Playoffs, Draft and lotto format announced - Are you happy with the format for the habs, or no?

[Koivu11]

I’d be ok with it if the Phase 2 draft lottery had weighted odds like in Phase 1. The fact that a team like the Leafs or Pens could lose the play in series and have an equal chance as us to get a top 3 pick is incredibly stupid.

 

[theOutsider]

We are the team that gets the most screwed from a draft lottery odds perspective.
This is counter-balanced by the fact that we are the most undeserving team getting a chance to make the playoffs.
Both scenarios can be neutral at a certain expected Stanley Cup win %-age.
Do you think our Stanley Cup win %-age is above that threshold is the question...

 

[SpeedyPotato]

Yeah they obviously can't announce the winning play-in team in the lottery or else there'd be a risk that this team would loose on purpose. Imagine the habs do win the lottery and they know it, but they still decide to give it all and beat Pittsburgh, forfeiting the pick by doing so, man can you imagine the drama?

 

[sharks9]

I’d be ok with it if the Phase 2 draft lottery had weighted odds like in Phase 1. The fact that a team like the Leafs or Pens could lose the play in series and have an equal chance as us to get a top 3 pick is incredibly stupid.

Exactly! Imagine getting blown out by the Pens, then on top of that the Leafs get to draft Lafreniere? I think I'd have to stop watching for a while

 

[BaseballCoach]

I’d be ok with it if the Phase 2 draft lottery had weighted odds like in Phase 1. The fact that a team like the Leafs or Pens could lose the play in series and have an equal chance as us to get a top 3 pick is incredibly stupid.

On the one hand yes, but there were eight teams that would have been guaranteed a playoff participation in a 16 team draw that now risk losing their spot, so giving them a small consolation prize boost in terms of odds kind of makes sense?!

 

[bobholly39]

If the Habs do well in the playoffs or in the draft, I'll be happy.

If they don't (and another one of the play-in teams win the lotto), I'll be annoyed, I guess.

Overall, I can't be too upset. This season is a huge mess. I don't get why they're dong the lottery before the play-in round is done and not have a second lottery, but whatever.

The draft was slated for June 26th
The lotto will be June 26th

i assume the motivation is purely marketing-wise, do something on that date for TV programming, etc. I expect 99% of fans agree that it's stupid to hold the lottery before the play-ins.

I will say however - for a team like us, having the play-in after the lotto is almost a blessing in disguise. So many fans are all about 'tanking' here. The biggest limitation with tanking is how slim the odds of getting a top pick are. Now - we'll know ahead of time what to expect. It's either going to be:

1. 0% chance at top 3 pick. If that's the case - you may as well root for winning in playoffs
2. 12.5%, 25% or 37.5% chance at a top 3 pick (and specific odds for 1st, 2nd or 3rd overall). Depending on your own criteria - you can decide whether you want team to win, or lose.

 

[Grate n Colorful Oz]

If the Habs do well in the playoffs or in the draft, I'll be happy.

If they don't (and another one of the play-in teams win the lotto), I'll be annoyed, I guess.

Overall, I can't be too upset. This season is a huge mess. I don't get why they're dong the lottery before the play-in round is done and not have a second lottery, but whatever.

My guess is it's a compromise for letting teams like Mtl and Chi get a possible access to the playoffs despite being on the brink of elimination. Those teams get the same chances to get in as better teams, and inversely, these top teams take the risk of not making the playoffs at all, despite being almost guaranteed to get in originally. So, quid pro quo, they get the same odds in phase 2, and is probably why phase 2 exists at all.

 

[hardcorehabs]

Unsure if I’m more upset about this, or the fact that our dumb f*** GM didn’t trade Petry for a 1st + at the deadline.

or the fact that the Habs PR will spin this in some huge positive, discounting the fact that we had not one but two 8 game losing streaks.....

Joke of a team with no direction before and after Covid.

 

[bobholly39]

lol. Why in the world is "no" winning at 87%? You guys are unbelievable. This is best of both worlds:

1. We get into the playoffs. did 87% of you really want this team not to make the playoffs all season long? I know some did - but many fans here were hopeful/wanting to qualify until our season went off the rails with injuries/other issues, and at that point you embraced the high draft pick instead. How is this hail-mary of a 24 team playoff different than if we had gone on a 10 game winning streak/Tor/Fla imploded and we made it anyways?

2. You still keep your lotto odds! The past few weeks have been full of rumors from the NHL of restricting the lotto to "only bottom 3 teams" or "can't go up more then 4 slots". None of those limitations have actually materialized. So we'll have our shot at Lafreniere, and #1, 2 and 3 overall. I get that our % goes down from 6 to 3% - but if we had finished the season, it's very possible we'd have finished 22nd or 21st instead of 24th overall, and that % would have gone down anyways. So I don't think the variance of 3% to 6% is such a huge issue, considering all the rumors we were hearing of us being completely excluded past few weeks.

I feel like Montreal is the team that benefits the absolute most in the league from this system.

 

[JeffreyLFC]

I feel like Montreal is the team that benefits the absolute most in the league from this system.

Not at all. Their odd dipped significantly compared to original lottery odds.
The team that benefits the most from this is the Rangers. Playoff opportunity, increased odds and 2 x 1st round (with increased) odds

 

[bobholly39]

Not at all. Their odd dipped significantly compared to original lottery odds.
The team that benefits the most from this is the Rangers. Playoff opportunity, increased odds and 2 x 1st round (with increased) odds

If you combine the increase in their playoffs odds (0.1% for 16 teams to ~50% if they beat Pittsburgh, or ~30-40% if you account for Pitt being favorites) to the lotto odds - i still say we came out ahead of Rangers overall, no?

 

[bobholly39]

Unsure if I’m more upset about this, or the fact that our dumb f*** GM didn’t trade Petry for a 1st + at the deadline.

or the fact that the Habs PR will spin this in some huge positive, discounting the fact that we had not one but two 8 game losing streaks.....

Joke of a team with no direction before and after Covid.

I'm a very big "anti-tanker" - but it doesn't mean i wasn't pro selling at deadline (i just wanted us to try and win still). And in that regards - what I wanted most of all was unprotected 1st round picks, possibly for Petry or Tatar. I know that the odds of a bubble team like NYI or NYR or such trading a 1st round pick unprotected are super slim of course....but what if we had gone after Pittsburgh's 1st round pick, unprotected? Pitt was 99% in playoffs anyways - so if Habs saw extra trade value in getting them to 'unprotect' their pick, it probably wouldn't have been a huge concession assuming the return for Pitt was good enough (ie Tatar or Petry).

Can you imagine how awesome that would be in this context? We cheer for Habs to win against Pitt at all cost....because we own their pick anyways, and can try and score off their lotto pick assuming the 1-3 picks are going to teams who lose the play-in.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

The NHL gets harder to be a fan of with every passing day.

 

[hardcorehabs]

I'm a very big "anti-tanker" - but it doesn't mean i wasn't pro selling at deadline (i just wanted us to try and win still). And in that regards - what I wanted most of all was unprotected 1st round picks, possibly for Petry or Tatar. I know that the odds of a bubble team like NYI or NYR or such trading a 1st round pick unprotected are super slim of course....but what if we had gone after Pittsburgh's 1st round pick, unprotected? Pitt was 99% in playoffs anyways - so if Habs saw extra trade value in getting them to 'unprotect' their pick, it probably wouldn't have been a huge concession assuming the return for Pitt was good enough (ie Tatar or Petry).

Can you imagine how awesome that would be in this context? We cheer for Habs to win against Pitt at all cost....because we own their pick anyways, and can try and score off their lotto pick assuming the 1-3 picks are going to teams who lose the play-in.

Lol stopped reading here. Cheering for this team to finish in the mediocre range and accepting that mediocrity is what’s killed this team and it’s future.

This team needs to lose and lose bad in the next few short years. Either that or trade our top 5 prospects and go all in with Price/Weber.

But Molson trying to get the $$$ and selling false hope to the saps like yourself.

 

[bobholly39]

Lol stopped reading here. Cheering for this team to finish in the mediocre range and accepting that mediocrity is what’s killed this team and it’s future.

This team needs to lose and lose bad in the next few short years. Either that or trade our top 5 prospects and go all in with Price/Weber.

But Molson trying to get the $$$ and selling false hope to the saps like yourself.

Well - i hate the idea of throwing in the towel, so ill never cheer for my team to lose games. But that's just my personal opinion and not really relevant to the point I was making. I agreed that having more unprotected 1st round picks acquired at TDL this year would have been awesome.

Lastly - Weber and especially Price are a huge problem with tanking. You have to 'suck' as much as Ott/Detroit to tank and really have great odds. With Weber and Price - the worst we'll do is finish about where we are now, 24th, and in a regular year ~6% odds at first overall. Is a 6% chance really worth throwing a full year away? So if you rebuild - lose Price and Weber too, which they won't do. And which is going way off-topic.

 

[WeThreeKings]

Well - i hate the idea of throwing in the towel, so ill never cheer for my team to lose games. But that's just my personal opinion and not really relevant to the point I was making. I agreed that having more unprotected 1st round picks acquired at TDL this year would have been awesome.

Lastly - Weber and especially Price are a huge problem with tanking. You have to 'suck' as much as Ott/Detroit to tank and really have great odds. With Weber and Price - the worst we'll do is finish about where we are now, 24th, and in a regular year ~6% odds at first overall. Is a 6% chance really worth throwing a full year away? So if you rebuild - lose Price and Weber too, which they won't do. And which is going way off-topic.

What you've described is the Montreal Canadiens cycle of mediocrity that has given us 20 years of basically nothing.

 

[26Mats]

Dom from the athletic wrote a piece about this. We had a 19 percent chance of having a top 3 pick, a 6 percent chance of 1oa. Now we have a 6.2 percent chance of having a top 3 pick and a 1.9 percent chance of getting 1oa. Meanwhile out Stanley Cup odds went from 0% to 0.4%.

Those aren't good odds, we lost so much asset advantage.

We're not beating the Penguins.

The only odds that matter are the odds given we lose to the Penguins.

Do you know what our odds are of drafting 1oa and also our odds of drafting top 3, given we lose to the Penguins?

 

[26Mats]

What's happening is just an all too real joke, and damn, let's say we manage to win the Stanley Cup, there will forever be an * beside it.

We better lose in the 1st round, for our own sake, we need that 8th overall pick (or those warped top-3 odds) more than to appease management or those 'superfans' ego, and also perhaps to remind those delusional enough to think that with a 'healthy Price' we have a chance for everything, while we were bottom-10 with a healthy Price, so yeah.

We're not beating the Penguins. Don't even spend a quarter of a second worrying about it.

This whole 24 team playoff thing is to salvage revenue, if it even happens. It's pretty irrelevant to me.

 

[CHfan1]

lol. Why in the world is "no" winning at 87%? You guys are unbelievable. This is best of both worlds:

1. We get into the playoffs. did 87% of you really want this team not to make the playoffs all season long? I know some did - but many fans here were hopeful/wanting to qualify until our season went off the rails with injuries/other issues, and at that point you embraced the high draft pick instead. How is this hail-mary of a 24 team playoff different than if we had gone on a 10 game winning streak/Tor/Fla imploded and we made it anyways?

2. You still keep your lotto odds! The past few weeks have been full of rumors from the NHL of restricting the lotto to "only bottom 3 teams" or "can't go up more then 4 slots". None of those limitations have actually materialized. So we'll have our shot at Lafreniere, and #1, 2 and 3 overall. I get that our % goes down from 6 to 3% - but if we had finished the season, it's very possible we'd have finished 22nd or 21st instead of 24th overall, and that % would have gone down anyways. So I don't think the variance of 3% to 6% is such a huge issue, considering all the rumors we were hearing of us being completely excluded past few weeks.

I feel like Montreal is the team that benefits the absolute most in the league from this system.

All fans here want the Habs to win the Cup. Some just believe their best shot of that isn’t this season. It’s by getting elite talent (that is more often than not found at the top of the draft). It’s building for the future. With this format the Habs chance at a top 3 picks also drops significantly.

This season their path to the Cup is most likely by beating some combination of Pittsburgh, Boston, Tampa, Washington, and Philly, then whoever comes out of the west. That’s a very difficult path for any team, let alone the 24th best team in the league. The conference they play in has 5 of the best 7 teams in the NHL. I just can’t see them making it. But if they win one series they could drop from 8th to 16th in the draft (depending on what happens in the lottery).

And let’s face it this team is not a good team. Their record 5 on 5 is 19-31-21. Their overall record is propped up by being better 3 on 3 (8-8), the shootout 4-1, and loser points. They haven’t won a playoff series since 2015. This team has a long way to go to be good.

 

[peate]

To me it narrows down to two options. Lafrenière or the Cup. Our chances at either are less than slim. So rather than crying about what could have been an 8th pick, and after the first three, they're more inclined to be bust material. I'll go for the cup.

 

[CHwest]

I'll start by saying - YES - i'm very happy for us.

Playoffs is a hail mary. We didn't deserve it - but we're being told "hey - beat this team, and you're in". I know there's a lot of negativity around here usually - but when the rails started falling off the season earlier in the year, if we had been told "hey - if you beat this team, you're in the playoffs" - I know I personally would have taken it. So i'm certainly happy being given a second chance.

Lotto odds - we'll know before the play-ins if #1, 2 or 3 picks are in-play. I'm far from a pro-tanker - but if last season as we were fighting for a playoff spot in the last few weeks of the season, if we had known before season ended that if Habs miss - we win a lotto picks (or - have between a 12.5% to 37.5% chance at once) - that would have been a hell of a consolation prize. And if no lotto picks are won - than screw it, i definitely want to win no matter what. So - I think knowing this beforehand, especially if no lotto picks are won by teams 24-17th - will be a big plus.

Odds of us winning a lotto pick under normal circumstances was 6%. Seems like a super long shot. I like the fact that all teams 24-17ths are being gathered in a pool with a 24.5% chance to win either pick. I think the math translates to giving us a 3% overall chance per pick vs 6% - which is less - but I still feel like i like this 2 round approach better for us. Because with 6% odds, I feel like we'd never win. 12.5% if we make it to round 2 is more promising.

And - as someone who always wants to make the playoffs and argues we'd have a 'puncher's chance' once in - I think the unique circumstances with this season give us some strong consideration for an upset. So i'd love to see us actually win against Pitt and do good - and i'm glad we're being given the chance.

So how does everyone else feel about it?

I feel like MB cheated the reaper.

 

[HabsDood]

So let's say we beat the pens, they get a lottery draft pick, we don't.. Then for some reasons the season ends forever.. We get the Pens' pick?

Is this how it works?

 

[jaffy27]

Unsure if I’m more upset about this, or the fact that our dumb f*** GM didn’t trade Petry for a 1st + at the deadline.

or the fact that the Habs PR will spin this in some huge positive, discounting the fact that we had not one but two 8 game losing streaks.....

Joke of a team with no direction before and after Covid.

Quarantine got a strangle hold on you I see......a bunch of if’s that are being passed as fact......

Petry for a 1st............what a hose job that would be

 

[HabsCowboysOwn]

The format is amazing. I mean what’s not to like? Let’s put our 8th overall pick and lottery odds at stake by playing some worthless games in this complete farce of a tournament to put the cherry on top of what should have been another bottom 10 season for us. I’m absolutely thrilled right now. Also, pulling an upset against Pittsburgh would cement another 5 years of Bergevin’s bullshit at the very least so again, couldn’t be happier!

I’m so proud of my no quit Habs competing for the Corona gimmick cup after the pathetic season they had. They deserve it.

 

[Grate n Colorful Oz]

The format is amazing. I mean what’s not to like? Let’s put our 8th overall pick and lottery odds at stake by playing some worthless games in this complete farce of a tournament to put the cherry on top of what should have been another bottom 10 season for us. I’m absolutely thrilled right now. Also, pulling an upset against Pittsburgh would cement another 5 years of Bergevin’s bullshit at the very least so again, couldn’t be happier!

I’m so proud of my no quit Habs competing for the Corona gimmick cup after the pathetic season they had. They deserve it.

The sarcasm is strong in this one