[Trade] Red Wings trade Jon Merrill to Canadiens for Hayden Verbeek, 2021 5th-round pick

[-Vintage Canuck-]

 

[Crabcakes]

Reason why Mete is on waivers.  Habs add big body on back end

 

 

Edited April 11, 2021 by Crabcakes

[DeNiro]

9 minutes ago, Crabcakes said:

Reason why Mete is on waivers.  Habs add big body on back end

 

 

“He’ll help the Canadiens in the playoffs”

 

Cart before the horse no?

[Roger Rabby]

20 minutes ago, DeNiro said:

“He’ll help the Canadiens in the playoffs”

 

Cart before the horse no?

Do you honestly see us, Calgary or Ottawa over taking them?

[DeNiro]

1 minute ago, Roger Rabby said:

Do you honestly see us, Calgary or Ottawa over taking them?

Montreal has lost 4 of 5, are struggling to score, and are without Price. Oh and their remaining schedule might be worse than ours.

 

Im just saying Habs fans shouldn’t get too cocky.

[SID.IS.SID.ME.IS.ME]

Nice pickup by the Habs. Merrill is very underrated, but statistically has been one of the very best defensive/suppression Dmen in the league.

 

EDIT: here’s a quick viz/chart

 

 

99th percentile EV defence is pretty darn good. Maybe not a ton of value in other areas, but that level of suppression can be very useful in most lineups/D corps.

Edited April 11, 2021 by SID.IS.SID.ME.IS.ME

[Provost]

7 minutes ago, DeNiro said:

Montreal has lost 4 of 5, are struggling to score, and are without Price. Oh and their remaining schedule might be worse than ours.

 

Im just saying Habs fans shouldn’t get too cocky.

We lost 3 in a row pre-Covid and are likely going to play a handful of our next games with half a roster made up of taxi squad and AHL players.

 

I think Montreal is reasonably safe with the less they built up.  They can feel cocky enough to think they are pretty likely to be playoff bound.

 

It Woolf take something miraculous out of us or Calgary to catch up.

[DeNiro]

4 minutes ago, Provost said:

We lost 3 in a row pre-Covid and are likely going to play a handful of our next games with half a roster made up of taxi squad and AHL players.

 

I think Montreal is reasonably safe with the less they built up.  They can feel cocky enough to think they are pretty likely to be playoff bound.

 

It Woolf take something miraculous out of us or Calgary to catch up.

It would be miraculous to go 4-0-1 better than the Habs with a game in hand?

 

You and I have different definitions of miraculous I guess. 
 

It would be tough no doubt but far from impossible.

[rekker]

19 minutes ago, Provost said:

We lost 3 in a row pre-Covid and are likely going to play a handful of our next games with half a roster made up of taxi squad and AHL players.

 

I think Montreal is reasonably safe with the less they built up.  They can feel cocky enough to think they are pretty likely to be playoff bound.

 

It Woolf take something miraculous out of us or Calgary to catch up.

I agree the Habs are reasonably safe and I have been watching them closely for a couple weeks now. I gotta say though with their injuries, if there is a team on the edge of collapse, it's the Habs. 

[Provost]

Just now, rekker said:

I agree the Habs are reasonably safe and I have been watching them closely for a couple weeks now. I gotta say though with their injuries, if there is a team on the edge of collapse, it's the Habs. 

You mean aside from us?  

 

We are probably 5 games in before we have a relatively intact roster as the guys trickle in out of Covid (assuming no one has lingering symptoms)... and that just gets us back to a roster that was performing terribly beforehand.

 

 

 

[Devron]

1 hour ago, Crabcakes said:

Reason why Mete is on waivers.  Habs add big body on back end

 

 

If you guys make the playoffs 

[Roger Rabby]

44 minutes ago, DeNiro said:

Montreal has lost 4 of 5, are struggling to score, and are without Price. Oh and their remaining schedule might be worse than ours.

 

Im just saying Habs fans shouldn’t get too cocky.

Fair point but after covid19 outbreak I'm not expecting much. In Calgary who knows wtf is going on there and Ottawa is trash. As for Price he hasn't been the best goalie for the habs for much of the year.

[King Heffy]

51 minutes ago, DeNiro said:

Montreal has lost 4 of 5, are struggling to score, and are without Price. Oh and their remaining schedule might be worse than ours.

 

Im just saying Habs fans shouldn’t get too cocky.

Ottawa is too far out, Calgary still hasn't brought in any men to play in their top six, and our team will likely still be feeling the effects of Covid.  I don't see anyone catching them.

[Provost]

Before folks get too excited... keep in mind Montreal has 5 of their remaining games against Calgary.

 

That means probably 10-12 guaranteed points between them.  If Montreal falls apart, then Calgary is the beneficiary who would then be surpassing us.  
 

If Montreal doesn’t fall apart, they have 5 games against the worst performing team in the NHL over the last 10 games (Calgary) plus 3 more games against Ottawa.  It is tough to imagine they won’t go above .500 against that opposition.

Edited April 11, 2021 by Provost

[rekker]

18 minutes ago, Provost said:

You mean aside from us?  

 

We are probably 5 games in before we have a relatively intact roster as the guys trickle in out of Covid (assuming no one has lingering symptoms)... and that just gets us back to a roster that was performing terribly beforehand.

 

 

 

Oh, believe me, I have no visions of playoffs for our team. Add to everything the upcoming stacked schedule? Forget about it. More just an observing the Habs and how they just don't have it either. Surprises me really as I liked the improvements Bergevin made last off season. I think he's scared for his job moving forward.

[Provost]

3 minutes ago, rekker said:

Oh, believe me, I have no visions of playoffs for our team. Add to everything the upcoming stacked schedule? Forget about it. More just an observing the Habs and how they just don't have it either. Surprises me really as I liked the improvements Bergevin made last off season. I think he's scared for his job moving forward.

I actually like the Habs, barring us making a miracle run, they are the team I would most like to win the Cup.. I feel bad that they are getting some bad breaks.  I still think they are making the playoffs and may even be a team that makes some noise there.

 

Say if they go just 5 of 8 against bottom feeding Ott & Cal

Then just 3 of 10 against the rest

 

That gives them 16 points for 59 on the season.  Throw a couple of loser points in there from OT losses and that is 61 points.

 

We need 27 points in 19 games to beat that total.  13-5-1 is a hard road with a depleted roster.

 

 

[Quantum]

Hayden Verbeek is the nephew of Red Wings AGM Pat Verbeek. I wonder if Hayden will get an extended look because of that with the Red Wings organization and isn’t just some contract matching throw in. 

[rekker]

2 minutes ago, Quantum said:

Hayden Verbeek is the nephew of Red Wings AGM Pat Verbeek. I wonder if Hayden will get an extended look because of that with the Red Wings organization and isn’t just some contract matching throw in. 

Pat Verbeek. The original "little ball of hate"  

[zimmy]

34 minutes ago, rekker said:

Pat Verbeek. The original "little ball of hate"  

I thought that was Stan Jonathan, or so Pierre Bouchard tells the story! (I realize this is only makes sense to someone over 50 but look the Jonathan/Bouchard fight up, factor in about 8 inches of height and 45 pounds and then enjoy one of the defining moments in ball of hate history).

Edited April 11, 2021 by zimmy

[Provost]

29 minutes ago, rekker said:

Pat Verbeek. The original "little ball of hate"  

I will always have a soft spot for him

as my best draft pick in my first ever hockey pool in my first year of university.

 

He was in Hartford, I picked him late and he got me a ton of points which made me a couple hundred dollars.