and go to the images tab.

What is the first image you see?

You guessed it.

Please don't come in here pretending that Bergevin somehow earned the title by osmosis or infer that HF is somehow responsible for the label.

I don't think you actually understood what Pichai said...

 

[Runner77]

I don't think you actually understood what Pichai said...

You're now the arbitrer of what is said and not said.

I must have missed the memo.

 

[Belial]

You're now the arbitrer of what is said and not said.

I must have missed the memo.

More like missing the point. Just saying.

 

[Lshap]

So why then are we hellbent on doing it in a completely opposite manner than what has worked for all of the teams you have mentioned? How many cups have been won in the last 15 years by teams having the philosophy that once you are in anything can happen? I can think of one of the Kings cup runs where I believe they finished 8th in their conference but the team had many good pieces and added Jeff Carter and Mike Richards via trade that year because they had the young assets to do so but I can't think of any others. I really like your post and it proves that even though there are many of us here that want high draft picks(I didn't say the word) it does not make us lesser fans of the team and taking measures to ensure that puts us in a position to be competitive for many years is not a bad thing at all. You see it in every major sport because it is also a cost effective way to build a foundation of talent and depth but instead we have Peca, Agostino and DLO and Chaput etc because we are ignoring logic and trying to get in because anything can happen once you are there.

Maybe last season backed Bergevin into a corner where he had no option left but the smart one. The question is whether he sticks with it. This trade deadline, I'm not expecting him to aggressively sell our top vets for picks -- that's not his style -- but I'll bet he won't trade away any picks or prospects either. Hopefully he's kicked that bad habit. As long as he keeps his focus on youth and doesn't chase a pointless playoff run I'll be good.

But I get why other fans still want to push for the playoffs. First of all, playoffs are fun. Second, if you're watching the games you're going to cheer for a win. Trading Weber or Petry would make the team worse and reduce the enjoyment we'd have during this season. Of course it's more logical to build a better team over longer time, but let's be honest, being a sports fan isn't based around logic.

As my oldest friend always tells me when we debate the same subject: "Don't tell me how to be a fan". He's right. So I let him fall in love with our players and refuse to consider trading any vets, and he lets me drone on about rebuilds and retools and ELC talent.

 

[OldCraig71]

Maybe last season backed Bergevin into a corner where he had no option left but the smart one. The question is whether he sticks with it. This trade deadline, I'm not expecting him to aggressively sell our top vets for picks -- that's not his style -- but I'll bet he won't trade away any picks or prospects either. Hopefully he's kicked that bad habit. As long as he keeps his focus on youth and doesn't chase a pointless playoff run I'll be good.

But I get why other fans still want to push for the playoffs. First of all, playoffs are fun. Second, if you're watching the games you're going to cheer for a win. Trading Weber or Petry would make the team worse and reduce the enjoyment we'd have during this season. Of course it's more logical to build a better team over longer time, but let's be honest, being a sports fan isn't based around logic.

As my oldest friend always tells me when we debate the same subject: "Don't tell me how to be a fan". He's right. So I let him fall in love with our players and refuse to consider trading any vets, and he lets me drone on about rebuilds and retools and ELC talent.

I have no problem with every type of viewpoint being expressed when it comes to the habs, if you want us to rebuild for a few years then that's fine, I have no problem with that. If someone else thinks that this team can win it all then I have no problem with that either because at the end of the day Lshap, what we think or say on a message board means nothing. We are just a random bunch of strangers on the internet arguing about topics or agreeing about them but in reality it all means nothing. What I do believe however is that there should be tolerance for every type of fan.

Your oldest friend can still be your friend regardless of your views and you be his, it should be like that here as well. Cheers.

 

[Lshap]

again what you are asking the owner to do is to potentially forgo years of playoff revenue for the chance of potentially, possibly going further in one specific year provided everything (that he can't control) lines up perfectly to give us some amorphous " increased chance" of winning it all. its a moving target, shoot now and hope fore the best wont work.

We have some good prospects, but it is clear that the time they will take to develop, is completely uncertain. Things happen. We sign KK because we need a center, we trade for domi who was billed from the jump as a winger who has played really well down the middle. There is nothing wrong with having a plan, but having a plan that doesnt account for things which you cannot control makes no sense, especially when this plan is based on player projections. there are no takebacks in trades, you move a guy out and then realise with him back you are better positioned, you screwed yourself.

The best things the habs can do is 1) identify team strengths and weaknesses and try to increase the former and decrease the latter. Shipping out byron and weber NOW because you think that their replacements ( they will have to be replaced) will be ready in X time frame makes the team worse now for some potential gain at some later date. and if it doesnt work, we are bad immediately and bad in the future where we get to ship out a whole nother set of players for the " new plan" that will be implmented in some indeterminate time frame.

What you're describing is precisely what the Leafs attempted to do for years -- patching and fixing and replacing. All in the name of avoiding risk. It got their team nowhere, until the light finally went on and the admin realized they could take a risk and the fans would be fine. Now it's looking like the franchise has the best of both worlds: A young, upcoming possible contender, and an energized fan base.

Montreal had some playoff success, so its standards were somewhat higher than Toronto. But even our modest success became stale. You're worried about foregoing playoff success? Guess what -- the old approach has already done that for us, without even trying.

You and others have described the focus on draft picks as an uncertain/amorphous approach. It's true, it might be. But the most uncertain approach of all is the approach that's proven itself to be a concrete failure, the approach that's made us a lottery team two of the last three seasons, which is the decades-old habit of filling our roster with short-term bandaids. Some of those bandaids were good, but in the end the Habs simply lacked the level of elite talent to get to the SCF, let alone win a Cup. Then those bandaids entered their mid-30s and declined, plus their expensive contracts made it harder to bring in more bandaids. It was an endless and expensive cycle of diminishing returns.

So yeah, some success. But not enough for our market. And, to add insult to injury, lots of abject failure. That's why fans and management find ourselves in an unusual alignment of purpose. We're both sick of losing, we've had enough of the same-old promises and 1st-round playoff losses. We're hungry for something fresh. It's the perfect time to rebuild because fans, management and media want it.

I also think, that this notion of dumping players for some amorphous gains in the future kills team chemisty. Losing is a cancer, and once you get a team ok with losing because you are telling them than someday someone is gonna ride in on their white horse and reverse the teams fortunes, that this is actually PART of the plan, you are screwing the team and killing the players who hate losing to the point where even if they scratch an itch, you have to move them because they threaten your " hope for the best" plan.

Nobody's saying trade everyone. Just trade the guys whose trajectory will be heading downwards. Every team makes trades, why shouldn't we?

But yes, I agree with you that we don't want a losing culture. Luckily, we don't have one. I'm happy with this year's team. But I still believe we need to find a way to grab some better draft picks.

 

[scrubadam]

Show me where I said that MB would trade his first round pick.

Welcome to Marwen.

Never said you said that, did you not notice the question mark?

So what is MB going to do to that is going to fast track this team to the playoffs (that they already in today) and show he doesn't have patience?

I said he will at most trade some middling pieces at TDL you disagreed with me, so what move is he going to do in your opinon that you are disagreeing with me?

 

[scrubadam]

Nobody's saying trade everyone. Just trade the guys whose trajectory will be heading downwards. Every team makes trades, why shouldn't we?

But yes, I agree with you that we don't want a losing culture. Luckily, we don't have one. I'm happy with this year's team. But I still believe we need to find a way to grab some better draft picks.

What players trajectory is heading down? The names I see here are Petry and Weber and neither are showing a downward trajectory and both are signed for multiple more years.

You mention better draft picks, while trading Petry or Weber this TDL is not going to get us a better pick then what we have now because non playoff teams aren't trading for those guys at TDL.

We have nothing to trade at TDL because we don't have any big name UFA's and I think its wiser to hold onto any players and see what opens up during the summer or even next TDL where for all we know we can be back at the bottom again.

 

[sandysan]

Nobody's saying trade everyone. Just trade the guys whose trajectory will be heading downwards. Every team makes trades, why shouldn't we?

But yes, I agree with you that we don't want a losing culture. Luckily, we don't have one. I'm happy with this year's team. But I still believe we need to find a way to grab some better draft picks.

so players that are " on a downward trajectory" but still an asset to the team, you ship them off for something sometime in the future and then you look at the players on the ascendancy and say " sorry boys its gonna get harder right away for possible good times in the future, which you may or may not be here for. But go out there and give it your all. And don't worry about trading assets away now, out plan is to replace with someone sometime in the 3-5 years whenever its convenient."

yeah that's precisely the message we want to give. And it completely ignores the economics of the cap and players with NMC's.

We DID make trades. we sent out 3OA out for a then underperforming winger and send our captain ( and leading scorer) out for prospects and a reclamation winger. We traded our captain when it was clear he no longer fit. In these pie in the sky plans of player development, you keep patches or do you ship him out because the model predicted he would end up a lame duck captain ? If the plan is to keep the teams best scoring winger to match him with a center we develop at some rate, how does that plan work out when he's wearing someone else's jersey ?

 

[Fixxer]

The Habs should wear a 3rd jersey next time Carolina plays in Montreal.

 

[Runner77]

More like missing the point. Just saying.

Nahhhhh. If the GM is already an idiot, he's an idiot. There is no "until".

You're missing the point but I can't be bothered to get into a dissertation about a benign quip.

Moving right along.

 

[Runner77]

I have no problem with every type of viewpoint being expressed when it comes to the habs, if you want us to rebuild for a few years then that's fine, I have no problem with that. If someone else thinks that this team can win it all then I have no problem with that either because at the end of the day Lshap, what we think or say on a message board means nothing. We are just a random bunch of strangers on the internet arguing about topics or agreeing about them but in reality it all means nothing. What I do believe however is that there should be tolerance for every type of fan.

Your oldest friend can still be your friend regardless of your views and you be his, it should be like that here as well. Cheers.

Go Habs Go, old pal. Amirite?

 

[Runner77]

Never said you said that, did you not notice the question mark?

So what is MB going to do to that is going to fast track this team to the playoffs (that they already in today) and show he doesn't have patience?

I said he will at most trade some middling pieces at TDL you disagreed with me, so what move is he going to do in your opinon that you are disagreeing with me?

You're asking rhetorical questions. I don't think he'd trade the farm, it's not what he's done historically at the TDL.

In-season might be another story, maybe a more major piece in exchange for another, to fill a need.

There's a trajectory suggested by the moves of this past summer. It's been younger and faster -- exactly where the league has been trending several seasons before MB noticed that it was. He's also the GM of a big revenue team that has missed the playoffs in two of the last three years. And most felt he was on the hot seat heading into the past summer.

Now that his "reset" is on better path sooner than anticipated, will he be tempted to do more so that his chances at a playoff berth are secured? All I'm saying is, next major trade will tell. He did choose to waive young players who were acquired with early picks rather than sacrifice 4th liners. I don't think that's enough of an indication, even if fourth liners by definition can always be had. Maybe the players that were waived were deemed to be lost causes.

 

[admiralcadillac]

News item from this week: Google's CEO Explained Why Googling 'Idiot' Shows Donald Trump

Let's conduct the same exercise for Bergevin.

Google the words "NHL idiot general manager" and go to the images tab.

What is the first image you see?

You guessed it.

Please don't come in here pretending that Bergevin somehow earned the title by osmosis or infer that HF is somehow responsible for the label.

I think your example would most certainly demonstrate that a rabid fan base is quick to call a guy an idiot. The only reason he'd be searchable on google is precedent, but it's not necessarily indicative of anything objectively. He's unpopular and he's made unpopular moves, doesn't mean they're always bad. He's made dumb moves that's for sure but I'm not willing to say he hasn't done lots of things well.

 

[Lshap]

so players that are " on a downward trajectory" but still an asset to the team, you ship them off for something sometime in the future and then you look at the players on the ascendancy and say " sorry boys its gonna get harder right away for possible good times in the future, which you may or may not be here for. But go out there and give it your all. And don't worry about trading assets away now, out plan is to replace with someone sometime in the 3-5 years whenever its convenient."

yeah that's precisely the message we want to give. And it completely ignores the economics of the cap and players with NMC's.

The message we'd be sending is the exact same message sent by every team that ever traded a veteran: "We're building a contender". There's your message. Of course it doesn't always work out. But every single player in the NHL knows they'll likely be traded at some point under that banner. And every single fan reaches a point of frustration where they need to hear their GM say and do just that. A large chunk of Habs fans have reached that point.

We DID make trades. we sent out 3OA out for a then underperforming winger and send our captain ( and leading scorer) out for prospects and a reclamation winger. We traded our captain when it was clear he no longer fit. In these pie in the sky plans of player development, you keep patches or do you ship him out because the model predicted he would end up a lame duck captain ? If the plan is to keep the teams best scoring winger to match him with a center we develop at some rate, how does that plan work out when he's wearing someone else's jersey ?

You can call it "Pie in the sky". I call it taking the necessary risks to become better. To be clear, I have no wish to lose Petry, Weber or Byron. I love those players. I felt bad when Pacioretty was traded because he was a terrific and loyal player for years. But... I'm at that frustration point mentioned above, where I'm sick of being half-built/almost-good-enough. The previous approach didn't work. We tried and tried and tried... and it didn't work. Time for a change. Is there a guarantee that mining the prospect pool will get us all the way there? Of course not. But when not a single Montreal Canadien is in the top-20 in scoring for decades and there doesn't appear to be a path beyond the 1st or 2nd round, it's time to build our roster the way other contenders have built theirs: Through prospects.

As I said in another post, I get why fans don't want to jettison their favourite players. There's no wrong way to be a fan. But look at how much the Habs have changed in the past six months and ask yourself if you like what you see. If you do, why not continue on this same course and possibly add even more high-end talent?