1- Habs don't only lose out on FA's to California or Florida. A lot of players still sign in Buffalo (Okposo), Minnesota (Staal), Detroit (Green) and those have similar weather and are taxed, as well.
2 - If one of the reasons players don't come here is because they don't want to send their kids to French school, that says more about them than Montreal.
I have never seen that happen: Gionta, Cole, Petry all embraced and wantingly sent their kids to do schooling in French albeit private…. Oh yeah all were American players too.
Miller Time went ballistic a couple of months back on one of my posts saying money may be most important to me but not players…. well when your career is maybe 10-12 years if you’re amongst the most fortunate…. it is the prime driver
Over 80% of these players don’t have a post playing career to fall back on & they’ve got another 40+ years to live
The other key factor is anonymity IMO - American athletes are raised wanting to be “the star athlete”, Cdn players simply aren’t culturally which is why Subban stood out like a sore thumb & created so much backlash. It’s why American players have been more willing to sign as UFAs vs Cdn ones IMO - they embrace the star power associated w being a Hab ($$ being equal of course)
As for Minny - who have they really signed except Parise & Suter, both mid Westerners who made it clear they wanted to play close to home (Chi or Minny). As for Staal, loved anonymity..
Habs UFA focus, should they want to even go that route, needs to be American players, bonus contracts are just too much of an advantage to pass up for US players …