The Montreal Canadiens' annual golf tournament gave us a great opportunity to better understand the Chris Kreider signing and address the proverbial elephant in the room.
It’s been a long time since a free-agent signing created such a mixed reaction from this market’s fan base, but when the Montreal Canadiens announced they had put pen to paper on a one-year deal with Chris Kreider on Saturday, it prompted a social media storm. For some long-standing fans, it was an affront to the events of 2014, but for the Habs’ brass, it was a solid decision that addressed many of the team’s needs, and they discussed it at length before hitting the links for their annual golf tournament.
Coach Martin St-Louis said it best when he was asked what he liked about him:
The first thing that comes to mind with Chris, obviously, is his speed, his compete level, and when you have that kind of speed, you can bring physicality. To me it’s simple: you look at our club; what do we need? Well, we need probably a little more experience: check; a little more sandpaper: he checks that box; net-front guy: checks that box. All these boxes wouldn’t matter unless he was a quality human being, right, and to me, it starts with that.
More than all the boxes he checked, the Kreider signing was also about whether he'd fit into the team's culture; he wouldn’t disrupt what's been built in the dressing room. President of hockey operations Jeff Gorton also made that clear:
Obviously, we weren’t expecting him to be available, but when he became available, we looked at our roster and thought he could be a good fit for a lot of reasons: size, speed, experience, and a strong playoff record. I knew that he would be a really good fit in the room; it just seemed like there weren’t really any negatives when we were thinking about it. Thankfully, once we spoke to him and went through the whole process, once he called us and said he really wanted to come to Montreal and liked our group we were all excited about that.
Gorton, who was with the New York Rangers in 2014 when Kreider famously crashed into Carey Price, explained:
It’s been a long time; we always knew Carey never held a grudge, and that helps. I was with New York when it happened, right, so I had a different perspective than maybe some people here did, but when you’re going 30 miles an hour…I don’t think anybody can stand here and say that was intentionally done. If you know Chris, he’s played almost a thousand games, and if you go ask anybody in the NHL, he’s never tried to hurt anybody. He’s a good person, so I wouldn’t worry about it. I think it’s going to all work out.
As for the man himself, Kreider is fully aware of just how passionate the Montreal fan base is, and he knows what kind of welcome to expect:
A passionate one. As I said, it’s a passionate fanbase. I think they’ve got long memories, so either way, I'm going to go out there and work as hard as I can and do whatever it takes to help this team win hockey games.
The events of the past didn’t make him or the team think twice about Kreider joining the Canadiens:
No, not from them, not on my part, so…what happened in the past happened; it was not intentional in any way. I was just a young kid and a pretty bad skater at the time, trying to score a goal, and things happen, so it’s hockey; it’s fast; we move on, and I’m happy to be here.
In other words, all those involved in the events have moved on and the Canadiens’ brass is confident that this knowledgeable fan base will be able to do the same, especially considering everything Kreider brings to the table. Because on top of his speed, skill and grit, the big forward also brings a wealth of experience, which is something GM Kent Hughes really values:
Of course it’s important for us. I’ve always argued that the year the Bruins won the Cup in 2011, […] I noticed the experience that Mark Recchi brought to the players. Especially in a Game 7, he was so calm. There are things that you have to live through to be able to know what it’s like. Chris has a lot of playoff and international experience.
Some will be quick to point out that the Canadiens already had plenty of experience with Brendan Gallagher, but they pushed him toward the door by giving him a smaller role on the ice, and that’s true, but unlike Gallagher, Kreider hasn’t slowed down much. The organization believes the power forward still has some very good hockey in his future, as St-Louis said.
Clearly the Canadiens were very keen on adding Kreider, the American explained:
Montreal was pretty aggressive out of the gate, and obviously there are several connections to my time spent in New York, so there’s familiarity there, so I think that certainly helped as well, and I think just everything they’re doing here, and that they’ve been doing for a few years now, the culture that they’ve built, the group that they have…Obviously, it’s a pretty big hockey city; the passion. I mean, I tried to explain it to my friends; it’s not just a sport here, it’s a religion.
If you’re wondering, Price hasn’t reached out to Kreider since the signing, and no, they haven’t bumped into each other, at least not since that day in 2014… La Presse’s Guillaume Lefrancois got everyone laughing in the scrum when he used those words. Clearly, he only wondered if the two players had interacted since the incident, but the use of the words “bump into Price” prompted a good laugh from everyone, Kreider included. At the end of the day, though, hockey players do what they do to win a Stanley Cup, and at 35, Kreider still hasn’t done that, but he sees Montreal as a place where he could make his dream come true:
They reached the conference final; they’re there, they’re ready to take the next step, in my mind, and I’m just happy to be a part of it.
The veteran added that Montreal was the only team with which he discussed terms and numbers, which just shows how much he believes in what has been built here and how much he wants to be part of it.
When the puck drops on the new season, Kreider will be wearing number 22 with the Sainte-Flanelle since his usual 20 is Juraj Slafkovsky’s number, and yes, there might be some fans who hold a grudge, but if he delivers on the ice as he’s done it in his 14 years in the league, he’ll win them over.
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