With every passing season, the Montreal Canadiens get in better salary-cap shape. Since general manager Kent Hughes’ debut, that’s been generally true as he attempts to build the team based on his offensive-minded vision for the team. It’s an assumption, but a pretty safe one that vision doesn’t exactly include being pressed up to the ceiling as a direct result of bad contract after bad contract.
Call it a hunch.
Related: Canadiens’ Best Contracts for 2024-25
As a sign of that implied year-over-year progress, this year’s edition of the five worst Canadiens contracts features some significant turnover. There are two new names on the list heading into 2024-25, not because Hughes has gotten himself into trouble, but because he’s had success moving out worse deals.
The end result is the light at the end of the tunnel is becoming visible. Some bad contracts may realistically not get shed for some while. However, the difference between Hughes and his predecessor, Marc Bergevin, is there’s at least a sense Hughes has tricks up his sleeves, instead of new bad contracts waiting in the wings. Here are the worst five currently on the roster:
5. Carey Price ($10.5 million cap hit)
Goalie Carey Price’s $10.5 million hit is projected to go on long-term injured reserve (LTIR). As a result, it takes the No. 5 spot as a less-than-ideal inconvenience more than anything else. However, compare and contrast Price’s cap hit with current-No. 1 Samuel Montembeault’s $3.15 million and you get the sense things are more where they should be in net.
Granted, Montembeault is no Price, who, at his peak, was the best in the world at the position. Looking at the last 10 goalies who won the Stanley Cup, though? Their average cap hit was less than half Price’s ($4.37 million). Maybe Montembeault is an overcorrection. However, he’s also more in line with what it takes to win it all in net these days: a competent affordable goalie, around whom you can build a more capable team. He may be a transitional goalie. He may not even see the playoffs with the Canadiens. However, beyond a shadow of a doubt, he’s got the better contract.
4. Rafael Harvey-Pinard ($1.1 million)
What a difference a year makes for forward Rafael Harvey-Pinard (and not for the better obviously, based on his inclusion on this list). He had an impressive 2022-23 rookie season, during which he scored 14 goals in 34 games, albeit with the benefit of playing on a line with Nick Suzuki due to the Canadiens suffering through so many injuries. In 2023-24 though, he scored just twice (45 games).
His rookie success actually led to a cost-effective contract extension and his inclusion on a list of the team’s best contracts heading into 2023-24. To be clear, Harvey-Pinard’s contract isn’t bad. It’s only noteworthy here because a) he got a one-way, two-year deal, which is less than ideal now, as it could help hold back another prospect with a higher ceiling (his unfortunate offseason injury notwithstanding) and b) if this is No. 4 on a list of the five worst Canadiens contracts and it’s only worth $1.1 million per year, Hughes is doing something right.
Indeed, Harvey-Pinard’s deal is the only contract on this list Hughes signed himself. The other four are directly linked to his predecessor Marc Bergevin, even if the ex-GM only signed three of them.
3. Christian Dvorak ($4.45 million)
Forward Christian Dvorak is the lone non-signee to make the cut, his contract originating during his Arizona Coyotes days. He obviously came over after ex-Habs forward Jesperi Kotkaniemi joined the Carolina Hurricanes via offer sheet. Bergevin turned around and acquired Dvorak in what was widely acknowledged to be a haste, knee-jerk reaction to losing depth down the middle.
The 2022 first-round pick (Filip Bystedt) going back the other way was bad enough (along with a 2024 second-round pick). However, this is obviously a commentary on Dvorak’s contract, not the trade itself. And, while Dvorak only has one season left on his deal, his cap hit is high enough, his struggles significant enough, that it has become a burden to the Canadiens.
Trading Dvorak should be an offseason priority for Hughes. It’s possible he gets it done, but Hughes is also contending with the fact Dvorak has played just 150 games over three seasons with the Canadiens, scoring just 70 points, including a meagre nine (five goals) in 30 contests in 2023-24. Dvorak’s one saving grace is his team-leading 57.8% faceoff success rate last season, but $4.45 million is a lot to count against the cap, especially if there’s no guarantee he’s going to appear in that many games to take faceoffs in the first place. So, Hughes has his work cut out for him.
2. Josh Anderson ($5.5 million)
Yes, forward Josh Anderson has got size. Yes, he’s got speed. It used to be as recently as 2022-23 that he had goals too, but the well unfortunately dried up last season. Despite being a reliable 20-goal guy during his first three seasons with the Canadiens, he scored just nine (20 points) in 2023-24.
The hope is obviously that, with three years left on his deal, Anderson rebounds. The Canadiens would understandably try their best to start him off on the right foot this coming season to maximize the value they get out of Anderson, the balance of his contract. However, seeing as he has never scored more than 32 points in any one with the Canadiens, it unfortunately isn’t all that realistic that he suddenly becomes the top-six forward he’s paid to be, not at Age 30.
1. Brendan Gallagher ($6.5 million)
You kind of knew Brendan Gallagher’s contract would come back to bite the Canadiens at the time. That’s kind of a recurring theme on this list, between him, Price and, to a lesser extent, Anderson, who arguably had a lot more to prove in the NHL before Bergevin signed him to his rich deal.
In Gallagher’s case, he was obviously paid “back” for overperforming over the course of his previous, six-year $22.5 million deal, during which he established himself as an arguably elite forward. Since his current, six-year, $39 million deal came into effect though, he’s played just 170 of a possible 246 games, scoring 31 goals, when he used to score at that pace over a single season.
To be fair, Gallagher showed signs of life in 2023-24. Of those 31 goals, 16 came last season. He ended the season on a production high with five goals (10 points) in his last eight games. He also continues to do the unheralded things right, like driving play, even if his role on the team has shifted.
Ultimately, Gallagher is still a positive-impact player when he’s on the ice, relative to teammates (excluding goals). His overall contract taken into account (including the no-movement clause), he’s a negative-value player all the same. Based on the team’s current make-up, it’s simply hard to envision him ever getting the minutes he needs to justify his deal… or him being able to take advantage of those minutes based on his accumulated injury history, even if he did.
Gallagher still personifies effort and grit. He still fits on this team and, thanks to Hughes’ work with the salary cap, as does his contract. It should over the next three seasons too, before it expires, at which point he’ll be 35. The idea of him retiring as a member of the Canadiens shouldn’t take all that much getting used to, as that’s where we’re logically headed… and it’s just fitting that he would.
For all the criticism Gallagher faces, in this piece too, there’s no denying he’s more than earned his place in Canadiens lore. For all he’s accomplished, his legacy should largely go untarnished as a result of the money he was happily handed. He’s got a few more seasons to go, at least giving him a chance to grow his legend further.
