Montreal Canadiens: Should any stock be put in Carey Price’s comments?
By Omar L
The Montreal Canadiens are fighting for that next Stanley Cup, especially Carey Price who has been a superstar in this league for years itching for a win.
As much as we wish for more personality and variety in player comments, there are reasons why they’d rather put up a wall of generality instead of being honest. However, Carey Price has growingly become one of the more “honest” players in the Montreal Canadiens locker room. He’s had an up and down relationship with the media, but sometimes he drops some lines that are worth investigating further.
The Montreal Canadiens Golf Tournament is one of the few things in September that truly trigger the start of the next year. The sport and the donated money are the most important things – $523,000 by the way – but, it’s also an opportunity to get some thoughts from the main cast of the roster ahead of the new season.
Everyone is talking about the Habs having their offer to Jake Gardiner rejected or the initial talks on Max Domi‘s contract negotiation (and rightly so). However, what Price said should be kept in mind as it easily adds more pressure on the team this season and the next set of seasons to come.
"A lot of guys play a lot of years and don’t get a chance to win. I don’t want to be one of those guys."
He’s not wrong. Shane Down, Henrik and Daniel Sedin, as well as Roberto Luongo, are some recent NHL stars who had many years of NHL experiences under their belts without a single Stanley Cup. Sometimes it’s completely out of your control and others times it isn’t.
Luongo reached a Stanley Cup Final with the Vancouver Canucks in 2011 but wound up losing after a 4-0 Game Seven defeat. The Sedin twins were part of that disappointing loss. Later on, in their careers, both could’ve been moved to contenders instead of choosing to stick with the team they called home for years. The same thing occurred for Doan who chose to stay with the Coyotes instead of seeking an opportunity to win elsewhere.
No one wants to sit years removed from retirement with regrets thinking, “Did I make a mistake staying?” Back to Price, the 32-year-old is signed with the Montreal Canadiens for another seven years which includes a full no-movement clause. That said, this isn’t the first time the star goaltender has made a comment like this.
At the team’s locker cleanout last year, Sportsnet’s Eric Engels asked Price how he would attract free agents to Montreal.
How would Carey Price sell unrestricted free agents on Montreal?
— Eric Engels (@EricEngels) April 9, 2019
“I would tell them that obviously my window is growing smaller and I really want to win more than ever, so I think that should be a pretty good indication of how bad we want to win here.”
There are two clear ways at taking this, both at their own relative extremities.