The Czech Mates: A Tale of Beer and Brotherhood

And the similarities don’t end there, folks.

In addition to the fact they’re both defencemen and hail from the same team, they also put up eerily similar numbers last season, with Moravcik totalling 16 points in 52 games while Sklenicka countered with 14 points in 49 games. And just for good measure, they’re both left-handed shots.

So what do you do when faced with the task of trying to recruit two very similar players?
For Bergevin, the answer was simple: sign them to identical contracts, both on the same day.

And that he did, with Moravcik and Sklenicka each earning a two-year, two-way deal for identical sums of money, and both contracts coming with a “European Assignment Clause” loophole written in.

So how are the two defencemen from the same team with the same contract doing, you might ask? Not surprisingly, they’re doing about the same actually, with Sklenicka having dressed for a couple of games more while Moravcik holds a two-point to one lead in the first annual Pilsner beer league scoring race.

At 6’4” and 215 pounds, Moravcik portrays as more of a stay-at-home defenceman, although there are signs of offensive life, as evidenced in his post-season performance last year with Plzen in the Czech Extraliga, where he collected seven points in ten games with an impressive +5 rating.

To compare his style of play, think of a poor man’s Shea Weber. Or at least a middle class Jordie Benn.

Sklenicka, meanwhile, is the smaller and faster of the two, standing 5’11” and going 180 and change. Harder to pigeonhole in terms of style, perhaps the best current comparison would be Victor Mete. Sklenicka does not appear to have tremendous offensive upside, but skates and moves the puck well.

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Although both players have outs in their deals which allow them to return to Europe should they choose, the fact that their AHL wages are probably on par with their old Extraliga paycheques, coupled with the cross-town lure of NHL fame and fortune, should keep their hopes high and their home-sickness low, at least for the foreseeable future. And because they’re inked to two-year deals, one or both could leave early this season and yet still be under contract through 2019-20. Smart move.

In the meantime, both continue to see regular duty with the Rocket as they adjust to a different team, and a different rink size, and a different language and for that matter, a whole different world. The mere fact that they have avoided demotion to the ECHL, where Montreal currently house two defencemen, attests to their development and skill levels, and the fact that they log regular ice time under demanding Head Coach Joel Bouchard attests to their character and willingness to compete.

Michal Moravcik and David Sklenicka are entering their third straight season as teammates, which is not unheard of, even in today’s transient, free-agent era of professional hockey.

The bizarre part is that while their bond and relationship hasn’t changed, everything else has. New team, new coaches, new arena, new locker room, new everything. And yet they’re holding up.

With any luck, the two Czech mates will soon catch the cross-town bus together to the big show. Seems only right, considering they’re from the land of beer and the Habs play in the house of beer.