The Montreal Canadiens have had to wait until the wire a few times recently before deciding if they were going to be buyers or sellers at the trade deadline.
This is not one of those years.
The Habs lost their first five games of the season and are scuffling along near the bottom of the standings as we zoom past the quarter pole. With just 14 points in the standings after 25 games played, the team is clearly going to be moving into sellers mode before the trade deadline.
According to Pierre LeBrun of TSN, the team is already on others radar as they look to pluck talent for a playoff run. LeBrun mentioned on TSN’s Insider Trading segment last night that contending teams are very interested in acquiring Ben Chiarot from the Habs before the deadline which is not until March 21st.
It makes sense. Chiarot is in the final year of his contract and only has a cap hit of $3.5 million so most teams could fit him into their pay structure on deadline day. Also, he played significant minutes on the Canadiens blue line last season during their run to the Stanley Cup Final. NHL general managers love a big, physical blue liner that they can trust with big minutes against other team’s best players.
LeBrun stated that the Habs could “absolutely fetch a first round pick” for Chiarot at the trade deadline, and though it is possible the new general manager could be interested in re-signing Chiarot, he will probably be traded this season.
It makes sense that the Habs would move Chiarot, but it is also nice to hear that the Canadiens could fetch a big return for their hulking defender. Chiarot is capable of handling big minutes as he showed last season in the playoffs, but he has his offensive limitations and the Habs just have too many similar defenders in the top four with Joel Edmundson and David Savard playing similar styles.
The Canadiens could very well move defenders Chris Wideman and Brett Kulak as well since they are going to be UFAs like Chiarot. It will be interesting to see who else they deal and whether they sell off spare parts or completely tear things down this season.