Montreal GM Kent Hughes re-acquired Jeff Petry and traded him again. With all of the moves, where have the Canadiens made gains?
When Kent Hughes spoke to Kyle Dubas, now GM of the Pittsburgh Penguins, on the eve of the recent three-team trade, the Canadiens general manager learned something. And as it turned out, it was the key to facilitating the blockbuster.
The revelation? The Montreal Canadiens were not on Jeff Petry's 15-team no-trade list. "I was under the impression that we were on Jeff Petry's no-trade list," said Hughes at his media availability on Tuesday. Once that was determined, the Canadiens were able to act as a broker to clear the way for Erik Karlsson to become a Penguin.
The addition of Petry to a Canadiens blueline would have created obstacles for the promising group of young defensemen. But that was never in the cards, according to Hughes. The plan was to move the 35-year-old veteran before the start of camp.
So on Tuesday afternoon, the Canadiens announced that Hughes had sent Petry to the Detroit Red Wings in exchange for defenseman Gustav Lindstrom and a conditional fourth-round pick in 2025. The fourth-round pick in 2025 will be the later of Detroit or Boston's pick.
The Canadiens will retain 50 percent of Petry's remaining salary, which will result in a $2.34 million cap hit for the next two seasons.
When all the dust settled, Hughes has shipped out Mike Hoffman and Rem Pitlick while acquiring Lindstrom, goaltender Casey DeSmith, forward Nathan Legare, a second-round pick in 2025 and a conditional fourth-round pick in 2025. And Hughes will foot the bill for part of Petry's salary.
In reviewing the three-team trade, the Canadiens GM was universally praised for dealing Hoffman without retaining salary. But the initial reaction proved to be too good to be true. While Hoffman's cap hit of $4.5 million for one year is off the books, the Petry flip will add $2.34 million to the bottom line for the next two years.
Tallying up the dollars to Petry, Joel Edmundson and Karl Alzner, the Canadiens will have close to $5 million in dead cap money this season.
It's hard to think of trading Pitlick's salary as a saving. The 26-year-old would not have impacted the cap greatly as it's likely he would have spent the majority of the season in Laval. With the writing on the wall, Pitlick requested a trade.
With respect to the other players acquired, Lindstrom was a second-round pick in 2017 who has fallen out of favour with the Red Wings. Last season he was a frequent scratch for Detroit, playing just 36 games for a weak defensive team. The right-shot Lindstrom, who turns 25-years-old in October, likely falls behind Johnathan Kovacevic on the Habs depth chart.
Hughes said that the club's pro scouts like the player. "They feel like he's a really smart puck-moving defenseman and that he still has a lot of room to grow in his game," said Hughes. "The number that they threw out was that he's about 70 per cent of what they believe his potential is."
That may mean that Lindstrom could start the season in Laval to determine his ceiling. But this isn't a player who should be expected to turn heads.
Legare is a gritty forward who will likely occupy a bottom six role in Laval. He's not a player who is not on a development path to the NHL.
As a result of the trade DeSmith became the fourth Canadiens goalie with an NHL contract. The 32-year-old DeSmith had a mediocre season appearing in 38 games for the Penguins last year. It was believed that DeSmith represented an insurance policy should Cayden Primeau be claimed off waivers if sent to Laval at the start of the season.
At the media availability, Hughes said that he reached out to DeSmith to let him know that it's not his intention to bury the veteran goalie in Laval. The Canadiens GM also mentioned that he asked DeSmith to be patient. Challenged by a saturated goalie market, is Hughes attempting to trade one of his netminders?
So what did these two sets of transactions accomplish for the Canadiens?
Firstly, we learned that Hughes is working towards being cap-compliant by opening night so that they can put Carey Price's salary on in-season long-term injured reserve. This meant that the general manager couldn't hold on to Petry until the deadline to create a bidding war.
Hughes conveyed that he could have waited to maximize the return for Petry but promised him that he would move him as soon as possible. "I promised him that we would work expeditiously to get him moved and that we wouldn't drag this out to try to maximize every piece of value in the trade," said Hughes.
This was not the charitable gesture that some are painting it to be. Moving Petry prior to training camp will help the Canadiens meet their cap goals giving Hughes greater flexibility to manage dollars.
In addition, the move removed an impediment for their young defensemen. Similarly, trading Hoffman created one additional forward spot. Hughes said that the move helped the chances of younger players like Rafael Harvey-Pinard and Jesse Ylonen to make the lineup.
The real prize for Hughes is adding a second-round draft pick in 2025 and to a lesser extent, a fourth-round pick in the same draft.
Regarding his war chest of assets, Hughes said, "I believe that as we accumulate draft capital - and we've used it in the past - it probably gives us a little bit of a luxury to maybe slightly overpay to acquire a player that we want that can help us compete in the window that we believe we can do it in."