The NHL and NHLPA made a joint announcement this morning stating that Canadiens’ goaltender Carey Price was taking a leave from the team to take part in the NHL/NHLPA player assistance program.
Angela Price, the wife of the Canadiens’ goaltender, posted the following on her Instagram account:
Eventful off-season
What an off-season for the Montreal Canadiens. In fact, if you add last season, with the firing of Claude Julien and Kirk Muller, followed by the same fate for goalie coach Stéphane Waite a few days later, it’s been an odd year! In case you were living under a rock this summer, here’s the sequence of events surrounding the Habs:
July 9: Joel Bouchard leaves the organization and signs with the Anaheim Ducks to coach their farm team in San Diego.
July 22: Marc Bergevin announces that Captain Shea Weber will not play next season and his career is in question.
July 23: Left unprotected for the Seattle Expansion Draft, Carey Price is not selected by the Kraken. They picked Cale Fleury instead.
July 23: Habs shocked the hockey world by selecting Logan Mailloux in the first round.
July 28: Phillip Danault signs with the Kings while Corey Perry signs with the Lightning. The Canadiens sign Mike Hoffman and David Savard.
July 30: Paul Byron undergoes hip surgery and will miss the first couple of months of the season.
August 5: Tomas Tatar signs with the Devils.
August 28: Jesperi Kotkaniemi signs a $6.1 million offer-sheet from the Hurricanes.
September 2: Mailloux is suspended indefinitely by the OHL.
September 4: Habs don’t match Hurricanes’ offer to Kotkaniemi, trade for Christian Dvorak instead.
October 7: Price voluntarily enters NHL/NHLPA player assistance program, taking a leave from the team.
Add to this the fact that Bergevin is entering the final season of his current contract with the team, and the speculations surrounding his future with the team and you have a drama-filled and tumultuous few months. No wonder the man is tire and wondering if he wants to continue in that role! Can you imagine if he did the same job elsewhere, where there is just a fraction of medias to deal with and where language for both the coaches and players selected are not an issue, how much easier the job would be? For the sake of the organisation, here’s hoping that he does in deed puts his name at the bottom of a contract in the next few days as rumoured.