Perreault, Bjugstad and De Haan

Équipe: 2018-19 Canadiens de Montréal

Date de création initiale: 3 mai 2018

Publié: 4 mai 2018

Mode - plafond salarial: Basique

A variant of a proposal I made earlier.
As much as I’d like to buy into the "burn down the house" line of thought (that'd be fun), I don't see it happening. Here’s why:
- First, a complete rebuild would have to start with trading Price, while his past performance and looming contract have brought his market value to an all time low. MB would be thrown under the bus if he’d pull the trigger on a mediocre deal, while the very reason he’d be doing it is because he failed to improve the team – I don’t see him making such a contrition act. Plus, there would be so many other “win-now” pieces to move (Gallagher, Weber, Pacioretty, Petry), that’d be something like 3 to 5 blockbuster trades. Very unlikely to happen.
- Second, given that non-top-5 first rounders have a 30% chance of blossoming into a top 6F/4D/1G, it'd take a return of like 16 1st rounders equivalent to have a decent shot at replacing the departed 5 players. That’s beyond unrealistic.
- Therefore, I see no choice but patch the holes and hope for the best. After all, winning a championship in modern hockey has a lot to do with puck luck and avoiding injuries...
Now, regarding the patching job:
- My bet is that MTL will miss out on the UFA market. The team is not a proven contender, QC taxes suck, Montreal media is a thing, I mean, why would Tavares, Stastny and Thornton choose MTL over let's say CAR, STL or SJ?
- Adding ROR would be an incredible boost, but if he proves to cost more than Pacioretty and a 2nd, I’d take a bet on Perreault. He’s playing solid hockey (amongst league leaders in WAR/60 over the last 3 years), he's cheap and a local boy. Not a proven 1C, but there’s not much at risk anyway. I'd also go for Bjugstad, since the rumour has it, the team is weak at centre.
- As for the LD, Mete could be thrown in the fire again (his WAR/60 confirms that he did an incredible showing) but I’d use the cap space to ink De Haan as an insurance policy.
But If don't know why I'm writing this, obviously MB is not looking st these posts. Heck, he's perhaps not even paying attention to the works of Emmanuel Perry at Corsica, else he would have figured that inking Alzner was a bad Idea...

1.

2.