EDMONTON | When we take stock of the transactions and signings Kent Hughes and Jeff Gorton have made since they took over, it seems like everything they've done has worked.
When this remark was relayed to him, the Canadiens general manager smiled hesitantly.
“You know, to date we have not always made the best decision. But we should not be afraid of mistakes,” he replied. On the other hand, we should not make the mistake of isolating transactions when analyzing them,” he added.
“When you make a deal, people immediately evaluate it. Then they will evaluate it in a year, in two, then in five. Each time the conclusions may be different.
After hearing Hughes' explanation, Rep. Magazine I couldn’t help but draw a parallel with Artturi Lehkonen’s deal. In March 2022, Hughes traded the Finnish forward for Justin Barron and a second-round pick.
Pay when you need it
In June of that year, Lehkonen helped the Avalanche win the Stanley Cup. However, about three years later, Hughes used Barron to pry Alexander Carrier from the Predators. As for the second round pick, it served as a bargaining chip to secure the pick that would select Michael Hage.
“That's it. There will be transactions that look lost or won,” he agreed. But the only thing that matters is where we are as a team, where we're going and what we need to do to get there.
“That’s why I often say that at the right time we will overpay [donner trop de joueurs, d’espoirs ou de choix au repêchage] to get the player. At this point it will look like we have lost the deal. But perhaps we will see it completely differently.”
As for the Canadian, we know that in trying to get a center player who can play on the second line, Hughes risks being too generous towards his counterpart, in that he will be ready to sacrifice too much.
This is well known. You don't even need to ask him.
“I often see people saying we haven't been able to find a second center. I don't think so,” the Montrealer said. “We know we want to improve our second line, but we haven't said we absolutely want to do that in the summer of 2025.”
If we understand correctly, everything is a matter of interpretation and vision. No matter how much we criticize, analyze, judge, a true assessment can only be made at the end of Hughes' tenure as Canadiens general manager.
