Working the NHL trade market is often about manipulating pressure points, with the most obvious one being the trade deadline. The reason that date is in place is to create urgency, to force NHL general managers to stop bargaining and just make a decision.
But sometimes, if you are paying attention, you can artificially manufacture a pressure point. It is difficult not to see the Montreal Canadiens trading Sean Monahan to the Winnipeg Jets on Friday as an example of that.
The Canadiens got the Jets’ first-round pick in the 2024 draft in return, and they will also get their third-round pick in 2027 if the Jets win the Stanley Cup this spring. But simply getting that first-round pick for Monahan at this early stage of the trade cycle was a deft maneuver by Canadiens general manager Kent Hughes, and it appears as though he used another trade to create the leverage necessary to get it done.
“Yes, I think the teams that were in the race for Lindholm shifted towards Sean. That accelerated things, for sure,” Hughes said Friday. “In terms of whether that had an impact on the return, we did our homework, we had a good idea of where the market was going.
“So when we got our price, we were ready to do it.”
On Sunday, the Jets put defenceman Declan Chisholm on waivers, losing him to the Minnesota Wild on Monday, and Jets general manager Kevin Chevaldayoff didn’t really deny that move was related to what was going on with Lindholm.
“There’s a lot of intertwining things that happened over the course of this week,” he said. “Obviously cap space is something that, depending on which directions you go with some things, you might need.”
Earlier, Cheveldayoff also acknowledged how the Monahan trade talks were ramped up as a result of the Lindholm trade.
“I think the urgency, or the timing of things was accelerated by the activity over the start of the break here,” he said. “Fortunately for us, we had some conversations early yesterday morning and culminated very late last night with pretty much an agreement.”
That urgency was due to just how much the Jets coveted Monahan.
“We believe this is a good fit,” Chevaldayoff said. “If there wasn’t a fit out there, there wasn’t going to be a trade. We were just fortunate that timing and opportunity intertwined, and we were able to make it happen.”
Does that mean he would not have traded a first-round pick for anyone by Monahan?
“I’m not going to just divulge our list, but would I have been as open to moving as high of a pick as I did if it wasn’t (Sean Monahan)? That’s probably a much more likely scenario that we wouldn’t have gone that deep for a pick in this situation,” Chevaldayoff said.
In other words, yes, that’s what that means.
Did the Canadiens know how badly the Jets wanted Monahan? Hard to say. Hughes did not give any indication that was the case, but whether it was the Jets or another team, it seems somewhat obvious Hughes used the Lindholm trade to his advantage here, and whether he simply got lucky that there was a team as desperate to add Monahan as the Jets were or he knew, the end result is the same: The Canadiens got another first-round pick via Sean Monahan, on top of the 2025 first-round pick they got for taking Monahan from the Flames to begin with.
And the urgency for the Canadiens seemed to be based on their experience last year, when Joel Edmundson was fighting to get back in the lineup in time to be a viable option at the deadline and Monahan was out with a torn groin. The fact the supply in the market shifted last year was also a warning sign for Hughes that he would be better off getting something done here while Monahan was the top centre available, at least to some teams, after the Lindholm trade went down.
“I think any time you go through this process, you try to understand the market, you try to understand who is or may be interested in the services of, in this case, Sean Monahan, what the upside would be and you measure that against the risk of any player (getting injured) — not specifically Sean Monahan, because I don’t have any specific (injury) concern in relation to Sean. If we did, we wouldn’t have signed him. We very comfortable it was a worthwhile risk to sign him,” Hughes said. “But there is a risk to any hockey player and there’s a risk to the market shifting too. You see that with who’s sellers, who’s buyers and how many other players end up on the market. I don’t think a (Mattias) Ekholm or a (Dmitry) Orlov, for example, were necessarily on the market in late January or early February last year.
“So we felt comfortable that this was the right deal and there wasn’t significant upside to waiting.”
Again, there’s some reading between the lines going on here, but Hughes seemed to suggest that extracting a first-round pick for Monahan, even if he did wait, wasn’t necessarily a given.
“With certain teams it’s really the cap that dictates everything and they don’t have enough space,” Hughes said. “But for many other teams, the fact that it’s a rental will lessen what they are willing to pay in terms of a return, 100 percent.
“There are teams who say they won’t give up a first-round pick for a rental.”
And in terms of his inability to add a prospect for Monahan?
“In terms of this trade it was more a pick that was available, and that was fine with us,” Hughes said.
He also added, “We asked for prospects in certain cases, but the prospects we asked for, the teams did not want to part with them.”
Doesn’t really sound like that hot of a market for Monahan, at least not right now, and at least not at that price point. Perhaps the market would have gotten hotter had Hughes waited, but when you get the price you have set on a player — and a first-round pick was clearly the targeted price — you grab it.
To get that price, you need a set of conditions to develop. The Lindholm trade and the Jets identifying Monahan as a great fit on their team and not really having any other options created those conditions.
“Sometimes when you’re doing things like this, you don’t know what the timeline is of the other team. That’s always kind of the tricky part,” Cheveldayoff said. “Everyone’s going to have a different timeline, everyone’s going to have a different pressure point. Fortunately for us, we were able to make a deal happen. Obviously, you give up a good asset, but you have to do that in this league to get a good player.”
So, from the sounds of that answer, it was the Canadiens that wanted to move quickly here. And in terms of the decision to part with a first-round pick, that also seemed to be related to the timeline the Canadiens had created.
“I think when you’re in situations like this, and I’ve been on both sides of them, you grind away to not have to trade it and you grind away to make sure you make the other team give it up,” Cheveldayoff said. “It can be a game of chicken. But you also have to weigh the alternatives and weigh the options and weigh the fit. When the fit is great, when you believe this is the best option for you, you have to make those tough calls.”
Were the Jets the only team willing to part with a first-round pick for Monahan? We’ll probably never know. But the old saying in hockey is all it takes is one team, and if the Jets were that one team, the Canadiens found them at just the right time.
But now, Hughes needs to look forward. There are still five weeks remaining before the March 8 trade deadline, and the fact Hughes was able to get a first-round pick without retaining money on Monahan is another significant development here because it means the Canadiens remain open for business.
They are still carrying three goalies and Jake Allen’s name has been out there for weeks. Having their one remaining retention slot could help facilitate a trade there, though it doesn’t sound as though there is that much of a market for his services at his cap number, or even at half price. If there were a robust market to acquire Allen, he probably would have been traded already, because our sense is the cost to get him wouldn’t necessarily be all that high.
A trade market can ebb and flow like the tides. Just look at the Edmonton Oilers, who seemed desperate to add a goaltender a month or two ago, but are no longer nearly that desperate, to say the least. Frederik Andersen is on the road to recovery in Carolina, meaning their need for goaltending may be on the wane. But all it takes is one injury to shift the market forces around.
If the Canadiens don’t use the retention slot to trade a player away, they could always use it to facilitate a trade and add another asset, like they did last season when they brokered the deal that sent Nick Bonino to the Pittsburgh Penguins by retaining half of his salary and got a fourth-round pick for the trouble.
But from a more big-picture standpoint, the Canadiens are also approaching a time when they will need to add actual bodies to their NHL lineup. Losing Monahan will hurt the Canadiens players currently in that room competing every night, and though every player will surely accept that this is what happens when you are in the position the Canadiens are in, it would not be far-fetched to imagine those same players wondering how long they will be in this position.
(Photo of Sean Monahan and Kyle Connor: Darcy Finley/NHLI via Getty Images)
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — DeMar DeRozan scored 27 points in a record-setting performance and the Sacramento Kings beat the Toronto Raptors 122-107 on Wednesday night.
Domantas Sabonis added 17 points, 13 assists and 11 rebounds for his third triple-double of the season for Sacramento. He shot 6 for 6 from the field and 5 for 5 at the free-throw line.
Keegan Murray chipped in with 22 points and 12 rebounds, and De’Aaron Fox scored 21.
The 35-year-old DeRozan has scored at least 20 points in each of his first eight games with the Kings, breaking a franchise mark established by Chris Webber when he reached 20 in his first seven games with Sacramento in 1999.
DeRozan spent the past three seasons with the Chicago Bulls. The six-time All-Star also has played for Toronto and San Antonio during his 16-year NBA career.
RJ Barrett had 23 points to lead the Raptors. Davion Mitchell scored 20 in his first game in Sacramento since being traded to Toronto last summer.
Takeaways
Raptors: Toronto led for most of the first three quarters before wilting in the fourth. The Raptors were outscored 33-14 in the final period.
Kings: Fox played strong defense but struggled again shooting from the floor as he is dealing with a finger injury. Fox went 5 for 17 and just 2 of 8 on 3-pointers. He is 5 for 25 from beyond the arc in his last three games.
Key moment
The Kings trailed 95-89 early in the fourth before going on a 9-0 run that gave them the lead for good. DeRozan started the spurt with a jumper, and Malik Monk scored the final seven points.
Key stat
Sabonis had the eighth game in the NBA since at least 1982-83 with a triple-double while missing no shots from the field or foul line. The previous player to do it was Josh Giddey for Oklahoma City against Portland on Jan. 11.
Up next
Raptors: At the Los Angeles Clippers on Saturday night, the third stop on a five-game trip.
VANCOUVER – The Vancouver Whitecaps are one win away from moving on to the next round of the Major League Soccer playoffs.
To get there, however, the Whitecaps will need to pull off the improbable by defeating the powerhouse Los Angeles FC for a second straight game.
Vancouver blanked the visitors 3-0 on Sunday to level their best-of-three first-round playoff series at a game apiece. As the matchup shifts back to California for a decisive Game 3 on Friday, the Whitecaps are looking for a repeat performance, said striker Brian White.
“We take the good and the bad from last game, learn from what we could have done better and go to LAFC with confidence and, obviously, with a whole lot of respect,” he said.
“We know that we can go there and give them a very good fight and hopefully come away with a win.”
The winner of Friday’s game will face the No. 4-seed Seattle Sounders in a one-game Western Conference semifinal on Nov. 23 or 24.
The ‘Caps finished the regular season eighth in the west with a 13-13-8 record and have since surprised many with their post-season play.
First, Vancouver trounced its regional rivals, the Portland Timbers, 5-0 in a wild-card game. Then, the squad dropped a tightly contested 2-1 decision to the top-seeded L.A. before posting a decisive home victory on Sunday.
Vancouver has scored seven goals this post-season, second only to the L.A. Galaxy (nine). Vancouver also leads the league in expected goals (6.84) through the playoffs.
No one outside of the club expected the Whitecaps to win when the Vancouver-L. A. series began, said defender Ranko Veselinovic.
“We’ve shown to ourselves that we can compete with them,” he said.
Now in his fifth season with the ‘Caps, Veselinovic said Friday’s game will be the biggest he’s played for the team.
“We haven’t had much success in the playoffs so, definitely, this is the one that can put our season on another level,” he said.
This is the second year in a row the Whitecaps have faced LAFC in the first round of the playoffs and last year, Vancouver was ousted in two straight games.
The team isn’t thinking about revenge as it prepares for Game 3, White said.
“More importantly than (beating LAFC), we want to get to the next round,” he said. “LAFC’s a very good team. We’ve come up against them a number of times in different competitions and they always seem to get the better of us. So it’d be huge for us to get the better of them this time.”
Earning a win last weekend required slowing L.A.’s transition game and limiting offensive opportunities for the team’s big stars, including Denis Bouanga.
Those factors will be important again on Friday, said Whitecaps head coach Vanni Sartini, who warned that his team could face a different style of game.
“I think the most important thing is going to be to match their intensity at the beginning of the game,” he said. “Because I think they’re going to come at us a million miles per hour.”
The ‘Caps will once again look to captain Ryan Gauld for some offensive firepower. The Scottish attacking midfielder leads MLS in playoff goals with five and has scored in all three of Vancouver’s post-season appearances this year.
Gearing up for another do-or-die matchup is exciting, Gauld said.
“Knowing it’s a winner-takes-all kind of game, being in that kind of environment is nice,” he said. “It’s when you see the best in players.”
LAFC faces the bulk of the pressure heading into the matchup, Sartini said, given the club’s appearances in the last two MLS Cup finals and its 2022 championship title.
“They’re supposed to win and we are not,” the coach said. “But it’s beautiful to have a little bit of pressure on us, too.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
Each PWHL team operated under its city name, with players wearing jerseys featuring the league’s logo in its inaugural season before names and logos were announced last month.
The Toronto Sceptres, Montreal Victoire, Ottawa Charge, Boston Fleet, Minnesota Frost and New York Sirens will start the PWHL’s second season on Nov. 30 with jerseys designed to reflect each team’s identity and to be sold to the public as replicas.
Led by PWHL vice-president of brand and marketing Kanan Bhatt-Shah, the league consulted Creative Agency Flower Shop to design the jerseys manufactured by Bauer, the PWHL said Thursday in a statement.
“Players and fans alike have been waiting for this moment and we couldn’t be happier with the six unique looks each team will don moving forward,” said PWHL senior vice president of business operations Amy Scheer.
“These jerseys mark the latest evolution in our league’s history, and we can’t wait to see them showcased both on the ice and in the stands.”
Training camps open Tuesday with teams allowed to carry 32 players.
Each team’s 23-player roster, plus three reserves, will be announced Nov. 27.
Each team will play 30 regular-season games, which is six more than the first season.
Minnesota won the first Walter Cup on May 29 by beating Boston three games to two in the championship series.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
