Author Archives: Kyle Roussel

About Kyle Roussel

Born and raised in Montreal, I have unhealthy obsessions with sports, Star Wars (the originals, of course) and my wife's cooking. Follow me at twitter.com/kyleroussel

If Only They Had a Powerplay…

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Yeah, we know. The Canadiens powerplay sucks. Not so much lately, as the Minnesota Wild might attest, but overall, the powerplay has been an embarrassment, right?

While it’s a sad sight to see a team with the man advantage move the puck from one hopeless spot on the ice to the next, might I suggest that we’ve been overreacting to the importance of the powerplay?

When all is said and done, and this dreadful season becomes a thing of the past, fans and media are going to dissect where everything went wrong for the Canadiens. Most, if not all are going to blame injuries and the powerplay for the Canadiens’ dreadful season. I won’t touch the injury excuse, but using the powerplay as a crutch to explain the poor season is a myth, and something that needs to be purged.

The Canadiens currently have 35 powerplay goals in 243 opportunities for a success rate of 14.4%, good for 28th in the NHL (WE’RE NOT THE WORST!).

I’ve heard people say “if the Habs had just an average powerplay, the season would have gone differently”.

Oh yeah?

If the Canadiens had a league-average powerplay, which currently sits at a middling 17.1%, the Canadiens would have just 41 goals in their same 243 opportunities. That’s a total of 6 more goals on the year. SIX! What does an additional 6 goals fix? Impossible to say, but the likely answer is nothing. If anything, it takes the Habs from being a team set to pick in the top-3 in the league, to a team set to pick in the top 4.

If we take it to the extreme and grant the Canadiens a 21.8% success rate on the powerplay – which would make them league leaders (Oilers lead at 21.7%), they would have an additional 18 goals on the year based on 243 opportunities. What does 18 more goals on the year fix? Again, impossible to say, but it still likely doesn’t make the Canadiens a playoff team given the number of games they’ve lost by 2 or more goals (including times they were shutout). We can’t assume that those 18 additional goals all translate to points in the standings. Some goals would have been scored during games where the Canadiens were already blowing out a team, (i.e. maybe they beat the Jets 8-3 instead of 7-3 – Eller’s penalty shot goal notwithstanding). Some powerplay goals would have been scored in some the many games in which they were being blown out, or shutout. Undoubtedly an extra 18 powerplay goals would lift the Canadiens from the Conference basement, but keep in mind that I took this example to the extreme. It’s unrealistic and absurd to bestow a league-best powerplay on them. Even Andrei Markov couldn’t make this powerplay jump from 28th to 1st.

We’ve been spoiled by the Habs powerplay. Since the lockout, the Habs powerplay has been ranked 5th, 1st, 1st, 13th, 2nd, 7th, 28th (this year). Given this data, people naturally make the assumption that a poor powerplay = disaster.

If this is you, then you’ll love this part. While people from all walks of life tell us how important the powerplay is (I’m not here to say it is unimportant – as my friend @HabsWatch says – “weak even strength play and a strong powerplay is like going to a restaurant where the main course sucks, but dessert is good.”), the harsh reality is that if your game plan is based on powerplay success, you’re doomed. Why? Try this on for size: when the lockout ended, the league promised a crackdown on obstruction, fighting and other infractions in an attempt to clean up the sport and generate more offense. As a result, the average team during the 2005-06 season had 480 powerplay opportunities (5.85 chances per game). In the years since, that number has dropped precipitously to the point where the average team this year is expected to benefit from a total of just 277 powerplay opportunities (3.38 chances per game). I’ll let that sink in for a moment. And for the the visual learners out there, I give you this:

All good? Good. In 7 seasons, teams have had 203 powerplay chances taken away, or 2.48 chances less per game. All told, that’s a drop of 42% in powerplay opportunities. Try cutting your salary by 42% over 7 years and tell me if your bread is still being buttered.

It should also be noted that this season is not an aberration. You’ll notice the constant downward trend in powerplay chances. They have dropped in every single season since the lockout ended. Whether players are adjusting, or if the refs are more relaxed in their standards is irrelevant to this discussion. So if the powerplay is declining in importance, it must mean that even strength play is paramount.

Coming out of the lockout, the Habs decided to focus their energy and gameplan on powerplay success and goaltending, especially so during the Gainey-Gauthier-Martin retooling era that brought in small, skilled players that were totally inadequate for even strength hockey. What the Habs did not recognize is that the powerplay was already declining in importance at a rapid rate. Why they built the Habs to succeed in a style that was quickly going the way of the dodo bird is beyond me.

“If the Habs had just an average powerplay, the season would have gone differently”.

No, it wouldn’t have. This statement may have been true between 2005-2008, but the sad truth is teams nowadays do not receive enough powerplay chances to score enough goals to make a huge difference.

I don’t expect everyone to believe me, as changing beliefs is often painful, and it’s more comfy in the cocoon of familiarity.

Questions or comments are welcome. Thanks for reading!

Le Grand Amour de Nos Amours

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This site may be a blip on the sports blog landscape, especially when it comes to the Habs. So when friend and reader Paul Branchaud asked to share his memories of Gary Carter posted for all Expos fans to read, I was honoured and happily obliged. Paul’s stirring homage to the hall of fame catcher is certainly one of the most heartfelt and honest tributes you’ll ever come across. Please have a read, and let Paul know your thoughts by leaving a comment below, contacting him via twitter (which you should have done already anyway), or connecting with him on facebook.

Thanks, Kyle.

 

It was a little after 5pm, February 16, 2012, I was steps away from my home as I returned from work when my cell phone buzzed, informing me of an incoming text message. The TSN text alert read: “Former Montreal Expo and Baseball Hall of Famer Gary Carter has passed away at the age of 57.” It stopped me in my tracks.

Not so much because I was surprised. Anyone who has seen the devastation that cancer can do to an individual and their family is never truly surprised when they learn that cancer has claimed another victim. In fact, the January news that new tumours had been found on Carter’s brain was (to me, at least) unspoken code that Gary’s time on this mortal coil was drawing to a close.

When I read the text, my reaction was a mixture of obvious sadness and a bit of surprise. Surprise, because, even though I consider myself well acquainted with the speed with which cancer can claim a life, there was a part of me that held out hope that Gary Carter, of all people, would be able to beat his cancer. Picking it off like so many opposing teams’ failed attempts to steal second base. That hope was fed by the young boy inside me who can make the old exterior set aside the cynicism and look at the world of sport with wide-eyed amazement.

My sadness at the news that Gary Carter was no longer with us was different, however. There was something about this death that affected me deeper than any other professional athlete’s passing previously. I’d never met Gary Carter, yet I felt as if I’d known him for most of my life.

Gary’s smile, his obvious joie de vivre and kind demeanour were intoxicating, you couldn’t help but feel a little happier on the inside when you saw how he conducted himself on and off the field. From all accounts, it was genuine, never a put on. Carter’s love of the game and the fans stood out.

Some teammates resented his popularity and the attention he received from the media, but Carter reaped what he sowed: he gave of himself to the game and the fans and he was rewarded with a Hall of Fame career and a city that adored him.

I went to my first Expos game on a weekend afternoon in 1974 against the San Francisco Giants. It was Carter’s rookie year. I have few memories of that afternoon; I don’t remember if he played in that game, but I did return home with a poster of Carter making a running catch in the outfield, wearing his batting helmet. It stayed on my bedroom wall for close to 15 years.

It wasn’t until Carter moved behind the plate full-time and the Expos moved into the Olympic stadium that my infatuation with the Expos and Carter got into high gear. I went fairly regularly to games as the Expos developed into a contender. I remember going to the first Pearson Cup pitting expansion Canadian MLB cousins, the Toronto Blue Jays against Nos Amours.

As a young baseball fan, I knew the Expos had a good team. The roster contained names like Scott, Cromartie, Valentine, Speir, Parrish, Rogers, Lee, Fryman, and Carter. The Kid’s star rose along with the team’s popularity. With all the talent on the field, I’d always focus my attention to the guy behind the plate, and how he controlled what opposing hitters could do.

Carter was easily my favourite Expos player. Looking back on my youth, I can identify 3 professional athletes I looked up to and admired: Bernie Parent, Ken Dryden, and Gary Carter. Two hockey goalies and a baseball catcher. It must have been the extra gear they wore compared to their teammates that drew my attention long enough to appreciate their incredible athletic talent.

As much as I admired Parent and Dryden, I idolized Gary Carter. I spent hundreds of hours in the basement, swinging at imaginary pitches while wearing my plastic batter’s helmet (on which I had painted a number 8). I wasn’t dreaming of me being at the plate one day and stroking the game-winning homer, I was Gary Carter, down in the count 0-2 with 2 out in the bottom of the 9th. Game 7 of the World Series. I don’t need to tell you how that fantasy would always end.

Despite baseball being a team sport, where different people get their time to shine, Carter was the face of the Expos. His smile and good humour perfectly fit the city of Montreal, and his ease with the fans and their requests for autographs and pictures were crucial in the team’s emergence through the late 70s, when capacity crowds in the Big O were the rule rather than the exception.

When Carter was traded to the Mets in 1984, I was sad. I felt as if the Expos, by trading The Kid, had betrayed the fans, ignoring how important he was to the team in general and the city as a whole. It felt as if the Expos didn’t care about the players that the public adored. I was old enough to understand it was economics, but it didn’t diminish the pain. When Wayne Gretzky was traded to the Los Angeles Kings in 1989, I could totally sympathise with the emotions Edmonton Oilers fans were feeling. I knew their pain.

When Carter and the Mets won the World Series in 1986, I was happy for Carter but was rooting for the Red Sox (an affliction I have since cured myself of). He may not have been an Expo, but The Kid deserved a championship, and I was genuinely happy for him when he got his ring.

I sometimes wonder if Montreal baseball fans fully appreciated that Carter bookended his remarkable career by wearing an Expos jersey. All I have to do is re-watch his final career hit, a game-winning RBI double, and the crowd’s reaction in an otherwise meaningless game, and my concerns evaporate. The added beauty of that final hit was that Carter appreciated the crowd’s reaction and how beloved he was in this city.

The only time I ever felt any kind of anger or frustration with Carter was when he lobbied to go into Cooperstown as a New York Met. Baseball got it right, even if Gary disagreed. The pinnacle of his career may have come in New York, but his lasting legacy on the game of baseball was with the first non-American major league team.

I was happy to learn that the Canadiens would honour the memory of Gary Carter prior to their game against the Devils on February 19. They had done a good job of keeping the Expos’ flame burning since the team left after the 2004 season. I’d been to other Habs games where the team observed the passing of a significant personality, so I expected that they’d do a good job.

This was also going to be my youngest son’s first professional hockey game. He was enjoying our pre-game dinner at the restaurant, telling me, between mouthfuls of complimentary popcorn, that he didn’t mind if we were late for the start of the game. I had to explain to him that it was important for ME to be there before the start, because the Canadiens would honour Gary Carter, and he was my favourite athlete when I was young. Shoving a few more handfuls of popcorn into his mouth, he accepted that it was time to head for our seats.

We caught the very end of warm-up, with the Canadiens all wearing Carter 8 jerseys. Before the ceremony started, I thought back to all the games I had seen Carter play in, I felt sympathy for his family who’d seen him suffer, I felt sadness that he never got to manage a team in the majors, but most of all, I thought back to that poster on my bedroom wall and how much I wanted to be Gary Carter.

As the ceremony started, I felt more sadness than I had since I first learned the news of Carter’s death. I managed to keep my emotions mostly in check throughout all the images, videos, and strains of The Eagles’ “New Kid in Town”. That is until Youppi came out in an Expos jersey. That’s when I completely lost it.

I couldn’t control the tears or keep the sadness in check any more. My childhood idol had died, and with him went the face of Nos Amours. The pain and sadness of his death doubled for me in that moment, because without Gary Carter, the death of the Expos was now irrevocable.

Les Expos, Nos Amours. Gary Carter, Le Grand Amour de Nos Amours. Godspeed, Gary. Thank you for a lifetime of wonderful memories.

It’s Your Fault

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If there’s one topic and player that has been flogged harder than Scott Gomez in the past 2 seasons, it has to be Andrei Kostitsyn.

Since being drafted 10th overall at the 2003 draft, he has consistently done one thing: fail to live up to expectations.

Guess what? It’s your fault.

He’s been assigned labels like “heartless”, “lazy”, “inconsistent”, “soft” and “replaceable”. Seriously, guys?

I guess you’ve been duped in to thinking that 20 goal / 100 hit guys grow on trees, or that Kostitsyn is somehow overpaid for what he brings. “Heartless” and “lazy” are off-base monikers that are totally subjective, and I suspect more often than not are derogatory adjectives given to Eastern European players by “lazy” fans and media who can’t be bothered to actually “do the research” before passing judgement on him.

Inconsistent
Let’s tackle this one: Since 2007-08, Kostitsyn’s points-per-game average has been: .68ppg (07-08), .55ppg (08-09), .56ppg (09-10), .55ppg (10-11), .51ppg (11-12). While this year represents a low, we should also note that he is no longer getting prime ice time, and rarely gets power play time (1:48 of powerplay time per game, 8th on the team). If Kostitsyn plays 70 games, he scores 20 goals and will throw 100 hits on a team that has been forever labeled small and weak. Talk about shouldering the burden.

Soft
Another misnomer for AK46. Over the course of the past 5 seasons, Kostitsyn has ranked no lower than 5th among forwards in terms of hits thrown, and anyone watching knows that Andrei Kostitsyn can throw his weight around as well as anyone. In fact, Kostitsyn led the team in hits last season with 140, and was 3rd in 09-10 despite missing 20+ games. This season, AK46 is second in hits behind Erik Cole with 75 hits in 47 games. Kostitsyn has played 10 fewer games than Cole, who will not keep up this year’s pace as he ages.

Replaceable
Habs fans have been clamoring for Kostitsyn’s ouster from Montreal for years now, mostly because he hasn’t pleased those who think he’s a 35 goal man with a 20 goal man’s drive. With the NHL average salary about to creep closer to 3 million dollars, I’d hate to think that there are people out there dumb enough to think that his 3.25 million dollar salary is some kind of overpayment for his services. I defy you to find another player on the open market that is a lock for 20 goals, 40pts and 100 hits for what will be slightly more than the league average next season. If the Habs look to replace his production and presence on the free agent market, they’ll have to badly overpay in terms of annual salary and term. The Habs would be smart to re-sign Kostitsyn while he’s still willing…if he’s still willing. And don’t talk to me about in-house replacements. The Canadiens have nobody – N-O-B-O-D-Y in the organization that is close to being able to produce the way Kostitsyn does. Not Louis Leblanc, not Mike Blunden, not Aaron Palushaj, not Brendan Gallagher.

While Kostitsyn was drafted behind all-stars like Perry, Getzlaf, Richards, Kesler, Parise and Carter, fans simply need to stop being so unbelievably and absolutely thick-skulled about Kostitsyn. Adjust your expectations already! Andrei Kostitsyn brings stability, skill and a sorely needed physical presence to the Canadiens lineup. If he was given steady linemates and given a role that suits his best skill (that of a sniper), maybe he’d be closer to the guy everyone thinks he ought to be. But until then, the Canadiens have a reliable, home-grown player that comes at excellent value. Apparently that isn’t enough, though. That damn 10th overall tag just won stop dogging him. Stubborn fans and media won’t let it go away. Apparently fans want to see assets mismanaged to the point where the next guy that is brought in to replace him is paid 30% more, while he inevitably eventually becomes somebody fans want traded for a bag of used mouth guards.

Andrei Kostitsyn as a failure? Hardly. It’s your fault for letting your imagination continually run wild. Is he a perfect player, and a perfect little boy scout? No, he isn’t, and he has hit slumps, sometimes for long stretches. Which player hasn’t? Stop comparing him to others in his draft class. We can play this game all day, and you’re sounding like a broken record. To boot, we can sing the Habs praises for drafting Pacioretty and Subban before other teams snatched them up, unless you would have preferred Riley Nash, Angelo Esposito, Logan MacMillan, Jakub Voracek, or Zach Hamill. If you’re going to remain in the camp that insists Kostitsyn is a drag on the team, at least be armed with a good reason other than “I watch the games and he’s poopy and he was drafted before Corey Perry and I hate him and he’s a bum”.

Shepherding the Lemmings

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So the Catholic Church has concocted an ad, asked us all to pray that the Habs can go on a miraculous run and escape the depths of despair to snatch the 8th playoff rung. How cute silly.

Usually you don’t go looking for miracles until you really need one.

  • Turning water in to wine
  • Granting sight to the blind
  • Healing the lepers
  • Exorcising the demons
  • Making 8th place

Hmmmm…one of these is not like the others, but it does a wonderful job in cementing the “Habs are a religion” story.

Do we really need to waste a miracle in hoping that the Canadiens can sink their hooks in to a playoff spot that historically bears no fruit? If you’re like me, and the Stanley Cup is the only goal that truly matters, then you no doubt know by now that finishing anywhere from 5th to 8th place is nothing but fodder for the top ranked teams. Why? I’ll say it again: because the last fifteen consecutive Cup winners started the playoffs with home ice advantage. It doesn’t get any clearer than that. History matters, and after 15 years, it is no longer a trend, but has become reality. Sure, we just saw the St. Louis Cardinals win the World Series after making a miracle run to the playoffs. We just saw the New York Giants win the Superbowl as nothing more than a .500 team that got hot at the right time. Neither of those sports are NHL hockey, and this is precisely the reason why we always hear the saying that “the Stanley Cup is the hardest trophy to win.” The NHL playoffs are a grind that are designed to weed out the weaker teams. Yes, 16 teams make the playoffs every year with “a blank slate and equal chance to win it all” but since the lockout ended, 8 of the 12 teams to compete in the Stanley Cup Finals had the minimal requirement of winning their division locked up. To boot, the Canadiens are not constructed to endure a run to the Cup finals. Thin on defense, small down the middle, not nearly rugged enough.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen quite enough of the Habs wearing Cinderella’s gown once the post-season ball begins. In any other year when they are traditionally a bubble team, I’d be hoping for the team to make the playoffs because once you’re in the mix, you may as well go all in and reap the experience of being in the playoffs, because aside from ownership rolling in pure playoff profit, there is no tangible benefit aside from experience. But this year, the Habs are not in the mix, and they aren’t close to the mix. Their current 3-game winning streak has only brought them 1 point closer to 8th – that’s how hard it is to claw back once you fall far behind, as the Habs did in October. You can claw back, as they did, but what happens when they have another mini-slump? Wallowing as low as they have this year, this is the team’s best chance at a brighter future by selling off their assets for draft picks, cutting dead weight loose, and trimming fat from the roster. Under no circumstances should the General Manager hoard his pending UFAs for a shot at 8th place, just to lose them for nothing a couple months later. Similarly, under no circumstances should he be permitted to be a buyer at the deadline. The Canadiens haven’t drafted in the first AND second round since 2007; a draft that netted Pacioretty and Subban in rounds one and two. Where is this Habs team without either of those players? The Canadiens would be without a young power forward that already has 21 even strength goals, and without a defenseman capable of playing 25 minutes per night. A one-year hiatus from the status-quo can do this franchise’s future a world of good. But we live in the instant-gratification age, and apparently it’s too much to ask to forgo one year of merry-go-round uselessness. It’s all now, now, NOW!

If you buy in to the Church’s silly ad (ease up, Kyle it’s all in good fun!), if you buy in to the “make the playoffs and anything can happen” garbage, and if you think that all the Habs needed all along was a little luck to be Cup contender, then this is where we part ways. You’re simply not paying attention to reality. Wait. Let me backtrack for a second. Anything CAN happen, as long as your goal is anything BUT the Cup. Winning one round CAN happen, and happens often enough. Winning two round is also possible. Heck, winning 3 rounds happens on average once every 5 years, but winning that key fourth round never does. If you want the Cup, wishing upon a star will just leave you disappointed at the end of the season. If you settle for less than the Cup…well…I’ll withold my opinions. This is a family website, after all.

If you want to see this organization realize true success, or at least give it their all in trying, then try this: Demand that Geoff Molson has a long chat with smart hockey people from outside his organization on how to build a winner in the cap era, because the hockey people running things today are there by either convenience, nepotism or cronyism. And when you breed mediocrity with mediocrity, you simply get better mediocrity.

The Canadiens have an open window to flush out the pipes and retool on a strong foundation of young players that desperately need the input and influence of somebody that gets it. They’d be wise to embrace this open window, because the usual way of doing things has led to nearly 20 years of futility and a generation of Habs fans who are now more than halfway to being Leafs fans (yes kiddies, we were already teasing the Leafs about 1967 back in 1997 – The Habs are a mere 11 years away from those depths).

Look, I hate seeing the Canadiens in this position, and I don’t enjoy them losing by any stretch. But I hate this never-ending cycle of mediocrity even more. If somehow, after trading away assets and allowing nature to take it’s course, the Canadiens manage to “Rise Together” to snatch 8th place, then fine. It will cost them the chance to draft the big, skilled franchise centerman that the team has desperately needed for more than 15 years, but so be it. It’s a compromise to appease the lemmings who would follow the team over a rocky cliff.

After reading this, I ask you yet again, what is the point of finishing 8th when it is so crystal clear that teams who finish 8th get nothing? Do not believe the “anything can happen” tripe. If “anything can happen” was at all true, then it would have happened more than once in the last 15 years. Again, it may work in other sports, but not in the NHL. What is your goal? The Stanley Cup, or something less?

A Note About Scott Gomez

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As I’ve said in the recent past, I like Scott Gomez, the guy, so don’t accuse me of piling on the guy. I don’t resort to attacking him on twitter, I don’t make jokes about his injuries, and I don’t make it a point to groan when he comes back to the lineup. But I am taking the time to write my thoughts and concerns, and I don’t want that to be misconstrued as Gomez bashing. Are we clear? Good, then read on!

After a disastrous 2010-11 season (by his own admission), Gomez vowed to every breathing human on this planet that he would bounce back. Nobody was expecting 20 goals or 70 points, but more than 7 goals and 38 points was expected. Prior to his nightmare season he was a .81 point-per-game player. Going in to this season, Habs fans would have settled for a .63 point-per-game pace. That would represent 8-12 goals and 51 points. It would have still been below his career average, but he would have at least partially cleared his name for playing on a team that can’t score to save its life.

He’s been hurt for the most part this season, so the website that aims to make fun of his year-long scoring drought is a misleading and cruel gag. The truth is Gomez’ performance doesn’t need to be made fun of – the numbers speak for themselves – loudly.

As he sits at 0 goals in 20 games this season (and upwards of 60 dating back to last season), we hear some fans looking to excuse his performance him by saying “he’s never been a goal scorer!!“. This is accurate. But 0 goals is not acceptable, nor is it normal. Throughout NHL history, guys who were not goal scorers found the back of the net far more often than that.  As for his sub-par assist rate? The exonerators say that “it isn’t his fault if his wingers don’t finish his plays“.

Okay, then.

So what we’re left with is a player – who is paid to produce – who carries a massive cap hit of almost 7.4 million dollars – being willfully absolved of all accountability!

Does this make sense to you? Because it doesn’t make sense to me. Accountability is key, and if there is none then what you see is what you get (and deserve) with this team.

You can throw out any statistic you like about how the Canadiens are better with him in the lineup than without him. YAY! They’re 9-11 with him in the lineup this year – still not close to a playoff spot. Do you prefer 10th place or 14th? You can tell me that he wins faceoffs and that he gains the offensive zone reeeeally well (yeah, but what does he do with it once he gets there?). You can revert to excuse-making and say that the injuries have prevented him from getting in to a groove. Or you can blame his revolving door of linemates. At the end of the day if that’s all you’ve got, then that is a really thin and flimsy defense of a player with his mega cap hit who is paid to produce way more than he has.

The cottage industry of advanced stats (which is a murky, slippery world in a sport like hockey as opposed to baseball) can paint the picture that he does more than we think and is thus underrated. If that were the case, then surely other General Managers would recognize this, and the Canadiens would not be having as much trouble trading him as they have. It’s pretty easy to explain why: other teams won’t take on that cap hit if there’s nothing tangible to justify it. Cherry-picking selective stats and portraying them as being complimentary to a player is pretty easy to do, but the stats that matter most are the ones that the player is being personally held accountable for…or not held accountable for, depending on who you talk to.

Opportunity Cost

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When an underachieving team has its back to the wall, and faces a huge uphill climb, it’s only natural to rally around that team when they rattle off some impressive wins. This is the case with the recent performance of the Habs.

Since trading a disgruntled Michael Cammalleri to Calgary, the team is a mediocre 3-2-2. Not nearly good enough to put them back in the playoff hunt, but optimism has been renewed since those 3 wins have come against the Conference-leading Rangers, the hated Leafs (in Toronto), and the mighty Red Wings. When the most recent victory sees the downtrodden Habs hanging a converted touchdown around the league’s best team’s neck, it’s easy – and sometimes fun – to get carried away that the turnaround is in fact upon us and that the Forum Ghosts are ready to lend a hand.

As the Canadiens blew off the preseason, most shrugged with indifference. In most years, I would have agreed – after all, didn’t Carey Price tell us to “chill”?. This year, however, I didn’t see a team building toward an identity, or establishing chemistry – I saw a team running out players that had no business being a part of a training camp for so long. It felt like the Habs were focused on squeezing as many dollars as they could from whatever time was allotted for preseason games. Once the regular season began, nothing changed. How could it given the lackadaisical approach given to the preseason schedule?  The team that sputtered through the exhibition season fell flat in October, so much so that they became ensnared in the dreaded numbers game bear trap.

The “coveted” 8th place slot drifted further and further out of reach as the season reached the quarter pole, all the way to the point where the Habs were a distant and dismal 11 points out of 8th at mid-season. In other words – they’d need a miracle to claw back and grab that 8th playoff position.

The more pragmatic Habs fans were reading the writing on the wall as they were taking the Halloween decorations down and dusting off the Christmas season regalia. Yes, the regular season is 82 games, and 6 1/2 long months, but the reality is that you can scuttle your playoff hopes in the first month of action.

Thus was born the #failfornail campaign, a euphemism for tanking the season and grabbing the top draft pick at the 2012 entry draft. This slogan sticks in the craw of many fans, who want the Habs in the post-season dance, no matter what. After all, you can’t win the Cup if you don’t make the playoffs, n’est pas? Never mind that no 5th-8th seed teams have won the Cup since 1995 when Braveheart was the reigning Best Picture winner and Gangta’s Paradise was dominating the radio waves. The Devils won the Cup that year, and it was during a shortened 48-game season, meaning that without having to endure the full 82-game grind, conditions were ripe for a team to win the Cup without starting on home ice. Even at that, the Devils were on the cusp of becoming a dominant league power, not a bubble team. The ’93 Habs were the last team to win the Cup without home ice to start the playoffs in a full season, but again, it should be noted that the Canadiens were a 102-point team that year and were in a stacked division, and were not a bubble team.

In short, bubble teams don’t win anything. In a town with a history like Montreal’s, an 8th place finish is nothing short of a platitude.

As a believer in history and trends, I’m tired of the Habs going in to the playoffs with the “plucky underdog” label. The dire reality is that if you want to win the Cup in the modern era, you need home ice advantage, at least to start the playoffs. The 2006 Oilers are a nice story, but that’s all they are – a nice story. If they had a healthy Dwayne Roloson for game 7, things may have been different, but he was hurt, and they lost. There are no moral victories to be found in game 7 of the Cup Finals, and the Oilers have been rebuilding ever since.

This season has 3 possible outcomes for the Habs:

1- They buck history to “rise together” to grab the 8th playoff spot, despite overwhelming odds. Pragmatists will weep at the loss of a potential lottery pick, while optimists and die-hard homers will trumpet this as an accomplishment worthy of recognition in the annals of Habs lore.

2- They make a brave charge for 8th, but fall short. Pragmatists will weep at the loss of a potential lottery pick, while optimists and die-hard homers will trumpet this as an accomplishment worthy of recognition in the annals of Habs lore.

3- They trade their available assets before the deadline, restock the draft pick and prospect cupboard by moving guys like Hal Gill, Travis Moen, Chris Campoli, Tomas Kaberle, in an attempt to do the one thing they haven’t done since the fluke of the 2005 draft (and previously the 1984 draft): draft in the top 5 and secure a franchise centerman.

When you weigh the team’s needs vs the daunting mountain of history that lies in in their path, the “smart” thing to do for the team’s future success would be to cut bait, let nature take its course and rebound hard next year.

Options 1 and 2, in my mind (and I know I’m not alone) represent a waste of time that although would be exciting for a couple months, would ultimately be a step back for the team. As Division and Conference rivals continue to improve, this is the year to make a huge leap forward in narrowing that gap, if not closing it altogether. Smart teams in today’s cap era build upon a foundation of young, cheap talent that can only come from good drafting. They do not build with pricey free agents. In terms of personnel in the organization, the Canadiens have one of the best evaluators of amateur talent in Trevor Timmins. Give him one year where, in a deep draft, he can lay claim to several high-end prospects and Habs fans will reap the rewards for many years to come.

I’m not naive enough to believe that a team of professional athletes are going to roll over and die. They just aren’t wired that way. With the amount of skill on this Habs team, their current position in the standings defies logic, and in that vein it’s not inconceivable that they could at least turn things around just enough to make everything look respectable. Like the thrilling run to the Eastern Conference Finals a couple years ago, I still believe snatching 8th place and missing out on the opportunity to solidify the future is nothing but a smokescreen that while exciting for a time, really sets the team back. It sparks false hope and conjures up delusions of grandeur.

Now, if only the shareholders would agree to forgo playoff revenue *just once*, the path would be so much easier for Geoff Molson and Pierre Gauthier.

So Tim Thomas Did Something Dumb…

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Stop me if you’ve heard that before.

Except this time, it feels more like character assassination because of the “B” on his chest rather than the act itself.

As the only American on the Bruins 2011 Cup winning roster, many feel like Thomas should have gone to the White House in solidarity with his teammates, to show respect to the President (even though he doesn’t agree with his politics) and generally to not rock the boat. Many say that if he wanted to make a political statement, he could have done it in another way (yeah right, if it were to come to that, the same people would laugh and say “who the hell is Tim Thomas? Shut up and play hockey, fatty”). Let’s recall that both Nick Boynton and Kris Versteeg (yes, both Canadians) decided not to visit the White House as members of the Cup winning 2010 Blackhawks. Granted, they had both moved on to other teams, but so did Tomas Kaberle, and he was there. I don’t recall the outrage when they skipped the ceremony, do you? You can tell me that as an American, Thomas had the duty to go and represent. But most people say it was about team unity. So which is it? Team unity, or Patriotic duty? Where does free will come in to play?

We’re all entitled to our opinion, and we can go back and forth all day over whether what he did was right or wrong, selfish, or bold. Personally, I could care less either way, so there’s my stance for the record. It doesn’t affect me in any way. What does bother me is this: Canada could barely muster a 60% voter turnout for its most recent Federal Election. That means nearly 10 million Canadians who were eligible to vote chose not to. South of the border, the situation is even worse. When President Obama became “The Man”, only 56.8% of voters showed up to have their say, meaning that nearly 100 million eligible Americans opted to not vote. In the 2010 mid-term elections, nearly 145 million eligible Americans stayed home (37.8% showed up).

I don’t know who did and who didn’t vote in their country’s elections. Based on the massive twitter outrage yesterday, the sheer volume of angry voices says that there were plenty of lazy donkeys among them who gleefully took up arms in the “bash Tim Thomas party”. They chided Thomas’ lack of respect for the President while they themselves didn’t have enough respect to get off their rear end to have their say.

To you people, kindly STFU.

To anyone who thinks that Thomas disrespected his teammates, if they are truly upset with him, they’ll stop defending him as well as they have in the past couple seasons. They won’t play as hard or with as much heart for a guy they’re that angry with.

So Long, Sniper

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After Cammalleri’s comments the other day, it was quite apparent to me that he wanted out of town, and that if he wasn’t already unpopular in the Habs dressing room, he would be. He may have said the opposite, that he has a love affair with the city and that he’s building a house. To paraphrase Seinfeld: “yadda yadda yadda, now he’s in Calgary”.

The adage is that the team that gets the better player wins the trade. I find that an overly simplistic way of looking at things. Under this prism, it would be a knee-jerk judgement to say that the Flames won the trade, after all, Cammalleri is a star while Rene Bourque is, well not Ray Bourque. If we take their entire careers in to account, there’s no doubt that Cammalleri has been the better player. But over the course of the last 2+ seasons, Bourque has actually outscored Cammalleri. Viewed in that light, the trade is already much more even. Given that Bourque is much bigger and tougher than Cammalleri, he brings another important component that the Habs have been sorely lacking.

When news of the trade broke last night, I didn’t know what to think. I thought Cammalleri deserved to be traded, and I believe he wanted to be traded. I don’t trust Pierre Gauthier, as most Habs fans don’t. When somebody is as univerally disliked as Gauthier is, it’s easy to pan his each and every move. He’s blamed for moves that Gainey ultimately signed off on, as if he forced Gainey to trade for the Gomez’ of the world. Twitter makes for a great sounding board, but it’s prone to make people look like they have some kind of manic disorder. Such was the case with my timeline once the trade was announced. I vacillated between hating and liking the move; If Cammalleri had to go, at least make it a salary dump…make it a move about the future of the team. That wasn’t the case, and the Habs held true to their traditional modus operandi. They’re not holding a firesale, and they will not tank the season in search of a lottery pick. That was a fantasy. After marinating in the trade overnight, I woke up this morning liking it more than when I went to bed. There are reasons to NOT like it, if that’s your choosing, and I wouldn’t hold that against you if are a Cammalleri fan, but I’m opting to look at the positive aspects and run with them:

  • Bourque has actually been a better scorer in recent years than Cammalleri.
  • Bourque is much cheaper (although his contract runs much longer). Nevertheless, he represents good value.
  • Bourque is much bigger, and that is something the Habs need very much need, especially in the dog days of the season when small guys show signs of fatigue.
  • The Habs got a 2nd round pick in return, as well as a depth prospect who may turn out to be a little more than a throw-in.
  • Team unity may improve with the removal of a guy who apparently was not very well liked in the room, and you can’t put a price on that.

If there’s a reason to not like the trade, it’s that Cammalleri was an elite playoff performer while in Montreal. Halak is hero #1, but Cammalleri is right there with him. Trouble is, his elite playoff production is useless if he can’t help the Canadiens get to the playoffs. Any way you slice it, 9 goals is unacceptable from Cammalleri. There’s no excuse for it. He’s been a giant bust this year, sulking around the ice and not doing what he was paid to do: score goals. Guys who come in on the heels of scoring 39 goals and who are given 30 million dollars are not paid to do anything other than score.

If there’s another reason to not like the trade, it’s the manner in how Gauthier goes about his business. He operates in a cone of silence and seems to not have a concrete idea of how to construct and maintain a team. It’s fair to say that the vast majority of Habs fans want him replaced, and perhaps some of the anger of this trade stems from the fact that we now see that he is likely not going anywhere any time soon. It appears that Molson has continued trust in Gauthier, and that makes us mad, and that casts a pall over any move that Gauthier will make. The Canadiens have long stood as an organization that carried itself with class, from top to bottom. Gauthier is sullying that reputation with his panic moves. Firing Assistant Coaches 90 minutes before a game, and other ‘save my job’ type moves are tarnishing the Canadiens, and the results are trickling down to the ice. They used to get it right nearly everywhere. Now they rarely do. There are no more ceremonies to honour the past, to show off how the Canadiens show class and reverence. The focus is on the present, and the focus is blurry.

In the end, there’s no choice but to get on board with the trade. To pray that Gauthier’s 180° turn from a mantra that asked small, skilled players to win it on the powerplay to a team that is getting bigger & grittier will eventually bring badly needed wins in a division that is quickly improving. We can also hope that it show semblance of a team that can tough it out with sandpaper in the playoffs. They won’t get there this year, but they weren’t getting there with Cammalleri, either. If team unity improves as result of a disliked player being moved, then that’s another huge, intangible plus.

The Conundrum

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If it was a secret, it’s not anymore. Actually, it was never a secret; the signs were there from the very beginning, but most chose to ignore them.

For those still unaware, the Canadiens season has been, and remains in jeopardy. Truthfully, it’s been on life support since Halloween. No, that’s not a typo. On the morning of November 1st, the Canadiens were in 11th place in the Eastern Conference, a mere 2 points out of a playoff spot, and very few fans were concerned with the situation (I was). If that isn’t grounds for “life support”, then let’s call it a gestating illness. There was a lot of nonchalance among the fanbase, despite what historical precedent showed to be the harsh reality. That reality said that being outside of the top 8 on November 1st meant a tough climb to get back in. Yes, November 1st is awfully early to pronounce any conclusions for how the season will end, but history was already against the Habs.

Fast forward to January 2012, and the Canadiens have dug themselves down to 12th place in the East, 7 big, fat, bloated points out of the playoff picture. In short: they went in the wrong direction. If things were unsettling back on Halloween, they must be bleak now. Or are they?

Unbeaten in 2012 (nyuk nyuk nyuk), the Habs appear to be a new team. As Will pointed out in his piece yesterday: “early returns suggest this two-game winning streak is more than just a fluke“. Two games is certainly a short sample, but the attitude and tempo appears to be contagious. They no longer sit on leads, they no longer have poor body language, and they no longer look like the stifled, frustrated, crippled group they were under former Coach Jacques Martin. And not to be overlooked: they are no longer boring to watch. We all reserve to right to reevaluate our opinions after more games against tougher teams are in the books, but we are starting to see the team that we thought we had when it was assembled back in 2009 (and tinkered with ever since).

The big question today is whether or not this modest turnaround is “too little, too late”. The Canadiens need to rack up 53 points in their remaining 41 games to end the regular season with 92 points, which represents the average threshold needed to make the playoffs since the lockout ended. Not to be misplaced is the fact that the 8th place team is currently on pace for 94 points, making things yet again harder. The aforementioned 53pts in 41 games is a win percentage of .646 over the second half of the season. If that imposing number wasn’t enough, they have to do their damndest to earn those points in regulation and not allow Eastern opponents to grab “loser points”. That would only make the Canadiens’ task tougher still. Simply put, the Canadiens need to go at least 27-14 from here until the final siren blares on game 82. That would represent quite the reversal of fortunes, and would still only likely reap them the 8th slot in the East – if that. Making things even harder is that the Canadiens need to leapfrog 3 teams, or hope that other teams completely fall apart. The Panthers, Leafs, Sens, and now massively depleted Penguins are all common targets to have the trap door open under their feet. As of yet, none have officially fallen out of the playoff picture, and even if they do, there’s no guarantee that the Canadiens will play well enough to surpass them. Interesting to note that in the past 3 days, the Leafs beat the Wings, Senators took 3 of 4 points from the Flyers, and the Panthers beat the Canucks. If those teams are going to give up the ghost, they aren’t going to do so quietly.

Here’s where The Conundrum rears its ugly head. Is it worth it for the Canadiens to play each of their remaining games like it’s the 7th game of the Cup finals? How much would they have left in the tank for the playoffs? Sure they’d be battle-tested, but they’d also be incredibly weary. Is it worth it for Pierre Gauthier to be a buyer at the trade deadline? Is it worth it to dump assets in a potentially futile quest to grab the 8th in the East? And given that only one Cup winning team since 1994 entered the playoffs without the benefit of home ice advantage, is all of the back-breaking effort really worth it? I would say no, it is not worth it. I would hate to go through a Habs-less spring, but this hamster wheel of mediocrity has to stop. Stakeholders in the team might disagree, as would those fans who say that “you can’t win the Cup if you don’t make the playoffs“. Personally, I would allow nature to take its course, and I would trade away pending UFAs (unless Kostitsyn can be signed at the right price) for future prospects and draft choices. In the cap era, having good, young talent at a cheap price is the only way to have a perennial contender.

But what do April tee times mean for “interim” Head Coach Randy Cunneyworth? Quite simply, it would likely mean his termination, but is that not already inevitable? He’s already been thrown to the wolves by his Owner and by his General Manager. Short of long playoff run, I’m not sure that anything can secure his future as Coach of the Habs. As much as I like Cunneyworth, and as much as I believe he deserves every single opportunity to be this team’s long-term Head Coach, there’s every reason to believe that the Canadiens brass will bow to pressure from narrow minded media types and extremist fringe elements and opt yet again to take the path of appeasement rather than institute a meritocracy. That means that Cunneyworth’s future as a Coach is elsewhere, and for that reason I see no reason to sacrifice key parts of the future for what is already a virtual mission impossible.

What’s your take? Go for broke, or look to a brighter future, albeit one minus Randy Cunneyworth?

Bonus question: What if the players, as a group, tell Molson that they adore Randy Cunneyworth and want him to stick around permanently? What then? Appease the nose-out-of-joint lunatics, or keep the team happy?