State of the Habs

[CANADIENS27]

14 hours ago, Patrick-Kane88 said:

Why are Niemi and Lindgren playing well with the same weak defence that Price had this year?

We know his contract can't be helping.  

 

 

[CANADIENS27]

Last night, the team losing the faceoff battle and getting outshout by a wide margin.  And not being able to hold a late lead.  

 

 

[East_Coast_Juggalo_13]

State of the Habs?  REBUILDING.  So Why not try and move the contracts of Price and Weber at the draft to teams that are desperate to win now?  You might have to sell low but it might be worth it long term. 

[Habs_Hockey_Nutz]

27 minutes ago, East_Coast_Juggalo_13 said:

State of the Habs?  REBUILDING.  So Why not try and move the contracts of Price and Weber at the draft to teams that are desperate to win now?  You might have to sell low but it might be worth it long term. 

You can add Pacioretty and I'm all for it

[East_Coast_Juggalo_13]

23 hours ago, Habs_Hockey_Nutz said:

You can add Pacioretty and I'm all for it

Agreed. MTL has too many holes to fill for a hockey trade to properly facilitate the team's needs.  A rebuild getting multiple futures back for our best pieces is the only thing thaty amkes sense.

[tony5775]

Spring break: Time to give yourself a break. Time to stop (please stop) enumerating the alleged failures of Geoff Molson, Marc Bergevin, Trevor Timmins, Claude Julien, the equipment guys, the marketing staff, the guys who sell beer at the Bell Centre. Time to stop obsessing for MB, 1C, left D and CJ.

Great read at the Gazette by Jack Todd. Everyone on here should read it.

[Habs=stanleycup]

1 hour ago, tony5775 said:

Spring break: Time to give yourself a break. Time to stop (please stop) enumerating the alleged failures of Geoff Molson, Marc Bergevin, Trevor Timmins, Claude Julien, the equipment guys, the marketing staff, the guys who sell beer at the Bell Centre. Time to stop obsessing for MB, 1C, left D and CJ.

Great read at the Gazette by Jack Todd. Everyone on here should read it.

Yup, time to resign ourselves to mediocrity I guess. The reporter who wrote it should not wish to jump off the Jacques Cartier bridge as a result of the fans displeasure over Management and the Ownership. We are Habs fans, we deserve better.

[maas_art]

7 minutes ago, Habs=stanleycup said:

Yup, time to resign ourselves to mediocrity I guess. The reporter who wrote it should not wish to jump off the Jacques Cartier bridge as a result of the fans displeasure over Management and the Ownership. We are Habs fans, we deserve better.

Yeah, i think its fine to be upset with Bergevin, for destroying a promising team and Molson for standing by him.  I do agree that life is too short to get all nuts over a hockey team though.  I think most of us have just severely tempered our hockey-viewing and consumption this year.   

I also think its unfair to criticize players for things out of their control.  Weber gets a lot of heat because he's not Subban.  I hated that deal & everything about it but its not Shea Weber's fault.  He's played to the best of his abilities & remained professional through and through.  Doesnt mean I dont think Bergevin majorly screwed up.


My problem with Bergevin is his complete lack of an end game.   He made some moves at this deadline that may very well end up being good.  I dont think its improbable that Valiev and Reilly will be better than Morrow, Beaulieu and Emelin.   So thats good, right?  But we're talking about #4-6 guys here.  We still have holes in much more important areas that are not addressed, while our core continues to age.  Thats the big problem & there seems to be no urgency to fix it. 

 

[Habs=stanleycup]

52 minutes ago, maas_art said:

My problem with Bergevin is his complete lack of an end game.   He made some moves at this deadline that may very well end up being good.  I dont think its improbable that Valiev and Reilly will be better than Morrow, Beaulieu and Emelin.   So thats good, right?  But we're talking about #4-6 guys here.  We still have holes in much more important areas that are not addressed, while our core continues to age.  Thats the big problem & there seems to be no urgency to fix it. 

 

Yup totally agreed. We are NOT Stanley Cup ready nor will we ever be, unless there is a MAJOR change in Management, Ownership and commitment to the fans, because as it stands now there is NO light at the end of the tunnel. If a rebuild does occur then it needs to happen with a new regime. A total cleanup from top to bottom and a willingness to put politics aside in favor of skill and common sense.

[BigTed3]

Here's the thing... if MB (or his replacement) were to deal Weber for Draisaitl or find a way to turn some combination of Weber, Price, and Pacioretty into a 1st line center and a 1 LHD and/or some young blue chip prospects that could turn into those things, I think you'll see much less dissatisfaction. As it stands right now, fans feel like we turned Subban into a less talented, older player and that we blew our window for a Cup. No one's going to forgive Bergevin for that. But you want to make people forget? You need to go out and open a new Cup window. You need to turn Weber back into an asset or assets that have the potential to become better than what Subban was here. You need to swap aging veterans into guys who can be good-to-great players here long-term. Until that happens, fans will rightly continue to blame Bergevin and Molson for leading us down a path that made us worse and reduced our chances of success. No, we can't change the mistakes that have happened in the past, but we can certainly undo the damage these mistakes caused and improve our chances in the future. Until those things happen, the state of the team remains tied to Bergevin's biggest mistakes, and those remain the biggest talking points.

[jeff33]

9 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

Here's the thing... if MB (or his replacement) were to deal Weber for Draisaitl or find a way to turn some combination of Weber, Price, and Pacioretty into a 1st line center and a 1 LHD and/or some young blue chip prospects that could turn into those things, I think you'll see much less dissatisfaction. As it stands right now, fans feel like we turned Subban into a less talented, older player and that we blew our window for a Cup. No one's going to forgive Bergevin for that. But you want to make people forget? You need to go out and open a new Cup window. You need to turn Weber back into an asset or assets that have the potential to become better than what Subban was here. You need to swap aging veterans into guys who can be good-to-great players here long-term. Until that happens, fans will rightly continue to blame Bergevin and Molson for leading us down a path that made us worse and reduced our chances of success. No, we can't change the mistakes that have happened in the past, but we can certainly undo the damage these mistakes caused and improve our chances in the future. Until those things happen, the state of the team remains tied to Bergevin's biggest mistakes, and those remain the biggest talking points.

exactly right.  Ive commented previously something to the effect of it not being bad enough that subban is a much better player than weber, but that even if they were identical in their production, we still gave away a fan favourite who made people excited about the team, and I dont think thats a point that gets made enough being buried under the mounting empirical data of how bad we blew that trade

There is a reason Jack Todd is even in a cultural climate to be compelled to write such a piece. Why are we collectively reacting this way? Im 35 years old, this is the most discontented the fan base has ever been in my life, no comparison, no debate.

The team is a mess and is devoid of anyone we are excited about. The farm system is a mess with no one coming to be excited about.....but it will allllllllllllllll change if we get a good return on pacioretty.  if we got rid of weber too for something good, this fan base would do a complete 180 and we would all be right back on board.

conversely though, they could really really blow it if we just say oh well it was a bad year, we have a playoff team here, lets try again. 

interesting summer coming

 

[HabsAlways]

18 hours ago, jeff33 said:

nversely though, they could really really blow it if we just say oh well it was a bad year, we have a playoff team here, lets try again. 

interesting summer coming

 

if MB is still here at the draft, that's exactly what Molson decided

[BigTed3]

Craig Button on TSN after last night's game, basically saying the following:

- Habs are not going to be able to make a quick re-build

- They have no defencemen. The ones they have are slow and not good enough and you can't simply go out and find an entire new defence corps at the store.

- They have no center ice players and have been plagued by this problem for a long time. Bergevin's solution was to trade for a winger and try to make him a center and that failed.

- The Habs are too small and don't have enough skill, and their solution seems to be trading Pacioretty, one of the only players with scoring ability.

- They have no "A" level prospects in the system. It's a flawed team, something he says he's pointed out since November, and there is no internal solution to fix the problems, because they have defence, no scoring, and no size.

- The solution comes through Geoff Molson because this team is entirely Marc Bergevin's, with his handprints over everything and it's terrible. So how can he keep this general manager? He adds that if Bergevin stays, he's got a lot of work to do to fix his mistakes and there's no way there will be a turnaround by next October.

***

I agree with a lot of this, in that the defence is awful, the team lacks players of size who can score, and the team has no viable scoring centers. I also agree that Bergevin is the root of the problem and needs to go. We know MB basically re-made the entire roster since he's taken over and replaced his entire D corps (almost twice now) in the past two years. And despite MB patting himself on the back for his work, the results show the team is worse.

Where I'll disagree is this: I do think the team can reset itself very quickly. I just don't think it takes that long to do in the NHL. Yes, they need some luck. They need Poehling to continue to flourish and become a 2C. They need some of their young D men to step up. They need to trade some combination of Pacioretty, Weber, and/or Price to fill other holes. But they do have a number of useful young players (Mete, Juulsen, Gallagher, Galchenyuk, Drouin, Lehkonen, Hudon, Danault, Scherbak, etc.). The problem is most of them play the same role. So it's not that there aren't younger players, it's that they're mainly supporting cast types. It's on the general manager to make trades to swap out the surplus of wingers and slow D men for assets that fill our needs. It's actually pretty obvious to everyone else that this is needed, yet not to Bergevin or Molson, apparently. It's very clear that Bergevin has failed and needs to be terminated and replaced by someone with a better vision and who understands the need for skill over grit and for more than just tinkering to the 4th line.

 

[maas_art]

34 minutes ago, BigTed3 said:

I agree with a lot of this, in that the defence is awful, the team lacks players of size who can score, and the team has no viable scoring centers. I also agree that Bergevin is the root of the problem and needs to go. We know MB basically re-made the entire roster since he's taken over and replaced his entire D corps (almost twice now) in the past two years. And despite MB patting himself on the back for his work, the results show the team is worse.

Where I'll disagree is this: I do think the team can reset itself very quickly. I just don't think it takes that long to do in the NHL. Yes, they need some luck. They need Poehling to continue to flourish and become a 2C. They need some of their young D men to step up. They need to trade some combination of Pacioretty, Weber, and/or Price to fill other holes. But they do have a number of useful young players (Mete, Juulsen, Gallagher, Galchenyuk, Drouin, Lehkonen, Hudon, Danault, Scherbak, etc.). The problem is most of them play the same role. So it's not that there aren't younger players, it's that they're mainly supporting cast types. It's on the general manager to make trades to swap out the surplus of wingers and slow D men for assets that fill our needs. It's actually pretty obvious to everyone else that this is needed, yet not to Bergevin or Molson, apparently. It's very clear that Bergevin has failed and needs to be terminated and replaced by someone with a better vision and who understands the need for skill over grit and for more than just tinkering to the 4th line.

 

Agree on all accounts.

There is a strong nucleus here.   MB has completely messed up this roster but not in a Mike Milbury sort of way.  We didnt give away superstars & get back junk. Most of MB's trades werent horrible in a vacuum, they were horrible in terms of what this team needed.   MB's biggest failings werent the trades he made, they were the trades he didnt make.  Trading away youth for experience but then allowing holes to remain is pure incompetence.  

There's still time to right this ship but a lot of it going to have to do with acting fast to move out players like Weber and maybe Patches & Price and others - while they still have high value - and get back pieces that can finally fill those roster holes.

[BigTed3]

21 minutes ago, maas_art said:

Agree on all accounts.

There is a strong nucleus here.   MB has completely messed up this roster but not in a Mike Milbury sort of way.  We didnt give away superstars & get back junk. Most of MB's trades werent horrible in a vacuum, they were horrible in terms of what this team needed.   MB's biggest failings werent the trades he made, they were the trades he didnt make.  Trading away youth for experience but then allowing holes to remain is pure incompetence.  

There's still time to right this ship but a lot of it going to have to do with acting fast to move out players like Weber and maybe Patches & Price and others - while they still have high value - and get back pieces that can finally fill those roster holes.

To a point, yes, I get what you're saying. A lot of his trades have been adjusting the make-up of the supporting cast, and in that regard, he's had some small wins and some small losses. The problem is that he's failed to address the bigger needs of the team, and he's turned a blind eye to a lot of the problems (not just the lack of top 6 centers and puck-moving D men, but also to his coaching staff at both the NHL and AHL levels). But I would also argue that his biggest failing was the Subban trade, and so on the rare occasion where he has tried to make a bigger move, the results have been awful. Subban for Weber was an easy-to-predict downgrade in terms of on-ice talent and in terms of getting the older player on a worse contract. The other big move of Sergachev (+/- a 2nd rounder at the time) for Drouin was in isolation a decent move IF Drouin filled the need for a 1C. That clearly hasn't been the case, and so if Bergevin's assessment at the time of the trade was that they could use Drouin as a 1C, then the trade is also a loss. So yes, I agree that he could have rectified the situation with deals he has failed to make, but I'd also argue that the most important trades Bergevin has made have been failures as well. I think it's clear this team would be better off with Subban and Sergachev in tow rather than Weber and Drouin.

So sure, people can credit MB for finding Byron and Deslauriers and Danault, but for every minor trade he's won, he's also lost deals in acquiring the likes of King, Ott, Benn, Schlemko, Scott, Martinsen, etc. And people forget those trades because we don't count the losses of Andrighetto and Pateryn and Beaulieu and mid-round draft picks as being major in the big picture of things, but there have been just as many bad deals as good ones, even on a minor level. Then throw in the loss of free agents like Markov and Radulov and the failure to move certain players like Plekanec and Price and Weber when their values were higher and their contracts not as large (and we'll see whether he misses the boat on moving Pacioretty too). And add on the constant lying to the fans and the media, and the broken "promises" he's given UFA's like Sekac and Jerabek whereby these players choose to come here among multiple suitors and then get dispatched of before their first season is done, and we wonder why this kind of mistreatment along with the high taxes and the hounding media discourage players from coming here. Simply put, Bergevin has done a lot of things wrong, and Button is spot on when he's pointed these out.

[maas_art]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

To a point, yes, I get what you're saying. A lot of his trades have been adjusting the make-up of the supporting cast, and in that regard, he's had some small wins and some small losses. The problem is that he's failed to address the bigger needs of the team, and he's turned a blind eye to a lot of the problems (not just the lack of top 6 centers and puck-moving D men, but also to his coaching staff at both the NHL and AHL levels). But I would also argue that his biggest failing was the Subban trade, and so on the rare occasion where he has tried to make a bigger move, the results have been awful. Subban for Weber was an easy-to-predict downgrade in terms of on-ice talent and in terms of getting the older player on a worse contract. The other big move of Sergachev (+/- a 2nd rounder at the time) for Drouin was in isolation a decent move IF Drouin filled the need for a 1C. That clearly hasn't been the case, and so if Bergevin's assessment at the time of the trade was that they could use Drouin as a 1C, then the trade is also a loss. So yes, I agree that he could have rectified the situation with deals he has failed to make, but I'd also argue that the most important trades Bergevin has made have been failures as well. I think it's clear this team would be better off with Subban and Sergachev in tow rather than Weber and Drouin.

So sure, people can credit MB for finding Byron and Deslauriers and Danault, but for every minor trade he's won, he's also lost deals in acquiring the likes of King, Ott, Benn, Schlemko, Scott, Martinsen, etc. And people forget those trades because we don't count the losses of Andrighetto and Pateryn and Beaulieu and mid-round draft picks as being major in the big picture of things, but there have been just as many bad deals as good ones, even on a minor level. Then throw in the loss of free agents like Markov and Radulov and the failure to move certain players like Plekanec and Price and Weber when their values were higher and their contracts not as large (and we'll see whether he misses the boat on moving Pacioretty too). And add on the constant lying to the fans and the media, and the broken "promises" he's given UFA's like Sekac and Jerabek whereby these players choose to come here among multiple suitors and then get dispatched of before their first season is done, and we wonder why this kind of mistreatment along with the high taxes and the hounding media discourage players from coming here. Simply put, Bergevin has done a lot of things wrong, and Button is spot on when he's pointed these out.

I agree, I just think it goes back to his lack of an endgame.   People always talk about Iginla for Niewendyk as the classic deadline deal (although it was several months before the deadline) trade: The Stars gave up an elite prospect for an ageing star.  Everyone knew that Calgary should win the trade in the long run but without Neiwendyk, Dallas probably doesnt win the cup. Was it worth giving up a generational goal-scoring talent for one cup? Maybe. But either way you can at least understand why the did it.  The same cannot be said for many of MB's moves. 

If we were so hell-bent on having to move Subban and MB felt like Weber was the answer, then you make more moves. You find a way to get a #1 centre (even if its an older guy like Joe Thornton at the time)  and you find guys to shore up the other holes in the roster.   What you do not do is trade a young elite defensman for a much older (probably no longer) elite defensman that plays the same position (without even an extra pick or top prospect coming back too).  At least if Weber was a LD you could have argued  Weber-Petry was a true first pairing or something.  

In no way am i supporting MB.  I think he's been horrible (Graeme made an interesting observation that it all seemed to come unravelled after the carey price injury a few years ago) prior to that he was ok but he's been abysmal since then.  That said, at least we're not left with a train-wreck like when Houle was finally let go.   It is imperative that we fix this NOW - this summer - and we cannot allow Marc Bergevin to be the one in charge of things. 

[BigTed3]

30 minutes ago, maas_art said:

I agree, I just think it goes back to his lack of an endgame.   People always talk about Iginla for Niewendyk as the classic deadline deal (although it was several months before the deadline) trade: The Stars gave up an elite prospect for an ageing star.  Everyone knew that Calgary should win the trade in the long run but without Neiwendyk, Dallas probably doesnt win the cup. Was it worth giving up a generational goal-scoring talent for one cup? Maybe. But either way you can at least understand why the did it.  The same cannot be said for many of MB's moves. 

If we were so hell-bent on having to move Subban and MB felt like Weber was the answer, then you make more moves. You find a way to get a #1 centre (even if its an older guy like Joe Thornton at the time)  and you find guys to shore up the other holes in the roster.   What you do not do is trade a young elite defensman for a much older (probably no longer) elite defensman that plays the same position (without even an extra pick or top prospect coming back too).  At least if Weber was a LD you could have argued  Weber-Petry was a true first pairing or something.  

In no way am i supporting MB.  I think he's been horrible (Graeme made an interesting observation that it all seemed to come unravelled after the carey price injury a few years ago) prior to that he was ok but he's been abysmal since then.  That said, at least we're not left with a train-wreck like when Houle was finally let go.   It is imperative that we fix this NOW - this summer - and we cannot allow Marc Bergevin to be the one in charge of things. 

Couple of points on this, and I think we're on the same page here...

- You go all in if you're close to a Cup. But the Subban-Weber deal didn't bring us closer, it brought us farther away in the short-term and much farther away in the long-term. The only argument was "team chemistry" and that clearly has been proven false. Subban appears to be a great and well-liked teammates in Nashville, and the team has had success there. So it appears the issue was with MT/MB, not PK.

- The Carey injury did derail the thinking somewhat, but I'd argue before that, MB just simply didn't make any significant gambles. So I think we simply saw his mindset come to fruition more than anything else.

[CANADIENS27]

Last night, the team forgot about the first period.  

 

 

[maas_art]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

Couple of points on this, and I think we're on the same page here...

- You go all in if you're close to a Cup. But the Subban-Weber deal didn't bring us closer, it brought us farther away in the short-term and much farther away in the long-term. The only argument was "team chemistry" and that clearly has been proven false. Subban appears to be a great and well-liked teammates in Nashville, and the team has had success there. So it appears the issue was with MT/MB, not PK.

Wholeheartedly agree.  We already have discussed (at length) how if we absolutely positively HAD to trade subban (ie, everyone actually did hate him - which i dont believe) etc etc - then at least you have to bring back a better return.  And I agree that Weber vs Subban doesnt get you closer to a cup.   Maybe some pacakge of vets - like say, Weber + Neal + Fisher could have been argued as an "all in" move because then you're filling multiple holes and giving up a bit of age to do so. But 1 for 1? It was abysmal.  The fact that we know now that both Vancouver and Edmonton offered packages of good young players makes it even harder to swallow. 

Quote

- The Carey injury did derail the thinking somewhat, but I'd argue before that, MB just simply didn't make any significant gambles. So I think we simply saw his mindset come to fruition more than anything else.

You might be right.  I think that what we've seen with MB is that he's reactionary.  We lose to Ottawa (and Eller gets absolutely destroyed on a freak play) and we must not be big enough so we trade for big slow guys.   Price gets injured and we collapse so we need more 'character.'      A good GM needs to figure out his plan and stick with hit, not make kneejerk reactions and about-faces each time something goes a little awry.  

[Regis22]

http://torontosun.com/sports/hockey/nhl/crosby-still-better-than-mcdavid-nhl-players/wcm/37de1502-d0de-4bb4-a415-eb45cc18ed77

CP voted most difficult goalie to score on by 41 % of players

 

[Windoe]

7 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

Couple of points on this, and I think we're on the same page here...

- You go all in if you're close to a Cup. But the Subban-Weber deal didn't bring us closer, it brought us farther away in the short-term and much farther away in the long-term. The only argument was "team chemistry" and that clearly has been proven false. Subban appears to be a great and well-liked teammates in Nashville, and the team has had success there. So it appears the issue was with MT/MB, not PK.

- The Carey injury did derail the thinking somewhat, but I'd argue before that, MB just simply didn't make any significant gambles. So I think we simply saw his mindset come to fruition more than anything else.

Agree on all the major points of the last couple of posts of BT3 and maas_art. Disagree on the minor point that Subban appears to be liked in Nashville by his new teammates therefore he must have been liked by his teammates in Montreal.      

Agree with all of Craig Button's points except that this can't be a quick rebuild, it sure can be (I'd say 2-3 years qualifies as a quick rebuild).

[BigTed3]

9 hours ago, Windoe said:

Agree on all the major points of the last couple of posts of BT3 and maas_art. Disagree on the minor point that Subban appears to be liked in Nashville by his new teammates therefore he must have been liked by his teammates in Montreal.      

Agree with all of Craig Button's points except that this can't be a quick rebuild, it sure can be (I'd say 2-3 years qualifies as a quick rebuild).

Wasn't saying that Subban had to have been liked by all his teammates here, simply that he appears to be well-liked by his teammates (and the organization as a whole) in Nashville. As such, it suggests that it wasn't just a problem with Subban. It's not that he's a cancer in the room, and it's also very clear that Subban's presence doesn't prevent you from winning. We reached the ECF with Subban here, something Weber hasn't been able to do, and the Preds reached the Cup finals, something Weber wasn't able to do either. I've also used Phil Kessel as an example of this before: vilified as a locker room cancer in Toronto and then goes on to help the Pens to multiple Cups.

The point is not that everyone like or dislikes a certain player, that wasn't what I was saying. I was simply saying that the problem is this situation lies with MT and MB. Clearly, Nashville has been able to make it work with Subban. Clearly, some of Subban's teammates liked him here and some didn't. A good coach and GM would have found a way to unify the team, and the Nashville situation simply proves that was possible to do. Instead, MT and MB exacerbated the problem by pointing out all of Subban's flaws and making him out to be selfish and egotistical. We know MT disliked Subban before he even coached him, and it was very clear that MT and MB wanted to make Subban the bad guy and it certainly appears that they wanted to create a rift between Subban and his teammates, or at least didn't do anything to try and stop it. So yeah, you find a coach and GM who weren't so driven by their own personal agenda of hate and the situation is probably better-handled and Subban is probably still a Hab. So I absolutely blame MT and MB for mucking up the play here. Don't think I will ever forgive them for this.

[southernhabfan]

51 minutes ago, BigTed3 said:

Wasn't saying that Subban had to have been liked by all his teammates here, simply that he appears to be well-liked by his teammates (and the organization as a whole) in Nashville. As such, it suggests that it wasn't just a problem with Subban. It's not that he's a cancer in the room, and it's also very clear that Subban's presence doesn't prevent you from winning. We reached the ECF with Subban here, something Weber hasn't been able to do, and the Preds reached the Cup finals, something Weber wasn't able to do either. I've also used Phil Kessel as an example of this before: vilified as a locker room cancer in Toronto and then goes on to help the Pens to multiple Cups.

The point is not that everyone like or dislikes a certain player, that wasn't what I was saying. I was simply saying that the problem is this situation lies with MT and MB. Clearly, Nashville has been able to make it work with Subban. Clearly, some of Subban's teammates liked him here and some didn't. A good coach and GM would have found a way to unify the team, and the Nashville situation simply proves that was possible to do. Instead, MT and MB exacerbated the problem by pointing out all of Subban's flaws and making him out to be selfish and egotistical. We know MT disliked Subban before he even coached him, and it was very clear that MT and MB wanted to make Subban the bad guy and it certainly appears that they wanted to create a rift between Subban and his teammates, or at least didn't do anything to try and stop it. So yeah, you find a coach and GM who weren't so driven by their own personal agenda of hate and the situation is probably better-handled and Subban is probably still a Hab. So I absolutely blame MT and MB for mucking up the play here. Don't think I will ever forgive them for this.

Amen. I agree..I have watched several games of Nashville (they are out about 3-4 hours form us) this year. Sub is love there you can tell and has been playing well. I too blame MT and MB...NOTE: I have been out of the loop here on this forum...I got rid of my Directv and thus also lost my NHL Center Ice...miss watching the Habs...even though they are losing...sigh. 

[maas_art]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

The point is not that everyone like or dislikes a certain player, that wasn't what I was saying. I was simply saying that the problem is this situation lies with MT and MB. Clearly, Nashville has been able to make it work with Subban. Clearly, some of Subban's teammates liked him here and some didn't. A good coach and GM would have found a way to unify the team, and the Nashville situation simply proves that was possible to do.

This to the 1000000X degree.

Subban is pretty close to a generational talent. He's easily the best defensman we had since Chelios (another polarizing player) and probably one of the top 10 most talented dmen ever to play for this storied franchise.  So he rubs some teammates the wrong way - and what do we do?  We vilify him and make matter worse to the point that the only real option is trading him away. 

The correct course of action would have been to privately talk to him and publicly praise him.  This does two things: it shows his teammates you support everyone (not just the quiet guys) and, if you end up having to trade him anyway, it keeps his value high enough that you dont have to settle for a former elite defenseman in decline. 

Instead we publicly berate him and downplay his accomplishments thus driving more of a rift between him and other players AND making his value in a trade much lower than it should have been. 

[BigTed3]

Here's a video from Geoff Molson... very very disappointing and shows very little insight if he's telling the truth.

https://www.nhl.com/canadiens/news/like-a-boss-13-geoff-molson-answers-fan-questions/c-296683020

In it, GM states that he thinks the Habs just had a bad year, and that they plan to double down getting speed, youth, and character. He adds that the team has a great nucleus that will rebound. Worst of all, he states that he believes Marc Bergevin will have the team ready to go in September.

Doesn't sound like GM has any plans to fire Bergevin. If the Habs are going to go with "it was a bad year" and "we have the right nucleus in place" and "our GM is capable of turning this around" then it shows no hope for the future. We have people in charge here who clearly have no idea what they're doing. MT and MB have blown a great window for a Cup and now we're doomed to suffer through what, another 5 years of mediocrity before anyone takes any action? I'm somewhere between frustrated, angry, and simply fed up of following this team. It's one pathetic excuse after another.