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We're starting to see a pattern ...
posted by Mike Boone at 20h41 EST on Jun 21
For the first time since 2001, Canadiens did not draft a single Quebec player.
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Looking for a sleeper?
Maxim Trunev, the Russian forward taken in the fifth round, 138th overall.
Canadiens scouts saw Trunev in a midget tournament out west and fell in love with the kid, recomending him to Timmins.
Canadiens would like Trunev to follow the Sergei Kostitsyn development path by coming over to play major junior.
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Steve Quailer, taken in the third round, 86th overall, is from George Gillett's adopted home state of Colorado and will attend Northeastern, Chris Nilan's alma mater.
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Canadiens last pick, Patrick Johnson from Wisconsin University, is the grandson of "Badger Bob" Johnson, the late Pittsburgh coach.
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It looks like the laffs will announce Tim Hunter and Rod Zettler will rejoin laffs coach Wilson in the Vatican , i had hoped that Zettler would be set free and Bob would jump on him (Wilson Bros. connection) cuz his reputation as an assistant coach is well respected in the NHL especially with young "D". He couldn't skate but survived in the NHL with smarts......... http://blogs.mercurynews.com/sharks/2008/06/23/yes-hunter-and-zettler-to...
I am wondering whether the lack of players coming out of Quebec has anything to do with a drop in registrations ie...the # of children enrolled in the sport? Out here in the west, Calgary to be specific, the cost for icetime, enrollment, equipment, has escalated immensely to the point where anyone with less than upper middle income status, would have to sacrifice a lot to have a child ( heaven forbid two)playing the game. For many the game is now out of reach financially.
Kids are finding other sports such as soccer indoor/outdoor as satisfying or more than the grand old sport of hockey.
hammer - Great post and the expense is enormous as i noticed following my nephew's boy last year. After the game the kids on the team were going in BMWs and the like where my nephew's van looked like a rent a wreck in comparison and his son pleaded with his dad not to pick him up in his mom's old sedan as it was embarrassing. Now my nephew's paying large sums to even tryout for the next level which his son made the cut so to go to the next tryout the cost is even more and i'm talking about hundreds of dollars. Not like the old days.
Of course it does, along with the idiotic way that the Quebec federation likes to jerk around the kids with regards to their ages and what level it slots them in.
"Under terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, any player who does not remain a college player through the graduation of his applicable class must submit a letter stating his intention to turn professional. Upon submission of that letter, the drafting club shall have 30 days to sign the player. If the player and team cannot reach an agreement within that 30 day period, the player becomes a free agent."
This is one of the reasons (together with the US development program) that American players are en vogue. You get to keep the rights to the player for more than the two-year limit applied to junior players unless the player decides to graduate early (a la Blake Wheeler). This gives teams a bit more of a window to judge whether a player is going to pan out, while the player is given more time to develop more appropriate competition.
Where have all BG's critics gone?
Silence is golden.
French or English,we all want the Habs to win the cup and I for one don't care if the athlete comes from Timbucktwo to get her done!!
or even Timbaucqueteaue!
re: good things from minnesota
don't forget the replacements and the hold steady :)
It's funny because I remember back in 2005 when the Montreal Canadiens had the fifth overall pick and the french media were pushing for us to draft Benoit Pouliot (he went 4th overall) and Gilbert Brule (6th overall).
But instead of drafting a player just because he was french-canadian, we drafted the best player available. That is how Carey Price ended up playing for us versus another team.
I understand we need to have french speaking players but we have to go with the best possible player regardless of race, nationality or language. If we have a french player and english player of equal talent then we go with the french player. I get that and so does everyone else.
Lastly, unless I'm mistaken we used our first round pick to get a french speaking player. Fellow by the name of Alex Tanguay.
"Lastly, unless I'm mistaken we used our first round pick to get a french speaking player. Fellow by the name of Alex Tanguay."
That fact will be lost on many.
After awhile it must seem like a slap in the puss for any CANADIAN kid who has hopes of playing for Montreal.......unless he's an Orr or a Gretzky, he better forget it. Had the present scouting team been in place in the early 1970s...instead of Lafleur and Shutt, montreal would have drafted Kent Hrbek and Kirby Pucket (or somebody like that).
NOBODY In Canada is good enough?????
I think its because the habs are getting the later picks, and instead of going for the canadian power forwards, theyre looking more towards the 'skilled' players from outside of canada which seem to be left over. I personally prefer a canadian, but if another player is going to payoff more and they are going to be as passionate about the habs tradition, than i can live with it
Dodger - what about Carey Price? I also think we have to look at it from the viewpoint of the other hockey countries around the world. I wonder how they have felt when we take all their best players for employment in the NHL? Their favourite tournament is the World Championships yet they rarely get to field a full team of hometown players due to the NHL schedule. I think it's a two way streit and we are now just getting to experience what Europeans have gone through for years. Hockey is a truly universal game, that's a reality of the 21 century.
The Original 24 Cups
I work with quite a few French Canadians. To a man, they FEEL if the draft choice is between an American or a kid from the Q, Timmins will pick the American. That is not say they are accurate, but there wasn't 1 player worth taking a chance on? I don't believe it. Is it accurate that the Habs only have 2 part time scouts for the whole of Quebec, the 2nd largest hockey hotbed in the country? If so, the Habs need to improve drastically in that area.
The equivalent would be the Yankees never looking for players from New York State. I'm not saying draft a home town boy for the sake of it, but there surely has to be some talent. They should beat the bushes looking for it. After all, it's not like all we do around here is talk hockey and not play the game.
Other than rarely looking in our back yard for players, Timmins has done a great job of loading the team with promising players.
Gilbert
Price is a milltion times better than Brule and Pouliot.
Mcdounagh is so much more of a sure thing than Espo ever has the dreams to be same with Max Pac.
Fischers great prospect status has slid a bit and while Giroux was around, where would a Giroux fit into our team now and in the future? Most top quebec propsects end up beign forwards or goaltenders, neither of which we need, last few years we've needed defense and now we have an embarassment of riches.
The Canadiens have beefed up their scouting in Quebec. The team held a combine at the Bell Centre, inviting 19 players from the Q plus three Montreal high-school kids. I'm sure had they retained their first-round pick - instead of trading it, for a Quebec-born player - Canadiens would have drafted Nicolas Deschamps. As it was, he was gone by the time they picked, as was Yann Sauve and a few other Q prospects. This was not a vintage year for Quebec players: there were more Danes drafted in the first round! I think Timmins is committed to taking the best players available. He's done pretty well so far.
"I think Timmins is committed to taking the best players available. He's done pretty well so far."
That's exactly what Detroit does. Besides, picking a guy just cause he's a frenchie usually turns out to be a bust.
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"Obviously it would be great, but they don't really hang conference titles in this rink. They raise Stanley Cup banners." - Carey Price
With all due respect to Trevor Timmins and his staff, If I'm a kid growing up in Quebec worshiping the Montreal Canadiens, the draft is littered with names (Angelo Esposito, Nicolas Deschamps et al) and being passed over for some honkey from where the bears fart I would be dissappointed. This used to be Sam Pollock's backyard. The names are endless, Guy Lafleur, Guy Lapointe, Serge Savard, Mario Tremblay, Jacques Lemaire, Guy Carbonneau, Vincent Damphousee, not to mention the Rocket, The pocket Rocket, Bernie Geoffrion, Jacques Plante. I could go on and on. Sure for every Lafleur there is a Shutt, Dryden, Risebrough, Robinson, Lach, Harvey, Moore etc.
It seems to me that we only have scouting in two places Minnesota and Moscow. Heck, we haven't chosen a Swede since Mats Naslund or a Czech since Tomas Plekanec or a Slovak since Jaro Halak or a Finn since Saku Koivu. I have nothing against talented kids from Minnesota and time will tell whether they will come to fruition or not.
Sure can't argue with Higgins and Komisarek so let the Americanization of the Montreal Canadiens continue. Hibbing on the St. Lawrence? I just see these kids being interviewed by RDS and they seem so clueless like they're going to play on another planet? Getting back to the Quebec kids, the Montreal Canadiens are the only professional franchise in the province of Quebec, and as such a sense of pride for Quebecois kids growing up and dreaming of playing for the Bleu Blanc Rouge. Now, I'm not a pure laine, more like an 100% acrylic but I get a sense that our drafting is going in a strange direction and sooner or later we'll end up with a non-french speaking, no national pride, kind of Mr. Hockey Minnesota style team. If we win cups, all power to 'em! Maybe the goverment of Quebec should give a tax break to the team for every francophone player. I don't believe the government should be in the bedroom or the locker room but Mr. Timmins, just draft a local kid once in awhile to humour us ok? When I see local kids going to Toronto, Anaheim or wherever it just makes me kind of wonder...why?
What about those loyal francophones such as a Daniel Briere, who are offered the world to "come home" and play for the only professional hockey team in la belle province and they wind up saying "non merci, je prefer jouer au hockey au Philadelphie"?
Those Benjamins are quite appealing regardless of where the player was born and Gainey, Timmins, Beliveau, the Forum Ghosts and even Mon Dieu Himself cannot do anything about that.
I could care less if there's a French speaking player on the team.
if he's a great player a la Lecavalier, then go for it, but one just for the sake of one? spare me.
Hey , aren't french canadian's "honkey's" too. How you people from quebec think your a different race because you speak a different language is puzzling. A french canadian's ancestry came from france, aka europe, birth place of all "honkey's". I 'm Italian and french, my grandfather is french canadian and last time I checked I mark the box that says white (honkey) when asked what my race is and so do all the eastern europeans you talked about. It is disheartening that we try to find such trivial things to divide us, rather than concentrate on what we have in common. In the US we have a french settled area aswell, it's called Louisianna. They don't try to seperate themselves from the rest of the country like it seems Quebeckers do. I understand we all want to be proud of where we come from, but that seems like a pretty ridiculous way of finding hockey players or living your life.
I apologize if I offended anyone. I was writing out of frustration not trying to spark a political discussion. This forum has no place for terms like "honkey". I just like to see local kids get a chance to realize their dreams. I don't think Danny Cristo went to sleep with a Habs jersey on but hopefully he will in a few years!
FrustratioN FOR WHAT??????????????
Good question! What is there to be frustrated about? We finished first overall in the East and we're a better team today than we were Friday. The future is so bright I need Sun(din)glasses!
You raise some good points but this used to be Sam Pollock's backyard not only because of his brilliant GM skills (best GM ever in the NHL in my opinion) but certain elements as well:
(1) There were about 12-18 teams in the NHL back during Pollack's era versus 30 or so now.
(2) Before 1967 I believe, Montreal had territorial rights to all of the players from Quebec. Just as Toronto had territorial rights to all of the players in Ontario.
(3) The scrutiny of french players is relentless now. With full-time sports shows, sports-radio, a voracious french media (RDS, LaPresse, Journal de Montreal, 110%) and the internet it makes it tougher now.
howtathor - the truth of the matter is that the province of Quebec just doesn't produce NHL players the way is used to, it's really not fair to compare today's market with the days of the 60's. Today's talent pool is truly universal, and sentiment has no place in the matter when you only get to draft 7 kids a year. Years ago, some teams fell asleep at the wheel and failed to see that European players were just as good as Canadian players. I think that's true in today's market with American kids. Instead of living in the past, Timmins may be ahead of the curve by drafting so many US players.
The law of averages suggest we may well have picked a player from Quebec this year but we got Tanguay instead. I doubt very much that it had anything to do with the fact that he's from Quebec. His spot could just as easily been filled by Jokinen (European) or Rolston (American). It just doesn't matter anymore.
The Original 24 Cups
I hear you. But frankly I would rather the Habs were a professional hockey team than a provincial hockey team. The Nordiques tried that route and it took them directly to the US.
Let us leave politics, language, origin, and religion out of the one thing we can debate together.
It's harder for a Quebec born player in Montreal what with the Journal de Montreal, La Presse and 110% stalking them 24/7. You end up with kids like Gui! who were never given the opportunity to develop at an AHL level because of the pressure to get them in the lineup.
As much as I would love to see politics, language, origin and religion left out of this equation, this is Canada and the above mentioned topics run deep and as long as one section of our society feels slighted, it's going to be all about the "us vs them". It's no longer about how well you can do this or that, it's about what you look like or what language you speak or where you came from. This is a sport where the end game is all about winning and bringing the $$$ and cup home, not about John, Jean, Ivan or Johann not being chosen because he speaks the wrong language.
Sorry for the soap box, just tired of hearing people crying about 'my poor (fill in name here) not being chosen because he's (fill in stupid excuse here)'
I love my Habs :o)