Former Montreal Canadiens First Round Pick Signs Contract Extension

The Montreal Canadiens were criticized for a while due to a lengthy run of first round picks that did not exactly pan out as expected.

After selecting both Ryan McDonagh and Max Pacioretty in the first round of the 2007 NHL Draft, the well kind of went dry for the Canadiens with their top selection each year. They traded their first round pick the following year, and may as well have traded them for the next decade.

Well, they definitely shouldn't have traded Mikhail Sergachev, but he was the only one they gave up on almost immediately.

Otherwise, that stretch from 2009-18 landed the Canadiens Louis Leblanc, Jarred Tinordi, Nathan Beaulieu, Alex Galchenyuk, Michael McCarron, Nikita Scherbak, Noah Juulsen, Ryan Poehling and Jesperi Kotkaniemi. That's not exactly building a dynasty with first round picks. Some of them barely touched the NHL and none have become impact players.

However, a few of them are hanging around as solid depth pieces on teams. Ryan Poehling signed with the Philadelphia Flyers and earned himself a contract extension recently as he has proven to be an effective bottom six center and great penalty killer for them.

Yesterday, it was McCarron's turn to ink a new contract. Now with the Nashville Predators, the hulking forward earns his ice time as a tenacious forechecker who is nearly impossible to knock off the puck. He has seven goals and 13 points in 42 games from the team's fourth line and will be sticking there for the foreseeable future.

McCarron signed a two-year contract extension with the Predators. He will earn $900,000 each of the next two seasons which is a bit of a raise on this year's $775,000 salary. The 28 year old took his time making himself an everyday NHL player, but has now reached the 200 game plateau and the 6'6" behemoth will be adding to those totals over the next two years at least.

McCarron put up two goals and eight points in a Canadiens jersey in 69 career games with the organization before being traded for Laurent Dauphin.

Fortunately for the Canadiens, the selection of Cole Caufield in 2019 has seemed to end the curse of first round picks that started when McDonagh was traded away.

Since taking Caufield, the Canadiens have selected Kaiden Guhle, Logan Mailloux, Juraj Slafkovsky, Filip Mesar and David Reinbacher in the first round. It is a little early to judge them all yet, but many of them look like franchise cornerstones.