• Moderators, please send me a PM if you are unable to access mod permissions. Thanks, Habsy.

Habs News & Notes: Regular Season 2019-2020

It's not obvious where our superstar will come from. We won't have the #1 pick and free agents like Panarin don't sign in Montreal.

We're trying to win with elite goaltending and outstanding team culture -- good luck.
 
It's a shit core no doubt, we lack top end talent, and the 2 elite players we have are past their prime. Other than that we have one good line and a bunch of players struggling with consistency and trying to find their games, including our better prospects. We have some speed but lack high end skills, size, grit or flair to go with it.
 
GrandWazoo said:
It's a shit core no doubt, we lack top end talent, and the 2 elite players we have are past their prime. Other than that we have one good line and a bunch of players struggling with consistency and trying to find their games, including our better prospects. We have some speed but lack high end skills, size, grit or flair to go with it.
Click to expand...

We all agree it’s a shit core and we are a bubble team

So how do you fix it ?

They refuse to rebuild and stink at drafting and developing

I know Nero wants to compete but we are damned in any situation

Our core vets are looking to get paid in their decline years or are in decline

Our kids are ok but will need 3 years to have any impact on this team

By that time most of our team is done

We absolutely needed a few star type players in the 22-25 range to smooth this transition
 
GEEMAN said:
We all agree it’s a shit core and we are a bubble team

So how do you fix it ?

They refuse to rebuild and stink at drafting and developing

I know Nero wants to compete but we are damned in any situation

Our core vets are looking to get paid in their decline years or are in decline

Our kids are ok but will need 3 years to have any impact on this team

By that time most of our team is done

We absolutely needed a few star type players in the 22-25 range to smooth this transition
Click to expand...
As Waz proposed, think out of the box and leverage the only seeming strength of the org - pro trades probably because it’s MB doing the scouting grunt work..

That would entail trading all draft picks for established NHLers and trading the Petry/Tatar for Pacioretty type deals including NHL ready prospects (Suzuki).

Not sure if outcome succes rate would be > than last 40-years but it’s trailblazing attempt & definitely ntely out is the box thinking
 
Sal_Butera said:
As Waz proposed, think out of the box and leverage the only seeming strength of the org - pro trades probably because it’s MB doing the scouting grunt work..

That would entail trading all draft picks for established NHLers and trading the Petry/Tatar for Pacioretty type deals including NHL ready prospects (Suzuki).

Not sure if outcome succes rate would be > than last 40-years but it’s trailblazing attempt & definitely ntely out is the box thinking
Click to expand...


We need elite talent , trading picks for established players only nets you Domi`s and Drouin`s

We need multiple top 7 lottery picks , plus trading Petry and Tatar
 
GEEMAN said:
We need elite talent , trading picks for established players only nets you Domi`s and Drouin`s

We need multiple top 7 lottery picks , plus trading Petry and Tatar
Click to expand...
Or the ability to roll 4-lines of Domi & Drouin - but the hit rate needs to be near 100%. There’s isn’t always a single be all & end all solution.

Depth of talent is what wins in the NHL, regular season is an arduous marathon and playoffs are always about secondary scoring.
 
Scoring by committee is the way to go for this team. Last cup winner had 7 or 8 20 goal guys iirc.
 
Ideally we fix our drafting. Tanking doesn't work if you can't draft for shit outside of the top 3, like Buffalo and Edmonton (for years) has shown us. But gutting the team with a scouting staff that produced only 1 core player in the past 12 years is quite risky. Given that we sucked at drafting for 45 years, my hopes of fixing the scouting department are pretty low.

I'm not saying that we should forget about drafting completely but maybe being a little bit more aggressive in trading assets might be a good thing for us. Some teams overestimate the value of picks and prospects, maybe there is an opportunity to be had there.

If we had traded our first round pick each year from 2009 to 2015 for an established player, we would have had 6 more established NHL players than we did by drafting them. And I imagine our top 3 pick in 2012 would have fetched a nice return.
 
Sal_Butera said:
Or the ability to roll 4-lines of Domi & Drouin - but the hit rate needs to be near 100%. There’s isn’t always a single be all & end all solution.

Depth of talent is what wins in the NHL, regular season is an arduous marathon and playoffs are always about secondary scoring.
Click to expand...

Rolling 4 lines helps if you have at least 1 elite line like Boston

Their lines 2-4 are like our 1-4 , but that top line carries them all year .

You need perfect health, no slack in production , and 82 games of playing consistent = IMPOSSIBLE

This year a few hiccups derailed our season , without some elite talent your going nowhere
 
I think both models are valuable, either build top heavy around 2-4 players that carries the team and hope no more than one gets injured at the same time, or build a balanced team around 3 solid lines and a solid top 4, with enough depth to fill in to cope with injuries.

Because of the lottery, only some lucky teams can use the first model. The cap makes the second model challenging but more accessible to most teams. You still need some high end talent but are less dependent on truly elite players.

Elite teams like Boston, Tampa, Washington are a mix of both, with Colorado following in those steps.

The Blues is 2nd in the league with David Perron as their leading scorer.

Philly, Vegas, Islanders, Carolina are also trying to build balanced teams.

Then you have the top heavy teams of Toronto, Edmonton, Pittsburgh.
 
GrandWazoo said:
I think both models are valuable, either build top heavy around 2-4 players that carries the team and hope no more than one gets injured at the same time, or build a balanced team around 3 solid lines and a solid top 4, with enough depth to fill in to cope with injuries.

Because of the lottery, only some lucky teams can use the first model. The cap makes the second model challenging but more accessible to most teams. You still need some high end talent but are less dependent on truly elite players.

Elite teams like Boston, Tampa, Washington are a mix of both, with Colorado following in those steps.

The Blues is 2nd in the league with David Perron as their leading scorer.

Philly, Vegas, Islanders, Carolina are also trying to build balanced teams.

Then you have the top heavy teams of Toronto, Edmonton, Pittsburgh.
Click to expand...

I’d argue that Tampa, Washington and Boston are also top heavy....

Stamkos, Kucherov, Hedman, Bergeron, Marchand, Pasternak, Ovechkin, Backstrom....all top scorers in this league at one point or another

And it’s a myth that Pens were not balanced when they won their Cups....when u have guys like Talbot scoring 2 goals in Game 7, or when you have Kessel going from line 2 to line 3, that’s balanced.

Habs have nothing of this
 
Rolex said:
I’d argue that Tampa, Washington and Boston are also top heavy....

Stamkos, Kucherov, Hedman, Bergeron, Marchand, Pasternak, Ovechkin, Backstrom....all top scorers in this league at one point or another

And it’s a myth that Pens were not balanced when they won their Cups....when u have guys like Talbot scoring 2 goals in Game 7, or when you have Kessel going from line 2 to line 3, that’s balanced.

Habs have nothing of this
Click to expand...

That's pretty much what I said, Tampa, Washington and Boston are both. They're heavy on top and balanced, that's why they're elite.

I'm talking about Pittsburgh now, but even at their Cups they were quite top heavy. 3 elite forwards and not much after that, especially the year that Letang was injured.
 
hairnova said:
Click to expand...


DnD.gif
 
GrandWazoo said:
Ideally we fix our drafting. Tanking doesn't work if you can't draft for shit outside of the top 3, like Buffalo and Edmonton (for years) has shown us. But gutting the team with a scouting staff that produced only 1 core player in the past 12 years is quite risky. Given that we sucked at drafting for 45 years, my hopes of fixing the scouting department are pretty low.

I'm not saying that we should forget about drafting completely but maybe being a little bit more aggressive in trading assets might be a good thing for us. Some teams overestimate the value of picks and prospects, maybe there is an opportunity to be had there.

If we had traded our first round pick each year from 2009 to 2015 for an established player, we would have had 6 more established NHL players than we did by drafting them. And I imagine our top 3 pick in 2012 would have fetched a nice return.
Click to expand...

If we’re picking in the top 10 or 12, by all means keep it.

But the Habs should be aggressive/creative with all those picks in the 2nd and 3rd to enrich packages for trades. They really need to bolster the D and get a back up goalie if they intend to compete for a playoff spot next year.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top