Montreal Canadiens: Just How High Can Habs Second First Round Pick Become?

The Montreal Canadiens already have two first round picks in the 2022 NHL Draft. They added one from the Calgary Flames as the centrepiece of the Tyler Toffoli trade. That pick will be 26th overall.

They also have their own which ended up being first overall after the draft lottery occurred. There have been plenty of rumblings around the hockey world that the Canadiens general manager Kent Hughes is not going to be satisfied to sit and pick at first and 26th overall.

Many around the game have suggested that the Habs are likely to be aggressive in trying to move up in the draft. But, how high can they realistically move up from 26th overall? And do they have a key player they are willing to move that would interest another team in moving an early pick?

It sounds like the team is sniffing around as high as the top ten picks. In fact, according to Bruce Garrioch of TSN, the Canadiens have contacted everyone else with a top ten pick to see if they would be willing to move it.

But how realistic is it that they can jump all the way from 26th to “top ten”? It is something that we rarely see in the NHL. Draft picks, especially top ten picks are precious diamonds in the hockey world that are never more valuable than the week of the actual draft.

According to capfriendly.com, the website that knows more about NHL contracts than the NHL general managers that sign said players to these contracts, it almost unheard of that a team trades away a top five pick, while already knowing it is a top five pick. What I mean by that is, teams have traded picks that eventually became top five picks, but they didn’t know it at the time of the trade.

How often are top ten picks traded at the NHL Draft?

At this time of year though? Trades of top five picks are almost non-existent and top ten picks are rarely moved. Since the salary cap era began in 2005, only nine teams have been able to trade into the top ten leading up to the actual draft, and one one team was able to move into the top five.

You will quickly notice that the only team to move up and into the top five at this time of year was the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2008. It cost them a 7th overall pick, a 68th overall pick and a future second round pick. So, they gave up a second and a third round pick to move up two spots.

There are a few other similar trades in there. Nashville traded for the 7th pick in 2008 for the 9th pick and a second rounder. In 2005, the San Jose Sharks got an 8th overall pick but they only moved up from 12th and it cost them a second as well as a seventh round pick.

The Sharks made a similar trade in 2007 as they acquired the 9th overall pick for the 13th and 44th picks and a future third.

As for players that were traded for top ten picks, the Arizona Coyotes gave up Anthony DeAngelo and a 7th overall pick for Derek Stepan and Antti Raanta in 2017. They thought Stepan was a two-way second line centre and Raanta could become their starting goalie for several years.

Jeff Carter was traded for Jakub Voracek, an 8th overall pick and a third round pick in 2011. Carter was a 26 year old forward coming off a 36 goal season. The Canadiens don’t have any of those right now.

A similar trade was made in 2012 when Jordan Staal was traded for Brandon Sutter, Brian Dumoulin and the 8th overall pick. Staal was 23 years old at the time and had just scored 25 goals and 50 points in 62 games. The Canadiens only player like that right now is Nick Suzuki but they aren’t trading him for a pick.

Cory Schneider was also traded straight across for a 9th overall pick at the 2013 NHL Draft. At that time, Schneider was battling Roberto Luongo, who just got voted into the Hall of Fame, for playing time and looked better for many stretches. The Canadiens don’t have anyone like that right now either.

Last year we saw one top ten pick move and it was a wild trade between the Canucks and Coyotes. The Canucks acquired a good young winger in Conor Garland and overpaid but somewhat reliable defenceman Oliver Ekman-Larsson for the 9th overall pick, a second round pick, a seventh round pick, and a trio of bad contracts in Antoine Roussel, Jay Beagle and Loui Eriksson.

How can Habs pull it off?

This is the only possible way the Canadiens can find themselves getting into a top ten pick. They need to identify two roster players, a forward and a defenceman that can help another team. They also need to take back a lot of bad money to balance out the cap hits in the deal.

Ekman-Larsson was seen by the Canucks as a bounce back candidate and a potential top pairing guy. Garland scored 12 goals and 39 points in 49 games in his final season with the Coyotes before the trade. The Canadiens need to find a team desperate enough to move out bad money that they are interested in taking on a couple of hefty contracts as well.

The most difficult part is finding a team that thinks they can win in 2022-23 and has a top ten pick in the 2022 NHL Draft. Maybe that description matches the New Jersey Devils, but no one is trading the second overall pick. Arizona, Seattle and Columbus have no reason to believe they can compete soon so scratch out third, fourth and sixth overall.

The 7th, 8th and 9th picks are owned by the Ottawa Senators, Detroit Red Wings and Buffalo Sabres who are all division rivals of the Habs. Finding a trade inside the division is difficult to pull off. That Anaheim Ducks own the 10th overall pick and they have taken a patient approach and likely continue to do so.

That leaves the 5th overall pick which is owned by the Philadelphia Flyers. They just hired John Tortorella so maybe they are crazy enough to think they are on the verge of competing with the right moves? If anyone inside the top ten is going to be bold (insane?) enough to think trading their pick is the right call, it will be the Philadelphia Flyers.

Could Habs and Flyers Make Trade For 5th Overall Pick?

So, now we have to look at that Canucks-Coyotes deal as the blueprint. Instead of Ekman-Larsson, insert Jeff Petry. The Canucks took on six years of his contract with a cap hit of $7.26 million when he was 29 years old. Petry is 34 but has three years left on his contract with a cap hit of $6.25 million.

In his last season with the Coyotes, Ekman-Larsson had 24 points in 46 games while Petry put up 27 points in 68 games last season, after taking the first half of the year off. The comparison isn’t perfect, but there is reason to believe the Flyers would find as much value in Petry as the Canucks found in Ekman-Larsson.

To add a forward that is somewhat similar to Garland’s value is tough. He was just 25 at the time of the trade and had 39 points in 49 games. The closest comparable would be Christian Dvorak who would add some depth at centre and has the potential to be much better than the 33 points he had in 56 games last season.

Dvorak and Petry aren’t enough value to get a fifth overall pick, so the Canadiens would have to do the Flyers a favour by taking back some salary as well. James van Riemsdyk would the the first name that would have to return in the trade. He has one year left on his contract with a $7 million cap hit. Dvorak and Petry combine to earn $10.7 million for the next three years each.

Maybe the Habs have to also take back the contract of Oskar Lindblom who earns $3 million and had 26 points in 79 games last season.

All told, that’s Dvorak and Petry for the 5th overall pick, and the huge contracts of James van Riemsdyk and Oskar Lindblom. For the Habs, they get a top five pick and some bad money on short term deals.

Why would the Flyers do it? They only do it if they think Petry can play like he has all of his Habs career aside from the first half of the 2021-22 season. If Ryan Ellis returns healthy next season and Petry steps onto the second pairing, they have a completely rebuilt defence heading into next season.

Put Ivan Provorov and Travis Sanheim on the left side of either player and that’s a heck of a top four. Up front, Dvorak slides in between Sean Couturier and Kevin Hayes to give the Flyers tremendous centre depth.

This would be a trade that the Canadiens absolutely win. Just like the Coyotes won their trade a year ago. But the Flyers didn’t hire Tortorella to help with a rebuild. I’d expect them to pull off a couple of shocking moves to make their team better next season. This would certainly be one of them while not affecting their cap hit at all.

Want your voice heard? Join the A Winning Habit team!

Write for us!