Balancing out the Montreal Canadiens qualifying offers ahead of the deadline
By Omar L
The Montreal Canadiens have dealt with some of their restricted free agents, but that’s only the first step in getting either of them signed.
With the 2019 NHL Draft behind us and the UFA contact period open, we’ve approached another milestone of the offseason. By 5:00 PM EST, teams, must have given their pending restricted free agents a qualifying offer. Otherwise, the RFA can become an unrestricted free agent and sign with any team on July 1st. The Montreal Canadiens have already started with this process but there with Charles Hudon being the only one in an odd situation.
From Marc Bergevin, we know that Artturi Lehkonen, Joel Armia, Michael McCarron, and Mike Reilly all received qualifying offers. On the other hand, Daniel Audette, Hunter Shinkaruk, and Brett Lernout did not while Hudon rejected the offer he received from the team.
Audette and Lernout are both draft picks of Montreal taken in the fifth and third rounds of the 2014 NHL Draft respectively. Lernout was a player fans thought could be an option on the bottom pair and looked good in last season’s preseason. He got some opportunities to play in the NHL with the Habs where some were decent, others were bad, while most were mundane.
He saw his usage decrease in the AHL as the Habs added more talent to the organization and with the likes of Josh Brook and Cale Fleury around, focus has shifted elsewhere.
Audette never got an opportunity to play in the NHL with the Montreal Canadiens, and if things were different this season, he may have gotten a ‘let’s see what you are’ call up towards the end of the season. He put up alright numbers given the talent pool on the Laval Rocket but was never consistent enough to draw any big-time interest.
For both of these players, perhaps a change of scenery is what they’ll need to get to the next level. Either way, it’s no major loss for the Habs.