You only need one team to do it. Just one. And I have zero doubts at all if the Canadiens wanted to move Petry, there would be plenty of teams interested in acquiring him and they could get a solid return for him without ever having to even consider the notion of retaining salary. He is no way, shape or form over paid.
He's not really overpaid, he might be paid at market value for a UFA of his caliber. I'm not denying or debating that point. It's that if you don't expect to retain on a 30 year old Petry with a 5.5m AAV cap hit- I don't think it's going to be a case where "plenty of teams will be interested in him" if the expectation is a solid return being a 1st+ package.
It seems like we are disagreeing on that notion- which is that, you expect multiple teams to be willing to give up a 1st+ for Petry (retention aside), and my opinion is that the Leafs (really their fans, as the organization has never wavered at any point to move a 1st for a D- when when Hamonic, Vatanen, among others were on the market) might be one of the few teams, if any willing to do that.
I singled out Dallas and Florida as other teams that might, but even that is a stretch. I don't personally believe either team would give up their 1st+ unless they are absolutely positive they are competitive by the TDL and that is not a certainty either (I mean, using Dallas as an example, they are going to need to pony up a ton for Seguin, Radulov, Spezza? and Benn soon and already have Honka, Heiskanen coming up).
As I said before, I felt the same way about the winger market last->this year and it's proven to be true for the most part.
That's all great, and in fact, in this thread I said in order for the Canadiens to retain salary it would require an overpay to "acquire" the retention in the deal. But the offers that were being suggested - with retention - clearly didn't include that overpay which led to my original point - why would the Canadiens eat three years of salary in order to trade Petry for a package that could easily be matched or bettered by a team that wouldn't expect retention.
It doesn't make any sense, which was my point.
Edit: To make my point more clear, this is what I'm disagreeing with. I don't see teams lining up for Petry and "bettering" or "matching" a package of 1st+, retention or not. Just my opinion. I could see it happening, sure, but I'm not convinced either way- even if it's just one team. Which team would do that? Just doing a thought experiment, the only teams I could think of is Dallas and Florida.
And for that to happen, a lot of things have to go right for both teams (i.e. competitive at the TDL), willing to move a 1st+.......and in Florida's case, they would probably have to really dislike Pysyk/Ekblad in their top 4. In Dallas's case, they would have to be comfortable with all the contracts they are handing out + Honka and/or Heiskanen would have to underwhelming enough that they'd lose confidence in them.
It’s not that the value isn’t there. I think 1st + 2nd or decent prospect is definitely close to what he’s worth. The problem relies on the fact that Habs management and most Habs fans believe that they can fight for a playoff spot and be somewhat competitive as soon as 2019-2020 when Poehling and Kotkaniemi will be with the big club.
Once there, these boards will be filled with “top 4 RHD to Montreal” because it will become a blatant needs for us and just like Leafs fans realize right now, it’s almost impossible to acquire one without creating a hole elsewhere. Other team will ask for Drouin, Kotkaniemi, Poehling etc... and we will be wondering all this time why we traded Petry for a late 1st that had just a bit under 50% chance of making it to the NHL.
Again, it’s not that that value isn’t there, it’s just that we are not interested in trading him unless we get a cheaper, younger and more efficient RHD but who’s going to do that? No one... So we just hold on Petry for now and unless/until we have a younger RHD who step up big time and take his place/role from him
Agree with most of everything. I agree with the Bergevin (Habs management) assessment, in fact, I have stated as such multiple times- as I follow the Habs relatively closely.
As for the debate about replacing Petry- yea you probably don't but it's not like we replaced Kessel either when we were certain we wanted to rebuild. Our forward corps in the year we tanked was horrid. Really comes down to the direction the Habs want to go, and that is probably going to be more clear by the TDL either way.
