Two years later: Revisiting the Kotkaniemi - Dvorak swap
- Thread starter DAChampion
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Similar to the PK trade.
Moving on from KK was the right move given the crazy deal he signed.
Moving on from PK was the right move givem the massive deal + injuries.
Where they falted was on the management aspect. They should have gotten more for PK, and also should have moved KK sooner.
Everyone knows they should have also moved Carey when he wanted to bank in, but Bergevin opted to live/die with him.
It took a boatload of luck, including a random pandemic, but it got Bergey a Stanley Cup run so im sure he's happy.
Too much risk when KK signed the offer sheet. Obviously there was always ability to negotiate a longer term deal with a lower avg cap hit after the fact but KK wasn't obligated to sign it and required a huge QO.
I'm not defending the situation as the best case scenario was we had him signed earlier but once shit hit the fan KK became a flight risk.
He's still looking like he'll probably be a 2nd line C which we were hoping he'd be after Suzuki but shit happens. Not happy we got Dvorak either but we move on.
I'm not defending the situation as the best case scenario was we had him signed earlier but once shit hit the fan KK became a flight risk.
He's still looking like he'll probably be a 2nd line C which we were hoping he'd be after Suzuki but shit happens. Not happy we got Dvorak either but we move on.
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BeliveauFan4ever
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- Apr 10, 2006
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In regards to Carey, that's not a guy you just randomly trade.
Everything is great in hindsight when someone like Carey is likely done playing hockey but this guy was supposed to be our Lundqvist and be with us till the end.
I have no regrets about the Carey Price contract because no one thought he'd be finished as soon as he was. We thought he'd go for a while longer before likely ending with 1-2 years left on his deal.
Should be a third option for just keeping the picks/trading for someone who wasn't Dvorak. Theoretically a fourth option for "don't be a weird control freak about stuff all the time, bury the hatchet and sign him to a respectable 2x3.75M bridge in July to show good faith to an unhappy player" as well.
At the time I thought it was fine because that number was just nuts for KK and I don't think it made sense to play that game, and I don't really like the contract he's on (although it'll probably be fine with the cap increasing). I thought Dvorak could maybe take a half-step with us to be a low-end 2C somewhere around the like 48-55pt range too. Dvorak hasn't really worked out, but I don't really care too much about the price paid, he's still an NHL middle sixer/good 3C-serviceable 2C and paid fairly, we'll get something OK back for him in trade eventually and he's a decent soldier during the rebuild.
Overall I moderately regret the Dvorak trade but don't really mind it that much since I don't think it'll be a catastrophe for asset management (at least in isolation, the asset management of 3rd overall pick becoming Dvorak and then Dvorak's trade return is of course terrible). I don't regret letting KK go to Carolina at all either. I do still think he has some upside left (he's still a string bean, EVENTUALLY he'll get his man strength and stop being Bambiniemi) but I'm much happier moving forward with Dach and Suzuki, and I doubt the Dach trade happens if Kotkaniemi was still around. Kotkaniemi is good and will probably be like a Charlie Coyle and it sucks to lose to that for Dvorak but not gonna jump off a bridge over it.
At the time I thought it was fine because that number was just nuts for KK and I don't think it made sense to play that game, and I don't really like the contract he's on (although it'll probably be fine with the cap increasing). I thought Dvorak could maybe take a half-step with us to be a low-end 2C somewhere around the like 48-55pt range too. Dvorak hasn't really worked out, but I don't really care too much about the price paid, he's still an NHL middle sixer/good 3C-serviceable 2C and paid fairly, we'll get something OK back for him in trade eventually and he's a decent soldier during the rebuild.
Overall I moderately regret the Dvorak trade but don't really mind it that much since I don't think it'll be a catastrophe for asset management (at least in isolation, the asset management of 3rd overall pick becoming Dvorak and then Dvorak's trade return is of course terrible). I don't regret letting KK go to Carolina at all either. I do still think he has some upside left (he's still a string bean, EVENTUALLY he'll get his man strength and stop being Bambiniemi) but I'm much happier moving forward with Dach and Suzuki, and I doubt the Dach trade happens if Kotkaniemi was still around. Kotkaniemi is good and will probably be like a Charlie Coyle and it sucks to lose to that for Dvorak but not gonna jump off a bridge over it.
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Exactly. They treated KK badly and then likely lowballed him. Either that or he has a thin skin and wouldn't accept a reasonable offer. There was no point matching because he likely wouldn't have stayed or he would have wanted 6m on a long term deal. Dvorak was stupid. With Danault gone they should have given up on the season unless they could have gotten Dvorak for just a 1st. A 1st and 2nd was idiotic.Feels we're not reading the same thread.
Most perspectives generally boils down to:
Should have let KK walk, kept the picks instead of getting Dvo, with the added thought that the situation should've never been allowed to degenerate that far in the first place.
Apart from a few outliers, haven't read that many comments like the one you're describing. Unless you're basing it on the poll, which was lacking the third option I described which might have been the dominant result.
Discussions were heavy back then. A lot of us wanted to move on from him because you can't really win when you build around a 10M+ goalie anymore. You can get close, but youre better off moving away at the right time and focus on building the team in front. Of course, this is a generality, we can be more specific and given the team we had + prospects, it didnt make sense to extend him to that contract.
In fairness to mb, I don't think he was ever given the mandate to give up on the season and chance of playoffs.
Plus iirc he had already made his "moves" for the next season (Hoffman?) So giving up on the season because you lost a 23 point centre seemed pretty silly, especially after just making the finals.
It was a desperation move and the one that I think finally got him fired.
Takeru
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- Oct 6, 2014
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I agree it would have been though to move on from Price, but Bergy also dealt fan favorite Subban the summer before the contract extension, so it's not as if he lacked the willingness to do such moves.
Also, the injury concerns were present and raised by many at the time, especially considering the mileage on Price and the seasons he got bombarded regularly with 40+ shots a night.
Ultimately, whether keeping or dealing him was the right move, the far worse offense was not doing enough to overhaul the roster after hinging that massive bet on Price. We wouldn't necessarily be better off today but that came with choosing that path and it might have cost us a cup.
I just don't see it. I realize HF stands for hockey's future so we love picks, prospects and get off on the tanking, rebuilding, retooling stuff but when you have a star goalie loved by fans, unofficial captain of the team and we want to 'trade and restart' with a 29 year old(he signed extension at 29) goalie it becomes a bit far fetched as a proposition.
Dude literally was in his prime at the time, 2 years removed from 4 awards in a single year.
By comparison, Patrick Roy was traded at 30 and the 2nd half of his career was HHOF worthy on its own.
Like I said, Carey was expected to be with us until the end like Henrik was for NY.
We said what we said, and we were proven right. Just a big fat waste of ours and Carey's time.
Well he got a similarly talented player back in Weber. We can debate forever which one is marginally better but they were both elite D and both being paid a lot.
MB didn't trade PK for futures or Ryder+Halak+2nd(for those who remember). He got a legitimate player back.
So maybe MB could've traded him but from looks of it he'd want someone equal back and goalies never ever get star talent back. It's very rare.
As for the rest of MB's legacy that is a mixed bag for me. A GM guilty of both stockpiling picks to think of the future but adding vets to compete. You have to pick a side at a certain point and he didn't.
nhlfan9191
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- Aug 4, 2010
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Dvorak was a panic move from a GM who was trying to save his own job and couldn’t care less about anything else including the team. Carolina’s OS on KK was so aggressive he had to be let go but there was zero reason to acquire Dvorak, especially at that price.
Why is it a waste of Carey's time? Dude's extension kicked in 2018 and he played 2 seasons before having an injury he couldn't fix. In those 2 seasons he went to the finals once.
So I don't think he's too mad about it.
Not sure how mad you can be with a contract that's double what you're really worth, but it was pretty obviously the wrong decision for the habs and Carey. That's all she wrote, bud, his career came and went. Cupless.
- Jun 24, 2012
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Where’s the poster who claimed that this fanbase forgets?
We should have a thread about revisiting past disasters due to our PTSD tendencies. Otherwise, they’ll keep popping up everywhere. We just can’t get over anything.
Whalers Fan
Go Habs!
Had the Habs matched, though, what would KK's subsequent contract have looked like? It's safe to assume that he would not have been open to signing a long term deal similar to the one that Carolina offered him.
The mistake began with the Aho offer sheet, and was followed up by not anticipating a retaliatory OS and getting KK signed before that could happen. IMO, the only thing Bergevin got right was not matching that OS. KK wasn't happy, so future contract negotiations probably would not have went well. However, Bergevin then panicked and threw away the first round pick on Dvorak.
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Takeru
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True, but high end goalies rarely ever get traded either. Hard to get a picture of what the market would have been for Price at that point in time.
Either way, it could be argued, joke trade aside, that it would have been better off trading both PK and Price for futures. But yeah, that's not what happened and we won't derail the thread on what ifs.
Agreed on MB's legacy, he will be remembered as flip flopping between directions and never sticking long enough to a course to yield optimal results.
You think Carey price 2 years after winning Vezina, William Jennings, Hart and Lindsay was worth 5.75 mil a year?
I mean...for context only one goalie has ever won the Lindsay trophy in its history, it's Carey Price. Only 1 goalie won the hart since Theodore in 2001-02...it's Carey Price. Only 6 goalies have won the Hart in it's 100 year existence. Carey is one of them.
By no means am I suggesting he was expected to be a superstar until he's late 30s but dude was a stud, offering him half of what he got makes no sense even if I do agree it was very expensive for a goalie.
Yeah, I do. Of course he could have got more somewhere else, and while that contract would've sucked too, at least it wouldn't have been on our books.
Then I just plain don't get it. I took a look in Caufield thread and you called it a fantastic deal for 2 half a seasons of an undersized scorer. Don't get me wrong, I love Cole but we've seen undersized players diminish over time and this one came off a season ending injury and is getting nearly 8 million dollars.
But a goalie in his prime cleaning up NHL awards is worth 5.75 ish? That just seems like either you don't like Carey, you're exaggerating OR you're using the gift of hindsight to make your conclusion.
Either way, if you feel Carey was a goalie only worth 5.75 we would've gotten nothing for him.
Edit: I am not implying I like Carey at 10.5M. Only that 5.75 seems low. Somewhere in the middle made sense. Like 8.5-9 ish.
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Carey wasn't in his prime at the start of that deal. He had already had a major injury and had like 600 games under his belt. What you think he was going to make it to 1000 games or something? Obviously we were not buying his best years, and buying them at a price that would require vezina caliber goaltending every year to justify.
In comparison Cole is 22, realistically the best goal scorer we can get, and not even the highest paid player on the team.
1000 games would've meant 4-5 seasons more so yes, that's realistic unless you get career ending injury.
My comparison to Cole was that he's undersized with an injury and at his size susceptible to more and we have no issue with it despite his small track record. Him being the highest or 2nd highest player on the team doesn't change value of the contract. That said I like Cole and I think he'll be fine but there's risk there too, that's all I am saying.
In any case Carey was injured and his contract doesn't really affect our cap the same way it would if he was around so its all pointless now.
Only been done 3 times before ---> realistic.
This is why I was right, and Price nuthuggers were wrong. They substitute wishful thinking and ignore basic facts of life like ageing and wear and tear, and I don't.
