Canadiens: A Look at Habs Upcoming Free Agents

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According to CapFriendly, the Montreal Canadiens have $14,671,191 in cap space for the upcoming offseason. With notable RFA’s such as Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Artturi Lehkonen needing new contracts, it will be interesting to see how Marc Bergevin (or whoever is the General Manager this summer) handles our UFA situation.

Let’s take a look at who’s set to hit free agency and take a wild guess on if we will see them in a bleu-blanc-rouge sweater next year.

Tomas Tatar

When Tomas Tatar came to Montreal as part of the Max Pacioretty trade, everyone claimed he was a throw-in in order to partially fill in the left wing void left by the former Canadiens captain.

At the 2017-18 trade deadline the Golden Knights paid a kings’ ransom to acquire “Tuna”; sending a 2018 1st round pick (#30 – Joe Veleno), a 2019 2nd round pick (NYI’s pick #54 – Robert Mastrosimone) and a 2021 3rd round pick. Vegas was all in during their Cinderella expansion season and they had hoped that the Slovak sniper was able to bring them to the promised land.

Tatar never managed to get comfortable in Vegas and in the final 20 games of the campaign, only had 4 goals, 2 assists and a paltry +/- -11. Come playoff time, his play was so lackluster that he only played 8 games. Needless to say, the team was desperately trying to unload his contract as Tatar had just signed a new 4 year $21.2 million contract with the Red Wings that year. Thankfully, Montreal bit with Vegas holding $500,000 of the $5.3 million annual contract.

Pros: Tuna quickly turned this around and has quickly gained fans in Montreal as well. He went back to being the player everyone expected him to be; a 20-25 goal sniper who stays out of the penalty box and plays an honest game. With the Habs he collected career highs in points in each of his first 2 seasons with the club with 58 and 61.

Cons: When it’s time for the playoffs, Tatar has a history of becoming a ghost. He contributed next to nothing in last year’s playoffs with the Habs notching only 2 points, both of them goals, in 10 games.

Prediction: GONE (Will get a 4-year $24 million contract elsewhere)

At age 30 and with his 2 best seasons just behind him, Tatar will still likely command anywhere between $5-6 million per year, which is something the Canadiens can spend elsewhere. They have a better and cheaper option in Tyler Toffoli and there’s money needed in order to re-sign other players from within the club.

Phillip Danault

Danault has finally become the player the Chicago Blackhawks thought he would be when he was drafted 26th overall in the 2011 draft – a reliable defensive centerman who can play against the opponent’s top line.

The Habs boast what can potentially be an incredible trio of players down the middle with Danault, Nick Suzuki and Jesperi Kotkaniemi. The issue of course is one of inexperience with Suzuki being 21 and in his sophomore year, while KK is still only 20 years old and in his 3rd year in the NHL. It’s only normal that Danault, 28 and the much more seasoned of the three, wants to be treated as the team’s top center.

Pros: Danault’s ability to shut down some of the league’s top superstars is finally getting some recognition. He finished 6th in votes for the Selke trophy last year and is starting to regularly show up in lists of top defensive forwards across the league. When your name starts showing up aside those of Patrice Bergeron, Sean Couturier and Ryan O’Reily, you know you’re doing something good with your life.

Cons: Unlike the players mentioned above, Danault is however not a 1st line center. He’s barely a second line unless he’s supported with good wingers like he has been with Tatar and Brendan Gallagher in the past few seasons. Danault will give you a dozen goals and 40-50 points with some good wingers but he has shown that if he doesn’t have that offensive support, he won’t give you those points.

Prediction: RE-SIGNS ON A SHORT TERM CONTRACT (2 years $8.5 million)

While Danault has been extremely usefull for the Canadiens on and off the ice, he isn’t a superstar but he isn’t completely disposable either. Everyone needs this kind of player on their team. Rumors launched by certain members of the French media suggested that Danault rejected a 6 year $30 million contract. However reports surfaced that the actual offer was 5 years $25 million. Danault’s clan counter-offered with a 6 year $33 million contract which was ultimately rejected. His agent then made a public claim that negotiations never even took place. So as usual, the rumor mill is hot in Montreal.

Is Danault worth $5.5 million a year? Absolutely not. Would he get that amount if he were to test free agency? Probably. Is he going to leave Montreal? I highly doubt it. While Danault might be trying to stand firm and demand to get paid, on one end you will have executives telling him that the cap is not changing and he is not going to get paid like Jean-Gabriel Pageau (6 years $30 million), while on the other you have a wife that is happy to be home and raising their young family.

Joel Armia

Now completing his 3rd season with the Canadiens, Joel Armia is aging like fine wine. He’s proving to be an effectie big winger on a shut down line who can give you a dozen or 15 goals per year with the potential for 20 if he can stay healthy. Injuries are the only reason we sometimes think he has disappeared on the ice. When healthy, Armia has shown to be comeptitive and plays with a chip on his shoulder.

Pros: Armia is often deceitful in his play in part due to his size. At 6’4″ 213lbs, he’s a big winger who takes up a lot of space. However when he shifts into that extra gear, he can flat out fly on the ice and the way he wraps his body around the puck makes it so difficult for opponents to take the puck away from him. On the back end of the ice he has increasingly shown discipline and plays the puck and the man very well.

Cons: Partly due to his style of play, Armia has a history of injuries that is starting to pile up. One is to think if he will ever become the 20 goal scorer he can be if it weren’t for the injury bug consistantly plaguing him since his junior years.

Prediction: RE-SIGNS (4-year $15 million)

Having this kind of player on your team is a borderline luxury without the need to break the bank. If one of Anderson or Gallagher gets injured then he can easily jump up the depth chart and help. Meanwhile putting him on a shut down 3rd line with a couple of hard working teammates (for example: Lehkonen-Danault-Armia) would still give him quality ice time all the while protecting everyone else from injury.

Eric Staal

My were we excited when it was announced that none other than Eric Staal was coming to town. A former captain, Stanley Cup champion, 6 time all star and only 3 years removed from a 42 goal season, we thought we hit the jackpot when we only gave a 3rd and 5th round pick for the Thunder Bay native.

Pros: The name alone gets the older crowd excited. This is a future hall of famer trying to milk every ounce of what he has left in order to touch the Cup one last time…

Cons: …and that’s about it. It’s clear as day that the game has passed him by and he can’t play 18-20 minutes a night. He has slowed down considerably and no longer has that edge to his game that once made him one of the premier centermen in the league. The fact that he accepted to remove Montreal from his no-trade list in order to get out of that mess in Buffalo shows that he never wanted to come here in the first place, but anywhere is better than Buffalo these days. Even if he suddenly gets a second wind and starts leading the team and scoring big goals, with the mess the Canadiens are in right now, no way he’ll even consider coming back.

Prediction: RETIRES OR SIGNS ONE-YEAR DEAL WITH CONTENDER (Ex Toronto at league minimum)

Corey Perry

What a beauty this guy has been for the team this year. Originally signed at league minimum to ride the taxi squad, Corey Perry is proving he still has that competitive edge and will accept whatever role he is given and constantly forces the hands of his coaches to give him ice time.

Pros: Even as he approaches the dark side of 30, Perry will still give you everything he’s got shift after shift. This is an approach he’s had his entire career which established him as one of the premier power forwards of the 2000’s. He won’t score you 50 goals anymore, but even in a limited 4th line role, throw in some power play minutes and he’s still capable of giving you a dozen goals.

Cons: As romantic as it all sounds, do you hang on to someone who will be 36 and has already done it all? Does he even want to continue at this point? We’re talking about a former Hart trophy winner, a former Maurice Richard trophy winner, a former Cup champion and a 4 time gold medalist. He seems to still be having fun out there, but deep inside, is he just hanging on for the sake of hanging on?

Prediction: RE-SIGNS (1-year $1.5 million)

Perry loves it in Montreal and it shows. Despite the team’s turmoils you can still see him smile on the bench and his eyes light up with intensity when he hits the ice. If he’s given a bonus filled contract like the one he had in Dallas last year, i’m sure he would stick around. Seeing him wear the “A” during the injuries of Byron and Gallagher shows his dedication to the team and this is the kind of mentor you want around to guide someone like Cole Caufield through his first steps in the NHL.

It’s obviously too early to tell what will happen to these trade deadline acquisitons, but let’s roll the dice anyway.

Jon Merrill

Merrill is the kind of defenceman you like to have when you need to rotate defenceman and give them nights off. We already have too many of those and it’s time to let kids like Cale Fleury and Josh Brooks show us what they can do anyway.

Prediction: WALKS IN FREE AGENCY

There’s plenty of work for someone like him around the league at a reasonable price.

Erik Gustafsson

The case for Gustafsson is a little different. This is someone that wants to prove to everyone that his 60 point season in Chicago during the 18-19 season was no fluke. That he is dedicated to this league and that he wants to put the work in.

Gustafsson is running out of options as he is now with his 4th team in 2 years so he will definitely need to step it up in order to showcase himself for a contract. If he does show flashes of offensive ability again, he will have no problem getting a one year “prove it” deal.

Prediction: 1 YEAR “PROVE IT” DEAL WITH MONTREAL (1 year $1 million)

Even in a depth role, you need some mobility on the back end and if he can show that same work ethic he has shown since landing in La Belle Province, he’ll be back for another round.

SUNRISE, FL – MARCH 7: Goaltender Charlie Lindgren #39 of the Montreal Canadiens (Photo by Joel Auerbach/Getty Images) /

Charlie Lindgren, Michael Frolik, Jordan Weal, Alex Belzile, Brandon Baddock, Laurent Dauphin, Lukas Vejdemo, Vasili Demchenko

Frolik and Weal will walk into free agency. Minor leaguers Belzile, Baddock, Dauphin and Vejdemo don’t have many options elsewhere and are doing a good enough job in Laval to keep their jobs for another year.

The goaltending situation however, is a little more murky. Demchenko hasn’t played much in Laval this year because of the pandemic-shortened season and not to mention being 3rd string to Cayden Primeau and Michael McNiven.

Whether he stays or not might depend on if Jake Allen is exposed to the expansion draft or not. If Allen goes to Seattle, then Primeau would likely act as Price’s full time backup thus giving Demchenko the second string job behind McNiven in Laval. If Allen stays, the Russian netminder will likely walk.

The case for Charlie Lindgren has been sealed when Cayden Primeau was asked to face the Flames. I can’t imagine someone who’s been riding with the main squad all year is too happy about not having the chance to play. Since 2015 the club has given him the chance to put his skills on display but he hasn’t been consistent enough to earn a place in the NHL.

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