I'm rather keeping Xhekaj with the 3rd paring with Savard. He played his best hockey when he is matched with Savard and he is now better right now than Struble in my opinion.

the key to a real riot.

arber is fan favorite to the power of eleventeen

trade arber, it will look like we lost or won the cup downtown montreal

abrer xhekaj is not available at all to your muppets.

find your own.

rempe was a nice try

Here is the order of how I see the Habs viewing their LHD in terms of availability (from most likely available to least likely)

Harris
Struble
Engstrom
Guhle
Xhekaj
Hutson
Matheson

No before everyone freaks out about Xhekaj being ahead of Guhle, hear me out.

Harris, struble and Engstrom are good young D with 2nd pairing ceilings so they are the most expendable in terms of we have too many guys to fill that role. Guhle is a very good young LHD with top pairing potential, the issue is we have Matheson in that role right now and I can see management extending him so that will hinder Guhle's ability to climb to his 1LHD ceiling. Right now Matheson is our best LHD and I don't see Hughes and company trading him or letting him walk in FA. Hutson is our most promising offensive D prospect and likely gets deployed in a 2nd pairing role as soon as 2024-25, so either Guhle flips to the right side, down to 3rd pairing or becomes available for trade. Xhekaj is the perfect 3 LHD, tough as nails, good defensively, can chip in offensively and sticks up for teammates, a generally all round hard to play against guy. Now the argument for moving Guhle to the right side can be made but I think Barron, Savard, Reinbacher, Mailloux and Kovacevic make it difficult to justify having Guhle on his off side next year. Add to that that Konyushkov will be making his way over in 2026 and that just crowds him out there too. I don't want to trade Guhle, he is one of my favorite Habs players right now, I am just saying that I think management is keeping Matheson, Hutson has too much offensive potential to trade, Xhekaj makes more sense on the 3rd pairing than Guhle, so where does that leave him? Here is how I see the Habs D looking in 2024 if Hutson makes the team, you can see how things become muddled up if any RD makes it

Matheson-Guhle
Hutson-Barron
Xhekaj-Savard

I am not a Montreal fan, but if it were me, I would flip Guhle and Matheson.

Harris
Struble
Engstrom
Matheson
Xhekaj
Hutson
Guhle

I would too, but I think Hughes wants to keep both Matheson and Savard long term.

Good to keep a couple vets around

That's why I think Guhle may come into play if Hutson keeps up hid development

I was talking about moving him up front on 2nd or 3rd line :P, I think some of my texte didn't appear, I was saying that it worked with some other big D-men such has Byfuglien and Burns, I'd try it at least

ah, well we got that covered.

see xhekaj, florian