Montreal Canadiens: Three Potential Jonathan Drouin Trades

The Montreal Canadiens have a few young forwards pushing to make the lineup this year. Due to that, a veteran may need to move out in a trade. If that is Jonathan Drouin, here are some potential deals for him.

The Montreal Canadiens are making their way through training camp and have uncovered a few pleasant surprises with just two more exhibition games before the real season begins. There are several young players that have stepped up and forced the Canadiens management team to take notice.

On defence, Cale Fleury has played very well throughout camp and is starting to look like he could start the year with the Canadiens at the age of 20. He played well for the Laval Rocket last season, but seemed to be stuck behind Shea Weber, Jeff Petry, Christian Folin and Noah Juulsen on the depth chart.

An injury to Juulsen and mediocre play from Folin, combined with an impressive performance by Fleury has him pushing away veterans as he makes his case to be in the opening night lineup. The same thing is happening up front.

Ryan Poehling had a great start to camp and showed there is not much need for minor league seasoning. He is a poised, two-way center that is skilled and smart enough to handle minutes in any role at the NHL level, even at the age of 20.

A third 20 year old is making a case to become a fixture in the top six this season and that is Nick Suzuki. He started camp centering a line with Charles Hudon and Jordan Weal, but played his most recent preseason game with Tomas Tatar and Phillip Danault on his line.

The influx of youngsters has led to a bit of a logjam in the Habs lineup, especially up front. It appears there are seven players: Tatar, Danault, Suzuki, Brendan Gallagher, Max Domi, Artturi Lehkonen and Jonathan Drouin fighting for the six spots on the top two lines. Add in Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Poehling who will soon be looking for bigger roles, and the Habs have a plethora of options up front.

So much so that, according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, the Habs could be looking to trade a forward in the near future.

Friedman also mentioned that it was worth noting how little Drouin was used in the Canadiens 3-0 loss to the Maple Leafs on Monday night. It does beg the question, if they do decide to move Drouin, what would a trade look like?

Now, I’d like to point out that Elliotte Friedman did NOT say that the Canadiens are going to trade Drouin. He simply said they have a couple of young forwards looking for big roles and they can’t fit everybody into the lineup. He also pointed out that Drouin did not see a ton of ice during a preseason game. That could be because the Habs know what they have in Drouin and wanted to play younger players a bit more.

It’s possible their answer to this logjam is to trade Charles Hudon to the Dallas Stars for a sixth round draft pick. That’s not as fun for us fans to banter about in late September though, so let’s ponder the possibility, no matter how slight, that Drouin could be the odd man out.

So, let’s take a look at three potential deals involving Jonathan Drouin.