HF Habs: Some statistics that explain the situation of the Habs

[Doc McKenna]

There's no "official" record, as far as I know, since it's not a stat the league appears to record, or at least it's left to the teams who count the numbers in inconsistent ways and often don't make them public. So if you can indulge the explanation of an amateur hack...

tl;dr version: The "record" holder depends on who you count - doesn't really matter since anything above 500 is a lot

Full version:
It was the 03/04 Kings who were reported as having the record with 629. No breakdown available from the time, but I tried to reconstruct it and got 637. Caveats to that: It includes a missed season by Adam Deadmarsh who never played again (but unclear looking back if he was known/understood to have effectively retired already), plus 67 games by Jared Aulin, who was a prospect with 17 games played the previous season, got traded at the deadline while injured and never made it back to the NHL (but had a pro career).

I don't know what the team itself recorded (if anything) but last year's Canadiens have been reported as having beaten the record with anything up to about 750. I had them at 599 but noting the following:

- I didn't count the first 13 games of Carey Price's absence while he was in the Player Assistance Program (though not entirely clear when he actually came out), though he was clearly still injured at the same time

- I excluded 82 games of Shea Weber on the basis of him being effectively retired (and replaced)

- I excluded 79 games combined from Joël Teasdale and Josh Brook being on Season Opening IR, since neither were realistic roster candidates

- I excluded 4 games that Gianni Fairbrother spent in Covid protocol while he was on the taxi squad not the main roster

So depending what you choose to count, they were somewhere between falling short of the Kings' number or blowing a mile past it. Obviously, the other significant bit of context is that the Canadiens had 70 games missed for Covid-related reasons and they didn't appear desperate to campaign for postponements when their big outbreak hit in December, unlike contending teams.

Breakdowns of the two teams (and the 500+MGL Canadiens of 2000/01) below FWIW.

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The kings and last years habs had essentially retired players on the roster. My memories of the habs in 2001 was we didn't have that kind of circumstance. It was mainly a lot of freaky bad injuries. As you mentioned Covid and such are a little different as well. We had mandatory time for isolation and it could quarantine more than a single player. In the late 90's and 2000's There wasn't a protocol for much of anything. Not head injuries, not cold and flu. Just get out there and play. Also much like the kings of the same era, habs had multiple 400 plus MGI seasons in a 5-6 year span.

Another 3 years will have been 5 years. This is perpetual losing and how you become the Sabres or Coyotes. This year should be the last tanking year while we gradually add pieces to supplement the young core.

My only argument against that is the massive cap issue left behind by bargainbin. We need to clear out a bunch so we can find the right combination of vets and young talent, instead of some of the bloated deadwood contracts floating around right now.