Prospect Info: David Reinbacher

[Scriptor]

Laval is too congested is a terrible reason. This is our supposed best D prospect right? You make room for him in the environment you think is best for him. Trade the other lesser prospects that might be standing in the way if need be. Our management team has repeatedly said the best development is under their control. That's the narrative that has been spread far and wide. And "still have full access too him" is an odd statement. How do you know that? Will they be able to increase/decrease his ice time? Ensure he gets maximum PP time to develop his offensive tools? Of course not. It's not their organization. As for your last sentence, so Hughes believes developing prospects under our control is so crucial it impacts our draft selections but if the prospect is developing well in their current environment then it's no longer important? Aren't most prospects drafted high by implication in good development environments in which they've done well (thus being drafted high?).

I think Montreal is not concerned about how Reinbacher will be used because his team (and coaching staff) gave him challenge after challenge last season and increased both his ice time and responsibilities as he clearly showed he could take on those challenges.

Reinbacher's meteoric rise last season is in large part due to how he was managed by his coaching staff.

Allowing Reinbacher to return there is more of a no-brainer than allowing Kotkaniemi to return to play with his father as head coach was, for example.

The only negative aspect, IMO, from Reinbacher returning to the Swiss league is the time lost getting used to North American dimensions, ice-wise.

However, offset that by a kid playing with a team less than an hour and a half drive from his family home, an environment (team) clearly dedicated to his development (past experience), less pressure than playing in or near Montreal as he develops and proximity to friends and family for another year as he matures.

I wouldn't write off all those things so quickly.

Other European Ds have come over to North America later than at the age 18 and have had an impact at the NHL level nonetheless.

Lidstrom being the highest profile D who came as a 20-21 year old.

I'm not saying Reinbacher is the next Lidstrom, but he can still have a solid impact at the NHL level with one more year in Europe.

Reinbacher is described as a quick learner who understands fundamentals and can apply them quickly, based on his rapid progression last season. he has skills and a mind to exploit them. His adjustments to smaller ice surfaces should not pose a great problem, IMO.

Half am season in the AHL, after another season in Europe should do the job, IMO.

A four on four scrimmage doesn't prove anything right now because it provides extra room on a smaller surface, evening out the whole affair, IMO.

I expect Reinbacher to come up at the same time as Hutson after they have played together for part of a season in Laval, playing on a 3rd pairing, with a role on special teams (PP for Hutson and PK for Reinbacher), initially, as they get acclimatized to the NHL tempo.

In two years:

Matheson - Savard
Guhle - Mailloux
Hutson - Reinbacher

Xhekaj, Harris, Barron, Kovacevic

Or, maybe, it's in three years, with Mathewson being traded for a decent haul as a rental in that year, and the Habs also moving on from one or two of Harris, Barron or Kovacevic, on top of Savard being gone in year two at the deadline?

In three years:

Guhle - Mailloux
Xhekaj - Barron/Harris
Hutson - Reinbacher

Engstrom - one of Barron, Harris or Kovacevic

With games at the NHL level. year four could see Hutson - Reinbacher moving up the depth chart, leaving behind the following D-Corps, with Engstrom looking to take over the RD spot on the third pairing:

Guhle - Mailloux
Hutson - Reinbacher
Xhekaj - Barron/Harris

Engstrom

The beauty of this future D-Corps is that we have assets for the PP in Hutson and Mailloux and the possibility of forming a strong shutdown pair according to game situations in Guhle - Reinbacher, without giving up too much offensive upside in the process. Meanwhile, both shutdown Ds appear to be the ideal candidates to play with Mailloux and Hutson at even strength.

The future looks bright on D, if all goes well in the prospects' development.

 

[Adam Michaels]

This Reinbacher thread is a wild one. It often deviates from talking about David to having a few pages of talking about Michkov. Then it focuses back to Reinbacher. Then it shifts from Slaf to Leclair and the Flyers and then off to MB sprinkled with some Reinbacher talk in between.

I've been guilty of it, too. But I just realized this thread has taken left turns and right turns at various points and the discussion is no longer about David for a while.

 

[bsl]

As the days go by and the more I watch and look at future and stuff like that the more I like the pick. I was iffy at first but not to the extend of most but now I like it. Any one else on that page or is everyone who was initially upset, still upset? Genuinely curious

I like the pick too. Same as I liked the guhle pick. They got the top d this draft and to my eyes the kid looks good. I like his mobility and he seems ready to jump up in the play, something msl is encouraging

 

[bsl]

Former player agents don’t always have a good track record as GMs. So I don’t think that’s a good argument, IMO.

That said, Hughes also has Gorton to help steer the ship. They are clearly following a strategy (which I think has flaws) but it will take time to see if it works and to what degree. They can/will also get lucky along the way.

If MB brought this team a few wins away from a cup, Hughes can certainly do at least as much.

I think they are looking at vegas model. Taking cast offs. Second step is to dump useless vets

 

[NORiculous]

Bergevin worked from a much stronger position than Houle. Full cap, inherited a young core, got ten years.

Houle had multiple stars and traded them all for crap. He should at least got interesting prospects if he had to cut salaries. MB left a lot of interesting pieces, Houle left nothing.

It took years and years and years to get over the damage Houle caused. We still have no #1 C. Houle had Damphousse and Turgeon… The biggest problem he had was they needed to play Turgeon on the 3rd line!!!

 

[NORiculous]

I think they are looking at vegas model. Taking cast offs. Second step is to dump useless vets

Newhook and Dach both have high potential. So they probably think they can keep on finding talent that way. Hopefully it works.

Once Armia, Dvorak and Gallagher are gone/bought out, and the cap will start raising again, with the cap structure they have, it will be interesting.

 

[Sorinth]

Houle had multiple stars and traded them all for crap. He should at least got interesting prospects if he had to cut salaries. MB left a lot of interesting pieces, Houle left nothing.

It took years and years and years to get over the damage Houle caused. We still have no #1 C. Houle had Damphousse and Turgeon… The biggest problem he had was they needed to play Turgeon on the 3rd line!!!

Every GM leaves some interesting pieces, Houle left us Hainsey, Beauchemin, Ribeiro, Markov, Ryder, to name just a few young guys/prospects that went on to have good careers.

 

[jrom]

I think they are looking at vegas model. Taking cast offs. Second step is to dump useless vets

Florida is another team with a former agent as a GM. Montour, Verhaeghe, Bennet etc

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

Every GM leaves some interesting pieces, Houle left us Hainsey, Beauchemin, Ribeiro, Markov, Ryder, to name just a few young guys/prospects that went on to have good careers.

If we dig, even the worst gm leaves some pieces that are good. But that doesn't fix the Roy, Turgeon, Damphousse, Keane, Malakhov and others gone, in addition with Carbonneau, Leclair and Desjardins gone too. It wasn't just stats players put together ramdomly, it was the core of a good team.

 

[HuGo Burner Acc]

Funny, because Bergevin's first lie was that he would rebuild through the draft over time. Then, of course, he added Cole and Prost to the roster and promoted youngsters immediately instead of developing them beforehand.

I honestly think that the shortened season because of the labour conflict applied pressure to generate more revenue and that's why Bergevin was asked to deviate from the idealistic initial plan.

Beyond that, Bergevin's lack of confidence, early on, really prevented follow up moves on good trades and wasted otherwise good shorter term moves.

His inability to follow through is what lead to the team's downfall, along with the insistence that the conservative coaching approach was the means of winning.

All the personal attacks on Bergevin have no reason to exist, but one can clearly be critical of his choices.

It's normal to be hopeful at the start of any season, or following any move. That's the essence of fandom, not cynicism.

Of course, the hyped up praise for players like Alzner, McCarron, Tinordi, Beaulieu, Scherbak, Mete and many more seems ludicrous today

Some players, like Poehling, had shown actual flashes of greatness, if only for short samples, but the refusal to trade him for O'Reilly (along with another first round pick -- was that the rumour?) and actually acquiring a bonafide top-6 C...

Hindsight is 20/20 vision.

I completely agree with your assessment but my point was in the context of MB actually committing to team building from 2018-2020, he did a decent job. He should never had that opportunity because Molson should've fired him after 2017-18. But he didn't and we have the evidence of his retooling efforts. Actions speak louder than words and the people he brought in (MT, etc), the way he structured the team, and had the team play was not signs of anything but trying to win now without risking the future which greatly limited his ability to surround the core at the time with good talent. Hindsight is 20/20 true but anyone can see what he was doing was destructive. The last straw was bringing in Ott, Martinsen, and King for the 2017 run. But I'm not sure if we're actually arguing about anything or just describing history lol

 

[Rapala]

This Reinbacher thread is a wild one. It often deviates from talking about David to having a few pages of talking about Michkov. Then it focuses back to Reinbacher. Then it shifts from Slaf to Leclair and the Flyers and then off to MB sprinkled with some Reinbacher talk in between.

I've been guilty of it, too. But I just realized this thread has taken left turns and right turns at various points and the discussion is no longer about David for a while.

I can't remember a popular thread that didn't go off track at some point.

 

[Rapala]

TBF, Leclair had been an enigma up to that point. His post amazing 93 cup performance had been followed by a return to form 94 season. The potential was there but there was also a chance he'd always be a 40-ish points a season depth guy who leaves you looking for more.

I was never a production only enthusiast like many. Leclaire did a lot more for the club than simply put up points. I'm a firm believer in keeping assets that are unique and he certainly was that for our team.

 

[Adam Michaels]

I can't remember a popular thread that didn't go off track at some point.

That is true.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

The argument is that while his stats are obviously crazy impressive for a draft-year KHL player and tell us that he's absolutely very good and a top-10 talent, they aren't slam dunk proof that we're looking at a Generational or Malkin tier player. The thing about the KHL is you can't always make basic assumptions like "bad teams are still mostly trying to win every game in good faith and ice legitimate top level professionals". The post from @waffledave that you're replying to was talking about how 8 of his 20 points came against Kunlun Red Star, with this absolutely atrocious goalie in net. I don't personally think that's a huge deal b/c even if we arbitrarily take half of those away 16P in KHL 30 games is still great, but it's an example of the context issues in the KHL as this goalie doesn't even belong on the bench in the SPHL, but KRS exists to promote hockey in China so he gets KHL starts.

Either way, the more significant point is that the KHL is way more stratified than the NHL or other European leagues, it's much closer to European soccer in that way. Top junior talent usually gets funneled to the bigger and richer KHL clubs early on, and then those players struggle to get ice time as 17 year olds because their teams are playing to win and they have veterans to appease. Michkov got loaned from 1st place (50-13-5) St Petersburg to last place (11-47-10) Sochi and got opportunities he'd never get even on a middle of the pack team, which is not usually what happens with KHL prospects. We just don't really know how Michkov's year stacks up historically because Ovechkin and Malkin never got those opportunities in their draft years so we don't have a reference point for phenoms like we do with Bedard where we can know definitively that 71G and 72A in the WHL is historically insane.

FWIW I'd say the same about the whole "2nd best Swiss league draft year" thing with Reinbacher where that's mostly because Swiss prospects go to the CHL and they don't import foreign teenagers. It's impressive but doesn't inherently mean that he's a super phenom because his draft year point total was triple of Roman Josi's.

Great post Joel. Very informative, thank you.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

I absolutely get why you are having a tough time being patient....feel the same way, it's just I see a huge difference towards the new regime versus the gong show Bergevin was running.

The new guys have changed literally the entire organization on and off the ice, and I think we will see this come together to make the habs a better team, and these guys will soon have this club doing good things......wish they had been here during Price's tenure.

Curious if you think, a former players agent knows what his players want? What they discuss?
Does this make a former player agent a good candidate for making a good GM?
I would certainly think it does.
In the case of Hughes, he has inherited a gong show of cap troubles, and a team spent to the max, and finished dead last. In some ways an awful spot to start, but in some ways, a good place to start.

We are on a path..........it's hard to be patient though....

I’m optimistic. Outside of Dach, which I’m skeptical of his upside still, they haven’t added much in the way of talent. However, I can’t state enough how much of a poorly built roster Bergevin left. Half the job was just letting terrible contracts expire. A couple of the bets they made Dach/Newhook are types of bets I like, I wouldn’t have bet on either one myself. Let’s see where it goes, the Dach trade is looking break even at worst and tremendous at best. I wasn’t a fan of this trade, but can’t deny the facts, it’s looking like a probable win. Let’s hope Newhook is more of the same.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

I’ve turned the corner on the pick. I actually like Reinbacher a lot. I just wanted a forward, but the top 4 went as expected and left us on the outside looking in. I much prefer this over Leonard or Dvorsky.

I’m at peace now.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

Houle was admittedly the worst GM of all time, no doubt about it. Bergevin looks good in comparison but, so would I, probably.

No he doesn’t. Houle had a mandate to cut costs, therefore, some of his decisions are forgivable. Marc Bergevin was trying to win with every fibre in his being and ended up producing 2 of the worst seasons in Habs history. Imo, it’s not close, Bergevin was worse.

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

I can't remember a popular thread that didn't go off track at some point.

We try to put that draft into a context and we take example of the past witch brings to the team's philosophy we question (and we are allowed to question). But everybody have his griefs, his key moment in history that proves something, like if today's Habs management was a repeat of the Houle or the Bergegin era. But whatever, we don't know enough right now about Reinbaker, and what he will become. We swim in the possible future, the signs of a truth or a big mistake, big mistake we did or big mistake we avoided. Go figure. But that doesn't allow some of us to send private messages starting with 'ostie de moron sans cervelle'.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

If we dig, even the worst gm leaves some pieces that are good. But that doesn't fix the Roy, Turgeon, Damphousse, Keane, Malakhov and others gone, in addition with Carbonneau, Leclair and Desjardins gone too. It wasn't just stats players put together ramdomly, it was the core of a good team.

Your combining players that were traded from 2 gms. Houle didn’t trade them all. Savard made some doozies too.

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

Leclair was an outstanding skater and a tank and certainly was not "tripping over the blueline" while in Montreal.

He was, actually. Leclair's puck-handling did not match his speed early on. He would put himself offside as he handled the puck crossing the blue line.

He was lanky awkward and that's a fact, but it's not abnormal by any stretch.

Leclair certainly never was lanky as he entered the leagues as a thick kid. I think that you might be conflating "awkward" with just never being comfortable as a center due to him being a naturally aggressive north/south inclined player who was being forced to play a more passive east/west style that just was not intuitive for him.

 

[JianYang]

How did that work out for the Habs in the finals? They got completely dismantled and exposed by Tampa's skill and speed. It was brutal to watch.

They ran out of gas. We knew weber was hurting, and he wasn't the same player that year, but we had no idea it was going to be his final NHL game. Price was essentially done as well. Then some support guys like byron were basically finished too by the end.

They gave it all they had because they probably knew it was their last chance. The ship ran out of steam, eventually.

As an aside, that tampa team IMO is the strongest roster to win a cup in over two decades. They were good, even by cup winning standards.

 

[dcyhabs]

Houle had multiple stars and traded them all for crap. He should at least got interesting prospects if he had to cut salaries. MB left a lot of interesting pieces, Houle left nothing.

It took years and years and years to get over the damage Houle caused. We still have no #1 C. Houle had Damphousse and Turgeon… The biggest problem he had was they needed to play Turgeon on the 3rd line!!!

Well part of the problem was that Turgeon demanded to be first line center in the media while Damphousse just played where he was played and did well. All the habs trades stunk in those years.

 

[dcyhabs]

No he doesn’t. Houle had a mandate to cut costs, therefore, some of his decisions are forgivable. Marc Bergevin was trying to win with every fibre in his being and ended up producing 2 of the worst seasons in Habs history. Imo, it’s not close, Bergevin was worse.

They were comparably bad, and similarly dumb. Ownership hasn’t been a strength but it was worse for Houle. Houle was known to be pretty dumb, though, Bergevin succeeded in leaving some doubt for a year or two.

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

Your combining players that were traded from 2 gms. Houle didn’t trade them all. Savard made some doozies too.

I know but Houle did the worst. Or he killed what was left as a credible hockey team. But true also his boss asked him to cut payroll. His boss was the owner before Gillett.

 

[Scriptor]

Newhook and Dach both have high potential. So they probably think they can keep on finding talent that way. Hopefully it works.

Once Armia, Dvorak and Gallagher are gone/bought out, and the cap will start raising again, with the cap structure they have, it will be interesting.

We'll still be stuck with Gallagher at 6.5m on a 95M Cap ceiling for a year or two while we start performing, IMO, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem. One bad contract under 7M won't cripple the team Cap, especially once the ceiling has reached 95M.

Armia, Dvorak, and Hoffman will all be gone within two years, whatever happens by then because their contracts will be up before that (Hoffman, at the end of next year), or at that point (Dvorak and Armia).

Savard will also be heading out in two years, likely at the trade deadline for an interesting pick if he is still performing and isn't injured.

With an eventual D that rolls out at the following medium to long term Cap hit, Hughes will be sitting pretty to line up a potent offense:

Guhle (7M) - Mailloux (5M)
Hutson (7M) - Reinbacher (5.5M)
Xhekaj (3.5M) - Engstrom (4M)
XXX (1M)

33M D-Corps

7M G tandem

55M forward group (with 7.875M to Suzuki, long term, 7.85M to Caufield, long term, 1.5M for the short term injury reserve, an average of 1M fir the 13th and 14th forward and an average of 2M for the 10th, 11th and 12th forwards playing beyond their pay grade (RHP, Anderson, Heineman, for example), that leaves an average of 4.25M for the remaining 7 members of the top-9.