Montreal Canadiens: Who Even Wants Jeff Petry With That Contract?

The Montreal Canadiens have been pretty quiet so far in free agency. They were the talk of the NHL Draft, picking first overall, selection a total of 11 new players, and swinging a couple of big deals to land Kirby Dach.

But, it has been quiet in Montreal since the league’s 32 teams left the Bell Centre following the 2022 NHL Draft. But will it stay that way?

The Canadiens offseason is far from over, as they have to make a few moves to get under the salary cap. They would likely want to move a veteran forward or two to make room for the likes of Juraj Slafkovsky and Jesse Ylonen, but it is a defenceman that is most likely to be dealt first.

Jeff Petry has heard his name in trade talks since before Kent Hughes was even the general manager. The veteran defender struggled to start the season as he wanted out of town, but he was still wearing Canadiens colors as the schedule wrapped up in April.

Hughes mentioned on Thursday that it was a priority to take care of the Jeff Petry situation, which means he needs to be traded. However, that might be difficult with three years left on his contract at a cap hit of $6.25 million.

We have already seen Max Pacioretty traded this week for nothing. Ryan McDonagh was dealt for almost nothing, and Brent Burns was traded with nearly $3 million retained and the San Jose Sharks still got very little in return.

So, who even wants Jeff Petry right now? Considering the team that is acquiring him would need to have more than $6 million in open cap space, and the need for a 34 year old right defenceman that is signed for three more seasons.

Petry can still play top four minutes, but so can McDonagh and Burns. So, who even has room for Petry right now, and what would they be willing to give up to get him?

Let’s take a look a three teams that might make sense, but the acquisition for the Canadiens is going to be little more than cap space.

Nashville Predators

If anyone is willing to take on salary for a veteran defenceman who is still good but has a little too much term on the contract, it is the Nashville Predators, right? I mean, they literally just did that with Ryan McDonagh.

McDonagh is fresh off three consecutive trips to the Stanley Cup Final with the Tampa Bay Lightning as a second pairing guy and a key contributor on the penalty kill. He is signed for four more years at $6.75 million, and the Predators just acquired him for Phillippe Myers and Grant Mismash.

Mismash does not look like a future NHLer and Myers passed through waivers last season and was loaned out to a different organizations AHL team. So, essentially, McDonagh was acquired for two contracts, including a small cap dump as Myers earns $2.55 million next season but could have been bought out for a negative cap hit.

The Predators depth chart currently boasts Roman Josi, Mattias Ekholm and McDonagh on the left side of the blue line while Dante Fabbro, Jeremy Lauzon and Alexandre Carrier patrol the right side. They have the cap space to add Petry and balance those scales a little bit.

Based on that last few trades we saw, it wouldn’t cost the Preds a lot. Maybe Kaiden Guhle’s Junior defence partner Luke Prokop or the San Jose Sharks 3rd round pick in next year’s draft would get it done. That’s the going rate for a top four defender who is signed for three more years.

Buffalo Sabres

The Buffalo Sabres mentioned heading into free agency they were looking to find some veteran right shot defender to play with their incredibly talented left shot youngsters and first overall draft picks Rasmus Dahlin and Owen Power.

They signed Ilya Lyubushkin so I wouldn’t really call that a problem solved. Is Lyubushkin really going to play on the top pairing with Dahlin or the second pair with Power. Maybe he can play on that second pair, but that still leaves a large gap next to Dahlin.

Henri Jokiharju isn’t the ideal fit and neither are Jacob Bryson, Lawrence Pilut, Chase Priskie, Kale Clague or Mattias Samuelsson. The Sabres are building something here and need to take the time to get it right. Their Uber-talented left defenders need the right mentors to help them along, and they just don’t have it right now.

They could acquire Petry for cheap to fill that void. The Sabres have a plethora of great prospects and they could keep every one of them, offer up recent 4th round pick Olivier Nadeau for Petry, and the Habs would be happy to be rid of the cap hit and disgruntled player that no longer wants to be here.

The Canadiens are clearly going into 2022-23 with no reasonable expectation of winning a lot of games. They need to build a culture in the dressing room of positivity and character and that would be difficult to do with one of the veterans and leaders clearly wanting to be traded.

So, trade him for next to nothing like San Jose did with Brent Burns and Tampa Bay did with Ryan McDonagh and be happy to have his $6.25 million off the books for the next three seasons.

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