Post-Game Talk: ITS OVER- Did we make a huge mistake on Pierre-Luc Dubois Thread?

[Scriptor]

Did you ever hear about Cole Caufield? He's an elite american sniper.

You obviously missed the other post that laid out what would still be missing in the lineup for MON to become a perennial contender.

What I said is that MON would be missing another sniper for the 2nd line in the top-6, as well as another puck-possession monster that could pass the puck.

From that, I also said that there would be a chance we might already have that in the system after the 2023 draft, via Roy, Slafkovsky and/or our own 2023 1st round pick.

In fact, I'm 100% sure we will fill at least one of those two Neds for the top-6 with one of those three assets/prospects.

We might be missing one spot to fill in the top-6 up front, at worst. The prospect pool is teeming with bottom-6 options and that is the least worrisome for me.

On the back end, we need a play-driving, puck-moving D. Can that become Hutson, or Mailloux?

We also ned a shutdown, physical D with puck-moving abilities to pair up with Hutson eventually. Can we trade for that so that we aren't continually pushing the missing pieces down the road, after the development time for our future draft picks?

I say, add/confirm from within a sniper, a puck-possession beast that can pass the puck, a play-driving, puck-moving D and a shutdown, physical D with puck-moving abilities and, within two or three years (missing players can be a dded within this time frame), and we will have a Cup-contending team after acquiring Dubois.

I think more than not are already within the system and, if, somehow, we are missing one of the players up front, or one of the two Ds after two or three years, we can always use the UFA market at that time to complete the puzzle.

A surging MON team should be attractive at that point, to UFAs.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

The issue with solely building through drafting is that the Habs’ roster is no longer bad enough for such a long game approach; if only because of what turn out to be two homeruns last summer: Dach and Matheson.

With or without Dubois, unless the Habs experienced a third consecutive record-setting injury-plagued season, Montreal’s likely heading into no man’s land territory draft-wise as soon as next season.

Also, the Habs need to shelter and optimise the development of the many U23 already on - or projected into next’s year - roster. Leveraging draft/prospect capital for a core piece like Dubois can help in that regard.

Whereas solely drafting doesn’t help at all during crucial core building years; especially with the underwhelming quality of complementary forwards surround the young core at the moment (Gallagher, Hoffman, Dvorak, Armia, Pitlick).

This is bottom 10 team regardless of injuries. We will stink again next year.

 

[LaP]

How so? what are your expectations of this player? what is he missing or doing in his game that compels you to say that.
The consensus from most fans is they all want him.

It depends what you are looking for. He's a good support player that could help the depth of a team like Colorado providing the AAV is not too high.

In the context of a rebuilding/bad team Lawson Crouse bring you nothing. He's not good enough to move any needles by himself and since he'll turn 26 this summer he'll be too old when a rebuild would be over. He's not really a vet presence either since he has very few experience on a winning team.

Considering you would rather have Crouse than PLD on a team lacking top line skills then the only conclusion is you overrated Crouse and you're not the only one i've seen some terrible take on Crouse around here.

 

[Scriptor]

No. They just have to take it as it goes and be patient. Caufield, Dach and Suzuki are still in development, Slaf also as well as all the dmen.

Molson already said it will take time and he has no timeline because it’s hard to say. Hughes said hey won’t make acquisition this off season that would make the team much better next season. If this message from them isn’t clear, i don’t know what more they could say.

Hughes said hey won’t make acquisition this off season that would make the team much better next season. If this message from them isn’t clear, i don’t know what more they could say.

I love the way you read Hughes' statement and stop reading as soon as you read what suits your purposes.

Hughes also went on to say that he meant not to get UFAs who were 28, 29 or 30 to have a better team just to make the playoffs (thankfully, I might add). He then added that, he would like to do something like the Dach move at the draft last year, trading a first round pick -- other than our own -- for a young NHL player that would/could be a way to accelerate the rebuild.

If you can't read the whole message to make a more informed opinion of things, I don't know what to say...

It's just rough to read a poster being snide with the highlighted statement and not to have stated everything about Hughes' interview. It's just misinformation with a Fukc you at the end, like other opinions are built on stupidity or lack of comprehension.

What I got from Molson and Hughes is that Molson is tempering expectations and that Hughes is letting the fans know that he will CONTINUE to be proactive if there are opportunities to take advantage of.

THAT should be clear as a message.

Nowhere did I see indications that nothing wouldn't get done and that Hughes would rely entirely on the draft in a passive que sera, sera approach to rebuilding his team, lie every closet tanker would like to see happen.

It seems that some of the most ardent supporters of Dubois in this thread actually seem to know the least about him.

Some people are repeatedly calling him "physical" and presenting the idea that he will fill a void as a big, physical forward on this team.

While Dubois is by no stretch of the imagination soft, and he does have some strength, if people are pencilling him in to bring a big physical component to the Canadiens forward group they are going to be immensely disappointed.

Puck protection, t buy time and space is what physicality Dubois brings first and foremost, as doe Dach, for that matter. None are kill the opponent during the forecheck types of physical forwards.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

Good grief, people don't want him so you paint it as hate? Seriously WTF. I don't want him because I don't think he is a difference maker, and I think he has suspect character. Nothing to do with hate.

Same, aside from him not being that good, this is how I feel too.

 

[Andy]

This is bottom 10 team regardless of injuries. We will stink again next year.

Goaltending won't help, and there is a lot of deadweight in Armia, Gallagher, and Hoffman.

That said, if Guhle, Harris, Barron, and Xhekaj continue developing on the same trajectory, I think the habs might be in the bubble area.

 

[Scriptor]

Are we counting his ability to disappear for long stretches as an intangible ? Remember earlier this season when he was on pace for a 90 point campaign , what's that pace now ? I don't think trading good picks & prospects plus spending valuable cap space on Dubois is the right direction for the Habs at this point in the rebuild , IMO it should be an easy pass for GMKH .

Sure, just look at the stats to make your assessment. Dubois was injured for a stretch and needed the few first games to get back to feeling good since he came back. Of course, when he returned, the whole team was in a funk, except for Morrissey.

The question is not whether Dubois is a Saviour, but whether he can be an important structural piece of the young core heading forward.

Dubois can't come back to the Jets after his injury and be the sole point producer when the rest of the players are cold, likely because the talented players (because they have talent to do better as a team) were playing as individuals in an attempt to solve everything on their own, as often happens through a funk.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

Goaltending won't help, and there is a lot of deadweight in Armia, Gallagher, and Hoffman.

That said, if Guhle, Harris, Barron, and Xhekaj continue developing on the same trajectory, I think the habs might be in the bubble area.

Naw, upfront is in shambles. Outside of caufield/Suzuki, there isn’t a quality forward on the team. This is a bottom 10 team quite easily imo.

 

[Andy]

Naw, upfront is in shambles. Outside of caufield/Suzuki, there isn’t a quality forward on the team. This is a bottom 10 team quite easily imo.

Well that depends on how Dach and Slafkovsky do next season. If the habs bring in PLD (the topic of this thread), things change completely.

There is still a lot of unknowns because the habs best players are still so very young.

 

[Scriptor]

Well both Matthew and Brady are considered physical and have a stellar attendance record. Why make stuff up?

I'm not saying that it's a majority of physical, body-checking players that end up on the sidelines because of injury, but we're not going to use one or two examples to dispute a tendency, are we?

Physical, body-checking players tend to wear down early and miss games along the way due to injury. Doesn't mean I wouldn't take them on my team either.

I love when people goes on a rant like that.

That poster was talking about we didn’t have a sniper ‘’after Dubois’’ when Caufield literally has more goals than him and is a way better goal scorer than him. That was the point but thanks with your talk about the plus minus lol.

Again, the post is about adding a sniper beyond Caufield after we acquire Dubois, to have a sniper on both top-6 lines. You don't read all the posts, not my fault. I assume the discussion carries on and am trying not to write fourteen paragraphs every time to spell everything out all over again.

However, it appears I should.

 

[SlafySZN]

Hughes said hey won’t make acquisition this off season that would make the team much better next season. If this message from them isn’t clear, i don’t know what more they could say.

I love the way you read Hughes' statement and stop reading as soon as you read what suits your purposes.

Hughes also went on to say that he meant not to get UFAs who were 28, 29 or 30 to have a better team just to make the playoffs (thankfully, I might add). He then added that, he would like to do something like the Dach move at the draft last year, trading a first round pick -- other than our own -- for a young NHL player that would/could be a way to accelerate the rebuild.

If you can't read the whole message to make a more informed opinion of things, I don't know what to say...

It's just rough to read a poster being snide with the highlighted statement and not to have stated everything about Hughes' interview. It's just misinformation with a Fukc you at the end, like other opinions are built on stupidity or lack of comprehension.

What I got from Molson and Hughes is that Molson is tempering expectations and that Hughes is letting the fans know that he will CONTINUE to be proactive if there are opportunities to take advantage of.

THAT should be clear as a message.

Nowhere did I see indications that nothing wouldn't get done and that Hughes would rely entirely on the draft in a passive que sera, sera approach to rebuilding his team, lie every closet tanker would like to see happen.


Puck protection, t buy time and space is what physicality Dubois brings first and foremost, as doe Dach, for that matter. None are kill the opponent during the forecheck types of physical forwards.

You keep trying to point at everyone that doesn’t think like you or doesn’t like Dubois as much as you.

‘’Stupidity’’ ‘’lack of comprehension’’ when you are the one who won’t even try to understand other people’s opinion or understand something in another light.

You think Hughes saying he maybe would want to do a trade similar to the Dach one means Dubois, 100% and every other opinion than yours is wrong.

 

[SlafySZN]

.

 

[FerrisRox]

Puck protection, t buy time and space is what physicality Dubois brings first and foremost, as doe Dach, for that matter. None are kill the opponent during the forecheck types of physical forwards.

That is using size, not physicality. They are very different things.

 

[habsfan44]

Yes i agree, i always liked Dach and i think he can become a first line center and he has taken a good step this year in his development but we still need an elite player or two.

Maybe two or three of Mailloux , Barron , Hutson , Guhle , Slafkovsky , Caufield or Mesar along with Dach could be the answer , maybe we draft one with with our two first rounders this year . Either way I agree , we need 2 or three elite/near elite players on this team to be serious contenders .The good news is that these are early days in the rebuild and we have time to let these players develop so we can see exactly what we have . What we need more than anything is patience , cup contenders aren't built overnight .

 

[sandviper]

See, to me, the Horvat deal is a TAD pricey for Dubois (it's also super pricey for Horvat there's a non-negligible age difference between those two players), but it's somewhat tolerable if that deal is offered out of free agency.

Trading for Dubois to have the "opportunity" to sign him to 8.5 x 8 ? Hell f***ing no.

I agree 100% that contract is high. Heck, I think it’s even high for Horvat, but I do think PLD is going to want somthing in the $64m+ range over 8 years. If we wait until he’s a UFA, I think he’s still going to want around $58m+ over 7.

 

[habsfan44]

Sure, just look at the stats to make your assessment. Dubois was injured for a stretch and needed the few first games to get back to feeling good since he came back. Of course, when he returned, the whole team was in a funk, except for Morrissey.

The question is not whether Dubois is a Saviour, but whether he can be an important structural piece of the young core heading forward.

Dubois can't come back to the Jets after his injury and be the sole point producer when the rest of the players are cold, likely because the talented players (because they have talent to do better as a team) were playing as individuals in an attempt to solve everything on their own, as often happens through a funk.

Make all the excuses you want the point is that despite his hot start he regressed back to the 60 something point player that he has proven himself to be thus far . I just don't think it's wise to move picks and prospects and then spend cap space over the course of 8 or 9 years on a player of his caliber this early in the rebuild when we have so much talent in the pipe and so much more to come from future drafts . I prefer a slow and steady wins the race approach rather than the accelerate the rebuild and hope for the best approach . Maybe I'm right , maybe I'm wrong but , like you I won't waver from my opinion .

 

[HuGo Sham]

Make all the excuses you want the point is that despite his hot start he regressed back to the 60 something point player that he has proven himself to be thus far . I just don't think it's wise to move picks and prospects and then spend cap space over the course of 8 or 9 years on a player of his caliber this early in the rebuild when we have so much talent in the pipe and so much more to come from future drafts . I prefer a slow and steady wins the race approach rather than the accelerate the rebuild and hope for the best approach . Maybe I'm right , maybe I'm wrong but , like you I won't waver from my opinion .

I tend to agree with this. It will be fascinating to see where Habs end up on lottery night, because I think that will play a role in what they do. I think a top 3 pick , may accelerate their rebuild (rightly or wrongly) and Hughes may decide to move several chips to the middle of the table for guys like Dubois and Hart.

He may feel they have too many pieces for so few slots and guys like Mesar, Kidney, Roy and Engstrom + picks may become available

 

[ReHabs]

Well that depends on how Dach and Slafkovsky do next season. If the habs bring in PLD (the topic of this thread), things change completely.

There is still a lot of unknowns because the habs best players are still so very young.

Our starting lineup for 23-24 seems so vague and undefined. I wonder if there will be some movement. Gurianov I’m not sure will be retained. Slaf I hope to see in the AHL, until he earns a promotion. Dach can definitely score more but needs linemates.

Make all the excuses you want the point is that despite his hot start he regressed back to the 60 something point player that he has proven himself to be thus far . I just don't think it's wise to move picks and prospects and then spend cap space over the course of 8 or 9 years on a player of his caliber this early in the rebuild when we have so much talent in the pipe and so much more to come from future drafts . I prefer a slow and steady wins the race approach rather than the accelerate the rebuild and hope for the best approach . Maybe I'm right , maybe I'm wrong but , like you I won't waver from my opinion .

How many 60+ pt scorers do we have in the pipeline?

Additional question: how many 60+ pt scorers have the Habs had in their pipeline in the last decade?

 

[HabsWhiteKnightLOL]

They are actually people who think we are in close to a playoff spot if we get Dubois next season
Oh lord
Oh no no no no no don't tell em

 

[c3z4r]

You obviously missed the other post that laid out what would still be missing in the lineup for MON to become a perennial contender.

What I said is that MON would be missing another sniper for the 2nd line in the top-6, as well as another puck-possession monster that could pass the puck.

From that, I also said that there would be a chance we might already have that in the system after the 2023 draft, via Roy, Slafkovsky and/or our own 2023 1st round pick.

In fact, I'm 100% sure we will fill at least one of those two Neds for the top-6 with one of those three assets/prospects.

We might be missing one spot to fill in the top-6 up front, at worst. The prospect pool is teeming with bottom-6 options and that is the least worrisome for me.

On the back end, we need a play-driving, puck-moving D. Can that become Hutson, or Mailloux?

We also ned a shutdown, physical D with puck-moving abilities to pair up with Hutson eventually. Can we trade for that so that we aren't continually pushing the missing pieces down the road, after the development time for our future draft picks?

I say, add/confirm from within a sniper, a puck-possession beast that can pass the puck, a play-driving, puck-moving D and a shutdown, physical D with puck-moving abilities and, within two or three years (missing players can be a dded within this time frame), and we will have a Cup-contending team after acquiring Dubois.

I think more than not are already within the system and, if, somehow, we are missing one of the players up front, or one of the two Ds after two or three years, we can always use the UFA market at that time to complete the puzzle.

A surging MON team should be attractive at that point, to UFAs.

Sorry, a bit off-topic, but do you seriously abbreviate Montréal as MON??

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

I love when people goes on a rant like that.

That poster was talking about we didn’t have a sniper ‘’after Dubois’’ when Caufield literally has more goals than him and is a way better goal scorer than him. That was the point but thanks with your talk about the plus minus lol.

If all the players on a team are in the minus stats, guess what happens.

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

Plus and minus is an indicator, but not the whole story.............even a guy like Danault is a -10 this year.
Interesting eh....Caufield has been on an awful team getting big time matchups....no way should his plus minus be something that gets looked at closely, in my opinion.

The whole team could improve and the plus minus could change. The team can adopt a system and follow it. Boston Bruins are a good example. We have to look at the whole team, every line, the Ds, the system and the philosophy of the team. I know the whole teams sucks now but it have to change. We don't have enough talent, not enough leadership, not enough speed and not enough weight. There is no system that could be implemented.

 

[ReHabs]

This is bottom 10 team regardless of injuries. We will stink again next year.

And draft someone in the 2024 draft who’ll be relevant in the NHL by 2026-2027 at the absolute earliest.

Do you feel it wise to waste three more years of Suzuki and Caufield’s prime?

 

[HabsWhiteKnightLOL]

And draft someone in the 2024 draft who’ll be relevant in the NHL by 2026-2027 at the absolute earliest.

Do you feel it wise to waste three more years of Suzuki and Caufield’s prime?

Waste or not the team is shit , they won't be relevant next year either way. Hugues is still getting rid of the garbage of Bergevin. We all knew this was gonna be a 4-5 years process. It's only the second year.

P a t i e n c e

 

[BehindTheTimes]

And draft someone in the 2024 draft who’ll be relevant in the NHL by 2026-2027 at the absolute earliest.

Do you feel it wise to waste three more years of Suzuki and Caufield’s prime?

With the state of the team I don’t see an easy way to accelerate the process without becoming tweeners like we’ve been for two decades. Suzuki and Caufield will most likely be playing their best hockey in 3-4 years.

PLD isn’t a game changer. He’s a complimentary piece to an already established team. We need to be in this for the long haul.