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The case to resign Monahan

Created by: jonh514
Team: 2024-25 Montreal Canadiens
Initial Creation Date: Jan. 26, 2024
Published: Jan. 26, 2024
Salary Cap Mode: Basic
Description
Ok guys, I get it. Monahan is probably (especially the way he's played since Boston) gonna bring back a late 1st round pick. I really, truly, get it. It true that it's probably the smart move. But I know 3 things that are also true:

1) The second we trade Sean Monahan, we are going to be looking for a replacement for Sean Monahan. I know people say that often about Anderson, but this really is different. Sean Monahan means so much to this team and the Chemistry they have in place, especially on the PP, is not something you swap a Roy in and it just continues.
2) The player we pick with the 29-32 pick we get back for him, may never make the NHL, and probably will never be as good as Monahan will be over the next 3 seasons
3) We regret Danault. Badly! Chicago regretted trading him to us, and we regretted letting him go over 0.5M in cap space per season. They are different players, but the value they brought to their respective Habs teams was the same.

What are the two big knocks against resigning him?

1) He's gonna be too old when Guhle, Reinbacher, Hutson, Mesar, Slafkovsky and co are ready to compete.
2) He's gonna want a lot of money, so we should trade him and use the asset we get back plus some other assets to shop for a different player

He might be too old at age 32-34 to help this team. It could be true. But it's not always true. Markov was at his absolute best during those years. Weber was amazing during those years. Crosby & Malkin are pretty freaking incredible today and they are much older.

Packaging the pick we get for Monahan is a nice idea, but the truth is we have 3 other first round picks we can trade over this year and next. We can only pick so many players. We have too many picks as it is, and we're not the only ones.

We need cap space? Send some mid round picks to a team to dump Allen, Anderson, Armia. Isn't keeping those guys and some middling picks over Monahan tantamount to giving Gallagher & Anderson 12M and letting Danault walk?

Let's keep him AND acquire some other players. This team with a healthy Dach is already that much better. No we don't have the raw talent of Ottawa or Buffalo. But talent isn't everything. The team that wins the cup each year is the hardest working, not the most talented. One thing I know about Sean Monahan, he comes to work every day and works his butt off.
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2$1,400,000
2$1,100,000
UFAYEARSCAP HIT
5$6,000,000
7$11,000,000
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ANA
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  2. Armia, Joel
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2024
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24$87,500,000$83,578,750$1,022,500$3,977,500$3,921,250
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$7,850,000$7,850,000
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$7,875,000$7,875,000
C
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RW
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C, LW, RW
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$950,000$950,000 (Performance Bonus$3,500,000$4M)
RW, LW
RFA - 1
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$2,900,000$2,900,000
C, LW
RFA - 3
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$1,700,000$1,700,000
C
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$3,150,000$3,150,000
G
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G
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LD
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$3,500,000$3,500,000
RD
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G
NMC
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RD
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RW, LW
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LW, RW
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Jan. 26 at 10:46 a.m.
#26
Habs 2010
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Edited Jan. 26 at 10:51 a.m.
Max Domi got a 2nd round pick at least year's trade deadline, he was scoring at a pace of 66 pts in 82 games before being traded. Domi signed a 1 year contract worth $3,000,000 the following season.

Monahan is on pace for 60 pts this season. He will probably get more than Domi based on reputation, a better contract, and he's a faceoff specialist.

I'd try to land a late 1st or a 2nd + Prospect for Monahan. I also get the argument that MTL should resign him, because you are right his work in the bumper on the powerplay has been what MTL has needed for a long long time... but $6M × 5 years for a player with his injury history is insane. If Monahan is prepared to extend now for $3.5M × 4 years I'd consider it, otherwise trade him and circle back in the offseason.

Edit: I use the Domi comparison because both players benefit immensely from the extra powerplay time, something they are less likely to get on a contender.
Andy_Dick and jonh514 liked this.
Jan. 26 at 11:39 a.m.
#27
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HuGo is a Boss GM
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Quoting: Jobob77
Monahan is a good 3C and helped a lot the young core of MTL. However, don’t fall in love with players like Bergevin did, espicially during a rebuild.

Monahan is good at the moment on the PP1 but next year the team will clearly want to put Dacher on this PP1 instead of him. He would lose quality time on the poweplay. Next year, Hughes will want to showcase Dvorak and Armia to sell at their highest value comes TDL2025. If you have Monahan in the lineup, he will steal a lot of quality minutes from them.

The 1st pick they will acquire (if they don’t flip it come draft day) might not pan out but it is the principle of a rebuild. If you have more lottery tickets, youhave more chance to win the jackpot. A late 1st can become Pastrnak, Tage Thompson, Debrincat, Aho, role players or non-NHL players. You mentionned that the 1st pick would not be as good as Monahan in three years. Why that window? MTL have 4-5 years still of bad contracts and Suz-Caufield still have 7 years on their contracts. HuGo probably planified that in 4 or 5 years from now the group that they put together will be ready and will be contenders.

Maybe Bergevin regets that he didn’t sign Danault but i think that he regrets a lot more that he didn’t trade Gallagher, Armia, Petry and Price when they were at their max value. Instead, they signed those players to reward contracts like you want to do with Monahan. It is absolutely not a disrespect to those players. Simply, you build a group of players with the same age. When they reach 28-30 years old, if your group is constantly contending you can still push for a year or two but you prepare yourself to return in a rebuild sooner rather than later.

You mentionned that Crosby and Malkin were still good at 32-34 yo. PIT is a good example. PIT won the cup early in their rebuild and carried the core until they were 28-30 and won two other cups. After that the best would have been to start a rebuild and trade the core for future assets. Instead (certainly in part because of the ownership), since the last cup, they are a middle of the pack team and one of the worst prospect pool in the league.

In summary, in the next years, you’ll see Monahan, Matheson, Savard get traded and it is what’s best for the team and the future. Their visit to Montreal will be greatly appreciated and useful. The transmission of their leadership to the core group of players may be one of the reasons why MTL will win a Stanley Cup. However, we need to be able to trade them when the time comes.


Not for nothing, cause I appreciate your response, but if the Canadiens have not won the cup in 5 years I at least expect them to have been in the playoffs in all of 2025-26 to 2029-30. This fanbase has been patient, more patient than Molson ever thought we could be, but we should not fall into the trap of the Buffalo perpetual rebuild. You need a balanced lineup of veterans and youth at all positions and that includes center. If you are planning to try to win the cup with a group of entirely sub age 30 players, you will never win it.
Jan. 26 at 12:08 p.m.
#28
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Quoting: jonh514
Not for nothing, cause I appreciate your response, but if the Canadiens have not won the cup in 5 years I at least expect them to have been in the playoffs in all of 2025-26 to 2029-30. This fanbase has been patient, more patient than Molson ever thought we could be, but we should not fall into the trap of the Buffalo perpetual rebuild. You need a balanced lineup of veterans and youth at all positions and that includes center. If you are planning to try to win the cup with a group of entirely sub age 30 players, you will never win it.


I agree with you, you need a mix of veterans and younger players. When you are at the start of the rebuilding process (2 years) you gradually sell the veterans with more value and keep or acquire veterans with leadership but with lower value. Unfortunately, to stay rational, you need to see your players a bit like assets.

Once you have a core of young players (6-7 F and 3-4 D) that can make the playoffs by themself, you are ready to acquire veterans with more value and push for few years.

Wanting to speed up that process led MTL to 20 middle of the pack years. MTL is absolutely not in a perpetual rebuild. The rebuild started 2 years ago. I would not say that the fanbase has been patient yet. MTL need the fanbase to be patient for another 2-3 years at least.

Personally, I hope that the mangers will stick to their plan even if MTL makes the playoffs next year or if they missed them until 2026-2027.

No more emotional management, stay rational wink
 
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