Yeah I said Laine said that, not that I agree with hin. IMO I think it's a win-win situation. You guys made a culture move. A high salary guy like that who doesn't want to be there is just a distraction.
And on top of it, you also get his huge cap hit back in cap space.
Habs GM saw an opportunity and pulled the trigger. He already scored some big goals for us and helped made our PP legit. We might end up re-signing him long term or trading him or assets next year.
The problem with Laine, at least while he was here was mainly two things.
1) he was streaky af, not always his own doing but there would be long pointless stretches. Sometimes it would be because he would get hot, get injured, miss time and then come back cold, really trying to do too much to try and make a play.
2) I already touched on it, but his inability to stay healthy can be a huge issue and I think it's part of why Montreal was able to get him fly so cheap. If he can have some luck and stay healthy it's a steal for y'all. If he misses 60-80 games over the next two seasons and doesn't re-sign, well things look a little different. But to the point, almost every time Laine would get going, it would almost always inevitably end with him getting hurt and missing weeks if not months of time.