The 2021 run was fun, but it fucked up our draft ranking. That would have been fine if we'd lucked out and won, but we failed. For me, beating the Leafs and then getting annihilated in the second round would have been just as satisfying as going to the finals and ultimately more useful in the long run as our draft position would improve. But for the most part I didn't want the Habs to make the playoffs in 2021 or the season before because of two things, neither of which had anything to do with the Leafs.
1. they simply didn't win enough to legitimately be a playoff team. They only got in on a Covid technicality.
2. "making" the playoffs those two seasons prevented what should have happened from happening sooner, namely the firing of Bergevin and Timmins.
Those 2 phony playoff runs did nothing other than buy those two imbeciles more time. We could be deeper into a rebuild by now if they had been turfed when they should have been.
And it's not that I want them to keep losing. It's just that I don't want a bit of flukey, unsustainable success to short-circuit the rebuild. I don't want to squeak into a wildcard spot and have the fanbase declaring the rebuild to be over. If they take shortcuts and half ass this we'll never see a legitimate Cup run. I'd rather suck until we are a Cup contender rather than a mere playoff spot contender. Lots of teams make the playoffs but only a handful are actual contenders to win it all. The rest is just fool's gold.
