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Habs Season Thread: Regular Season 2026-27

TheCountofMonteCristo said:
He does have the most wins in Canadiens history
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Only because they play 82 games per season instead of 50. And in any event, that's not the criteria. Price has the most wins in franchise history. Great. He also has the record for most wins by a Habs goalie who never won a Cup.

Hall of Famer + Cup(s) = banner. Anything that is not that gets your picture on the wall above the blues in the 400 level of the Bell Centre. How the hell can you retire Price's number when Steve Shutt's 5 Cups weren't enough to get his #22 retired? What kind of bullshit is that? How can you have a dozen or so retired numbers and all but one of them is a Cup champion?

The bottom line is that retiring jersey numbers is not mandatory so the Habs don't "need" to do anything here. If they never retire another one, guess what? That's okay. It's about achievement, not popularity. Price had a great career but he failed to win the ultimate prize. It's not his fault that he didn't, but it is what it is. No Cup, no banner.

Montreal does not raise banners for non Cup winning teams or non Cup winning players. It's not how this franchise rolls. Let other teams celebrate mediocrity and underachievement. We dont have to.
 
TheCountofMonteCristo said:
Rules change over time (and there is no rule).
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It's a de facto rule and why would you want to change it? Why would you want to lower the bar when you don't need to? People say "Well, if you don't lower the standard there wont be any more retired jerseys", to which I say "Yeah, and? So what?" We already lead the league in retired numbers. At the rate we're going we'll need to issue 3 digit jerseys before too long. We don't NEED to retire anyone's number and if a player doesn't meet the standards set by their predecessors then they don't deserve the honor.

There are other ways to pay homage to former players without retiring their jerseys. Build him a statue outside the Bell Centre if you want but be aware that the plinth on which it stands will contain a lot fewer impressive statistics than the others. Maybe they can use a larger font to make up for the lack of Cups.
 
GEEMAN said:
Ottawa retired Phillips a 4D , as low a bar as you can get
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And that's why the Sens are a fucking joke of a franchise. If we start retiring numbers for players who never won anything we also become a joke. We turn the ultimate honor, an honor reserved only for the creme de la creme of the franchise, into a popularity contest. Like the Hall of Fame, it becomes a case of "he was a good guy, had okay numbers and everyone liked him so Hall of Famer".

Saku Koivu was way more popular than Price. Why not retired his #11 even though he isnt in the HHOF and never won a Cup? After all, it's not his fault he didn't win anything. He played on Whittier teams than Price. He had to play with Andreas Dackell, for fuck sakes.
 
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