Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Marc Bergevin Looking At Western Conference Defensemen: Jeff Petry Anyone?

1:41 PM  Fred Poulin  5 comments

With about three weeks before the trade deadline, it has been fairly quiet on the trade front in the NHL. However, action should pick up around the league as we are slowly separating contenders and pretenders. One player that will definitely be traded is Edmonton Oilers' defenseman, Jeff Petry. The right-handed blue liner is an impending unrestricted free agent earning a respectable $3.025 million this season.

According to TSN Insider Darren Dreger, Montreal Canadiens GM has been contacting Western Conference teams to inquire about the availability of some of their defensemen.

The impending UFA is currently having one of his worst defensive seasons so far this year, recording 4 goals and 8 assists for 12 points with a putrid -27 differential in 53 games with the lowly Oilers. The lanky 6'3'', 198-lb, blue liner, who is not known for his offensive abilities, has spent all his professional career with Edmonton, who drafted him 45th overall in 2006.

The 27-year-old defenseman has only 70 hits and 61 blocked shots this season, which is nothing to write home. Spending on average 21:16 minutes on the ice per game, Petry is a more expensive version of Tom Gilbert, who has been playing very well lately, paired alongside bruising defenseman Alexei Emelin.

A healthy scratch earlier this season (like Gilbert), Petry has been one of the steadiest Oilers defencemen lately, although he will never be physical enough to hush his harshest critics (like Gilbert). For comparison purposes, Gilbert has 2 goals and 7 assists for 9 points with a +8 rating in 49 games with the Habs this year. Gilbert is the lesser physical of the two with a mere 23 hits this season, but he has more blocked shots than Petry with 87. 

While Petry (50.2% CFeven) has better possession numbers than Gilbert (45.2% CFeven) and is slightly more physical than Gilbert, is he really worth sacrificing a middle round pick and/or a prospect to improve the Canadiens' defensive brigade which ranks first in the league in goals allowed per game with 2.03? I don't think so. I'd trade for Cody Franson instead if I were Marc Bergevin...

Who would you want to acquire if you were Marc Bergevin?

Other options on defense include Cody Franson, Mike Green, Andrej Sekera, Marc Methot, Zbynek Michalek and Marek Zidlicky.

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5 comments:

Aceman here from Habfans.com We are recruiting new members to our gay Habs fan blog, registration comes first then the best hockey delusional talk around about how the Habbies are going to win the Stanley Cup (rolling eyes)

I really dont think you were supposed to mention that type of blog we are, after that incident with Duane. Best comment on Habfans today was when someone said All the Canadiens need to be a contender are a tough big defenseman, a top 6 left winder and a power foward right wing. Is that all !! LMAO

tINTIN

Losing to Philly again, I see, Habs cant beat the bigger teams at all, and it gets worse come the playoffs, when you have to go up against Good teams with size Taa Taa Losers.

umm a person above should wait untel the games actually over to show his ignorance itseems the habs did indeed beat the big badonly on the scoreboard flyers

I would easily prefer Franson (not Franzen) over Petry. Franson has played behind Weber/Suter and about 15 leaf Dmen before getting recognized for his hard work and getting rewarded by playing with Phags on the #1 Dpair (which obviously would qualify as punishment). Get him away from Phags and the leafs and see if he doesn't earn 5mil/year. I bet he does.

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