When it’s the off-season, it’s Christmas for fans of the glorious MLB teams. Big stars will be added to the club they cherish. When the same period arrives in the NHL, the supporters of the Glorieux, the Canadian, know that it will still be extremely flat and that perhaps a guy we had never heard of and who we will never hear of will appear. will join the club.
• Also read: Juan Soto signs the biggest contract in the history of sport: $765 million
The Canadian and the New York Mets, who just awarded a $765 million contract to Juan Soto, are very similar.
For a little over 30 years, the two teams have never won major honors.
The two clubs live most of the time at the bottom of the rankings.
Only twice have the Mets reached the final since their last championship in 1986. That’s three times for the Canadian, who won it once.
It hasn’t been joyful for the Mets for 30 years. The pressure is strong. The partisans are ruthless. We saw players insulting supporters.
Like New York in baseball
It’s not the joy of playing for the Canadian for 30 years either. The supporters are also demanding. For athletes who want to go incognito off the ice, it’s not easy, Montreal. Like New York in baseball.
Still, the Mets had no problem convincing one of the greatest players in the world to sign with them.
That’s $765 million worth of convincing reasons, you’ll tell me. It’s true. But Soto had several amazing offers in front of him. He could have gone elsewhere for comparable pay.
Photo Getty Images via AFP
He chose the Mets. He knows that the owner wants to do everything to win and he likes that.
I started reading the book The CH and its peopleby journalist Brandon Kelly. I know the history of the Canadian pretty well, but you understand that when they are called the Glorious, it sounds weird to me. I was five years old during the last Cup. I don’t remember anything from those years except that a guy from the Rangers was named Jeff Beukeboom. He was mean and he had a funny name.
In short, dear generations who are over 40, I am jealous of the great years you experienced with the CH.
I know very well that managing a baseball team in the MLB is different from managing a team in the NHL. There is no official salary cap in baseball. The richest can afford the players they want.
Sad, the power of attraction
That being said, there is something sad when I look at the drawing power of Sainte-Flanelle.
We see, in baseball, a team as sad as the Mets succeed in attracting the most coveted free agent.
We see baseball’s biggest markets, the Yankees and the Dodgers, go for stars every year.
And in hockey, one of the biggest markets, Montreal, hasn’t signed a superstar since I was born. I’m talking about a star player. The most important was Brian Gionta, 15 years ago. He had not scored more than 60 points in the three years preceding his arrival in Montreal.
Photo d’archives, Martin Chevalier
Over the past 10 years, the Canadian has offered around 70 contracts to free agents. The best who were there for more than a year were David Savard and Ben Chiarot. Otherwise, it’s Riley Barber, Brandon Baddock and Zach Redmond.
The 1is July is never exciting in the most beautiful, glorious, big hockey market in the world. The Canadian is never there. If we want to attract a star, we hope that a general manager from another team will be thick enough to trade her before she shines or we will look for a 38 year old.
Or you get it because no one else wants it, like Patrik Laine.
I’m not saying that the Canadian should go get a star as quickly as possible in any context. Rather, I’m saying that it’s not normal that this never happened and that amateurs deserve more than that.
Now is not the time for the Canadiens to shoot themselves in the foot by giving a huge contract to a star when the team is not ready to win. But the sad thing is how much of that never happened. This is what distorts the glorious image that was once attributed to the Canadian. The stars don’t really want to come here.
It might be long
Most teams have had more success than the Canadiens in attracting free agents. It doesn’t always turn out well, on the contrary.
But a chance that the Panthers had Sergei Bobrovsky last year, to lift the Cup. A chance that the Golden Knights had Alex Pietrangelo, the previous year, to be crowned champions. I don’t think these free agent signings were regretted.
All the reasons in the world could have justified that the Canadian did not attract stars: we are rebuilding, we gave all the money to Price and Weber, we do not want to overpay players on 1is July, we want to have flexibility on the payroll, the players do not want to play in Canada, the pressure is too strong in Montreal…
It’s true. But it’s not the fault of the amateurs who pay everyone’s salaries. It’s time for that to change. And this is a goal of Martin St-Louis and Kent Hughes, to change the players’ perception of Montreal.
Because there is nothing glorious about a team that never attracts a single star. And it may take one before long if the team wants to reach the next level.
