Habs News: Montreal Canadiens, NHL, Marc Bergevin, Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Carolina Hurricanes, Offer Sheet, Sebastian Aho, Nick Suzuki, Alex Galchenyuk

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A Careful Choice

Late afternoon on Saturday, the Carolina Hurricanes announced that they had tendered an offer sheet to Canadiens centre Jesperi Kotkaniemi. Following the stunning news, the Canes poked the bear with a myriad of well-played jabs in the direction of Marc Bergevin and the Montreal Canadiens. And then everything went quiet, publicly, as the clock ticked down on the 7-day timer for the Canadiens to make their decision.

But behind the scenes, we are confident that GM Bergevin is huddled with his advisors pouring over his options. Will Bergevin match the Hurricanes one-year $6.1 million offer or will he allow his first pick of the 2018 NHL Entry Draft, third overall, leave the organization for a considerably less valuable first round pick in 2022 accompanied by a third round pick?

Overwhelmingly, Habs fans are content to let Kotkaniemi go to Carolina. Some are downright thrilled but that no doubt can be attributed to the negatively-slanted reporting on KK by the Montreal media (initiated to protect Phillip Danault.) Or perhaps many simply don’t understand the process or ‘the plan.’

Addressing the Void Down the Middle

To get a sense of Bergevin’s plan, we have to return to the 2017 playoffs, where the Atlantic Division champions, the Canadiens, were ousted by an Eastern Conference wild card team, the New York Rangers in six games. Throughout the series Montreal struggled mightily to generate offence. The Habs centres, Danault, Tomas Plekanec, Brian Flynn, and Steve Ott combined for just one goal in the series.

Just weeks after the bitter playoff loss, Marc Bergevin acquired Jonathan Drouin with the intention of making him the team’s number one centre. As we know, that experiment was a complete failure. Exactly one year later Drouin tried again to trade for a centre acquiring Max Domi. That too, would be a failed attempt.

But one week after the Domi trade, Bergevin made the first positive step to solidifying the centre position by drafting Jesperi Kotkaniemi. Less than three months later, the general manager acquired a second centre when he traded Max Pacioretty for Nick Suzuki.

We have heard the Canadiens brass speak in glowing terms about the belief that Suzuki and Kotkaniemi could excel at being Montreal’s ‘1-2 punch’ down the middle for a decade or more. But management’s decision-making on Kotkaniemi put that plan in peril.

Multiple mistakes

There’s little debate that the Canadiens rushed Kotkaniemi into the NHL when he should have returned to Finland for one more year. Then a combination of Claude Julien and Dominique Ducharme took turns undercutting the young player’s confidence. And neither head coach put Kotkaniemi in a position to succeed with a dizzying array of linemates and no defined role.

While Kotkaniemi, known for a competitive personality, has excelled in the Canadiens last two playoff appearances (second in goals in 2021), his numbers have been below expectations during the regular season affected by poor coaching. This allowed Bergevin to low-ball his camp during negotiations for a contract extension. It has been reported that the Canadiens offered between $2.2 and $2.5 million each year of a two-year contract.

So, with the Hurricanes offering $6.1 million on a one-year contract, it was an easy decision for Kotkaniemi. It was a well-structured offer by the Canes, who want the player, and have put the Canadiens in a difficult position. It is a far more intelligent play than the inept, P.R. stunt to offer sheet Sebastian Aho pulled by Bergevin and the Canadiens in July of 2019.

And Bergevin has no one to blame but himself for opening the door to a hostile offer dragging out the contract negotiations until just weeks before the start of training camp.

But the culpability goes beyond this off-season.

Thinking Long-term

In the past 40 years, the Canadiens have had just two top-three picks in the Entry Draft. Both have occurred on Bergevin’s watch: Kotkaniemi and Alex Galchenyuk. In each case mistakes were made in development and transition to the NHL. And it appears that both will exit the organization within short order.

That could be a legacy of major failure for Marc Bergevin.

Given that a pick like Kotkaniemi comes around so rarely in the organization, Bergevin must carefully consider the long-term aspects of the decision he is about to make. If the general manager lets Kotkaniemi walk, it is highly unlikely that he can acquire a player with the same ceiling for the compensation he receives from Carolina. And that will certainly affect the Canadiens ability “to build on what we’ve already accomplished” as stated by Ducharme last Friday.

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