Dog Days article. It's a slow time, so thought I'd print out an Arpon Basu mailbag article where he answers questions from fans. It's from The Athletic, so giving them and Arpon credit for the article. If you want to spend $90 a year on a subscription, The Athletic is worth it. They cover everything from nuts to soup as the saying goes. Your favourite sports have to be in there. Tiddly winks is missing, though.
Canadiens mailbag: Juraj Slafkovský expectations should be measured, but not undervalued
By Arpon Basu
Jul 31, 2023
We are in the heart of the summer and I am on the verge of taking some vacation time, so let’s end things by answering some of your questions.
There were many good ones, and I am generally not one to answer profound questions with a great deal of brevity, so I have cut this mailbag column up into two parts.
I am answering questions here in order of how many likes they got in the discussion thread, so there’s not much of a theme to go on other than the concern the fan base has for the proper development of the Canadiens’ youth and what the future holds for the franchise.
So let’s dive in, and keep an eye out for part two later this week.
Some questions were slightly edited for length and clarity.
What does a good year for Juraj Slafkovský look like for you? What are your personal expectations for this year, for him? — Daniel M.
This was by far the most popular question asked, and frankly, I’m glad it was.
I’ve seen some of the negative discourse around Slafkovský from some Canadiens fans on social media, and I find it baffling.
Slafkovský was the only player drafted in 2022 to play more than eight games in the NHL. Yes, he only registered 10 points in 39 games, but he’s only played 39 games. And he turned 19 at the end of March. I don’t know what Slafkovský will ultimately become, but no one really does. It is up in the air at the moment, and nothing I saw from him last season suggests that the book is closed on him.
I saw potential. I saw a big body with skill. I saw a kid trying to adjust to the best league in the world and taking important steps toward that adjustment. I saw a kid who was afraid of making mistakes, who played an intentionally conservative game because of the situation he found himself in, but who was capable of much more.
Had he been able to finish the season, I truly believe Slafkovský would have found a groove. The plan the Canadiens had for him was sound. I’ve read so many people saying the Canadiens rushed him to the NHL, and maybe they did, but they went about it the right way, giving him little bites and resisting the temptation to give him too much without earning it.
The day before the draft in Nashville, when Kent Hughes and Martin St. Louis had their media availability, I waited around to be able to ask St. Louis specifically about Slafkovský and the rhetoric of a pocket of the fan base about his rookie season and what a failure it was. And St. Louis pushed back hard on the notion that it was a failure. He saw improvement in Slafkovský, and had he remained healthy, he saw a progression that would have led to more opportunity and more important minutes eventually. Once he had earned it.
That moment hasn’t come yet. But I believe it will come this season.
Slafkovský held a media availability in Slovakia last week, and colleague Štefan Bugan sent me this rundown of one of his exchanges with the media there.
“Maybe the most telling is the story from his graduation day in high school. In Slovakia, there is a tradition that graduates go through the city, they have fun and people give them some money to the hat. Slaf didn’t participate in this part: ‘I was with classmates only for a while, because I had a practice.’ It was one day during summer, but hockey was even then a priority for him.”
Bugan also said he counted six different occasions where Slafkovský mentioned he needed to be better this season over the course of his availability. He talked about the specialized training he’s done this summer to improve his lung capacity in the hopes of improving his explosiveness, the work he’s done with stroboscopic glasses to improve his awareness in the hopes of avoiding some of the big hits he took. He recognized what he needed to work on, and worked on those things.
So, to get back to your question Daniel, I think expectations need to be reasonable for the coming season for Slafkovský. In fact, I think they need to be reasonable for what he will one day become as a player, as well. I think he can hit 20 goals and 40 points in his second season, assuming he stays healthy, because he learned a lot in his limited NHL time as a rookie. I think he will get more of a leash from his coach, because as St. Louis told me, watching some of his games from earlier in the season, he felt Slafkovský stood out. And he made a point of mentioning that once all the emotion and everything was stripped away, once he was able to watch the games objectively, that became clearer to him.
He didn’t say this explicitly, but I took that to mean that in the heat of the battle, perhaps St. Louis himself had some trouble recognizing it, and that maybe the steps he had mapped out in Slafkovský’s development could have been fast-tracked just a little bit.
I think it’s important to remember that no one projected Slafkovský to become a typical No. 1 superstar. He was drafted primarily because of his toolkit and the Canadiens’ belief that they could develop that toolkit into a highly effective NHL player. Not necessarily a superstar, but an important piece of a puzzle.
Maybe they will, maybe they won’t. I don’t know. But what I do know is Slafkovský’s story has not been written yet. It’s only beginning, in fact, and everyone would be best served allowing the process to play out before passing judgment.
What young players on the team do you think are not in the long-term plans? — Andrew G.
Avec tous ces jeunes défenseurs qui s’accumulent chez le Canadien, dans combien de temps est-ce que tu t’attends à ce qu’il y ait assez de congestion dans le pro pour que l’équipe cherche à échanger ces jeunes? Avec ce que tu vois en ce moment, qui selon toi constituera le top 6 quand l’équipe sera aspirante? — Anthony R.
Which of the young prospects do you think the Habs should look to package/move to add immediate impact roster players within the next two years? Clearly, not every single prospect can/will make the team, good talent evaluators will be able to identify which prospects they believe will pan out and which ones won’t. Being able to identify that early on is crucial so you can perhaps move them at their highest value. — Massimo C.
There were a lot of questions along this line of thinking, wondering which prospects are part of the plan and which ones aren’t. And really, my answer is similar to what I said about Slafkovský in that time is needed to make this determination.
The Canadiens have the deepest prospect pool in the NHL, but one lacking in bona fide star potential. There is definite concern among many fans about that lack, but the advantage of the depth of the pool is it affords the Canadiens the luxury to let things play out and see if one, or maybe even two players are able to beat the odds and become star players.
This is the counter to Massimo’s point that it would be advantageous for the Canadiens to figure this out early so they can trade some prospects when their value is high. Yes, it’s true that a first- or second-round pick has more value while his future still remains somewhat of a mystery, when the upside teams saw in his draft year is still there. And if there is a true impact roster player to be had by trading a prospect or two, I am all for it.
But I would also argue that there is more value in letting things play out and being patient enough to allow that longshot star to emerge. The benefit to adding a true star player out of a large group of B and B-plus prospects outweighs whatever you could add by trading them early in their development, in my opinion. And sometimes, the patient approach can work to achieve what Massimo suggested. The Los Angeles Kings just pulled that off by being patient enough to allow Gabriel Vilardi to develop and emerge as a budding star and then they made him the centrepiece of their package to go get Pierre-Luc Dubois.
But as for Anthony’s point as to the eventual logjam on defence, that is something that will probably need to sort itself out sooner than later. And I feel the catalyst for that will be Adam Engström. He is a left-shot defenceman who has returned to Rögle to play out the final year of his contract in the SHL, and with the way he is progressing, it looks as though the Canadiens might be in a position where they have to make room for him in the NHL in the next two or three years.
The 2024-25 trade deadline will be very interesting. If David Savard is still here, he will more than likely be available as a rental, and Mike Matheson will have one more year left on his contract, making him a potentially valuable trade chip on a very affordable contract. Trading them both at that trade deadline would leave the Canadiens with a very young blue line, but it would be one with a decent amount of experience at that point, and one that will have grown together in the NHL.
Kaiden Guhle, Arber Xhekaj, Jordan Harris and Justin Barron will be finishing their third NHL seasons, David Reinbacher and Logan Mailloux will likely be finishing their rookie years and Lane Hutson may very well be ripping it up in Laval or also finishing his rookie NHL season. That is seven defencemen right there, three on the right and four on the left. And that’s not counting Engström, who in all likelihood would be in Laval that year as well.
I honestly struggle to see where Harris fits in that mix. But, again, there is no need to make that determination right now. To go back to my initial point here, Harris’ story, like Slafkovský’s, has not yet been written. There is time for the pieces to fall together on defence.
But one important thing to keep in mind is that this management group is not afraid to trade talent for talent, and they are not against doing that especially when they see a surplus in a particular area. I wrote this line on June 17, 2022: “Alexander Romanov, clearly a core player at this point, needs a new contract this summer.”
Romanov was traded less than three weeks later. So he wasn’t clearly a core player, at least not to the people running the Canadiens. Things change. Opportunities arise. But what is good news for the Canadiens is their current prospect pool should allow them to be aggressive on the trade market in the next two years.
They didn’t have the proper ammunition to get Dubois from the Jets. But they will soon.
You and MAG more or less had Newhook as the prime target for a “Dach-like” trade option for the Habs and nailed it. Just for fun, want to take a way too early prediction on who they might target from the 2024 class of free agents? — Josh D.Oh yes, I find it very fun to look stupid and extremely wrong. Sure, let’s do this.
As of right now, the Canadiens have 12 forwards, five defencemen and one goalie signed in 2024-25. When you add in Carey Price’s $10.5 million, it makes for a total cap hit of $72.15 million, leaving them with roughly $15 million in space under a theoretical $87.5 million cap, plus much more if they put Price’s contract back on LTIR. That total does not include Xhekaj, Barron or Sam Montembeault, none of whom are signed past this season, but I would imagine they will each have a contract in 2024-25 as well.
So let’s ballpark it and say the Canadiens would have roughly $10 million in cap space next summer, give or take a million, without even going into LTIR. But when you add those three players, the Canadiens have 12 forwards, seven defencemen and two goalies under contract, and that’s not including any young players who might be pushing for a spot, including Reinbacher, Mailloux, Emil Heineman, perhaps Joshua Roy and several others. But it is possible, if not likely, that Christian Dvorak and perhaps even Josh Anderson will have been traded by then, though I would imagine if they were traded, there would be NHL players coming back in the deal because the Canadiens see both those players as having legitimate value, and trading either of them just for futures probably wouldn’t suffice. Still, those trades, if they happened at all, would probably still result in even more cap space to work with, even if it isn’t a straight deduction of their salaries.
If the Canadiens decided it was time to get active in free agency, I would imagine they would target a forward, and more specifically a winger to fill out their top six. They would have the cap space to make a serious run at William Nylander if he makes it to market, and it doesn’t sound as though talks on an extension with the Toronto Maple Leafs have gone all that well thus far. He will have just turned 28 two months before July 1, 2024, and has been a remarkably consistent scorer for the Maple Leafs, even in the playoffs — in his last three playoffs he has 12 goals and 25 points in 25 games, matching Auston Matthews’ point total over that span.
Nylander will cost at least $10 million a year on a long-term deal, one that would take him into his mid-30s. There’s definite risk there, but players like him rarely make it to market. I’m not willing to predict the Canadiens will sign him, but if I were running things, I would do everything I could to make it happen.
Assuming no trade or contract buyout(s), what is your view of the four forward lines and three defence pairs on opening night? — NoCup4U
What are the odds that one, two or all three of Dvorak, Hoffman and Armia are gone before the beginning of the season? — Nicholas F.
I would expect Joel Armia to be in the opening night lineup, but I don’t feel nearly as confident about Mike Hoffman. I think there’s a very real possibility he gets waived and assigned to Laval. Roster spots for young forwards are at a premium, and I don’t think Canadiens management is willing to allow a development opportunity pass them by with the slight hope that playing Hoffman could lead to a trade at the deadline.
The situation with Armia is very different. Even if he’s not scoring, he provides value as a penalty killer, he can match up with difficult opponents and he can play a strong possession game in the offensive zone as someone who wins board battles. His salary suggests he should do more than that, but there’s still value there. If Hoffman is not scoring, he’s not providing any value. And he hasn’t scored consistently in a Canadiens uniform.
Also, if we are talking strictly about opening night, Christian Dvorak is not here either because it is my understanding he is not likely to be physically ready for the start of the season. He might need an extra week or two. That’s one reason why a trade involving Dvorak is unlikely prior to the start of the season, but one during the season or at the trade deadline is a definite possibility.
So, with that said, here are my opening night forward lines.
Cole Caufield, Nick Suzuki,Alex Newhook
Juraj Slafkovský, Kirby Dach, Josh Anderson
Joel Armia, Sean Monahan, Brendan Gallagher
Jesse Ylönen, Jake Evans, Rafaël Harvey-Pinard
I believe Dvorak’s return will change things significantly.
Cole Caufield, Nick Suzuki, Alex Newhook
Sean Monahan, Kirby Dach, Josh Anderson
Juraj Slafkovský, Christian Dvorak, Brendan Gallagher
Jesse Ylönen, Jake Evans, Joel Armia
This is where Rafaël Harvey-Pinard’s waiver exemption hurts him. When the Canadiens are healthy, there is simply no room for him, because Michael Pezzetta is the 13th forward in both these scenarios and I’m taking it for granted that barring a series of injuries in training camp, Rem Pitlick will be waived and sent to Laval.
I am placing Alex Newhook on the top line because I believe the Canadiens would like to see what that looks like. His speed is an element I think management felt would be a good fit on that line, offensively but more so defensively in transition, and I truly believe it will be given a shot in the preseason unless the coaching staff vehemently disagrees. Having Sean Monahan help Kirby Dach in faceoff situations once Dvorak is back just makes too much sense, but he could also be a replacement for Newhook on the top line if that doesn’t work out. And you could do much worse than a third line of Slafkovský, Dvorak and Brendan Gallagher. Plus, that fourth line looks pretty decent as well, with three players who can contribute at both ends of the ice.
Alright, on to the defence.
Mike Matheson - Kaiden Guhle
Arber Xhekaj -David Savard
Jordan Harris - Johnathan Kovacevic
This is a tough one, but again, Barron’s waiver exemption hurts him. He will need to severely outperform Johnathan Kovacevic in training camp to grab that third-pairing spot, in my opinion. And if he doesn’t, management will not want him sitting in the press box when they can easily have him playing meaningful minutes in Laval. I’m sure they would rather not have Guhle playing on the right side either, but having him on the left means there’s no room for Harris — I don’t see any scenario where Xhekaj doesn’t have a spot in the opening lineup — and I think the Canadiens would be less willing to send Harris to Laval than Barron. Chris Wideman serves as the seventh defenceman here.
Should the Habs trade for Shohei Ohtani? He seems like he could do anything with maybe a few skating lessons and some guidance from MSL. — Glen R.Yes, this is a brilliant idea and I endorse it 100 percent. Shohei can indeed do anything he puts his mind to, and he would make one hell of a power forward.
) on Mr. Eriksson. Hockey IQ is his greatest strength, according to his coach. Right now, without knowing if he can improve on his Swedish Juniour single point per game average, I'd say he could project as a 4th or 3rd line centre. Lots of development time left and his inclusion on the 5 Nations tourney team is at least the first indicator that maybe he has more scoring in him. We don't know if he had the wrist injury and tried to play through it for a few games, or had the wrist injury and had to stop playing immediately. Playing through it would reduce his skills and therefore his point totals. Habs braintrust seem very knowledgeable about wrist injuries and their effect. 
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