#Isles have placed Sebastian Collberg on uncondtional waivers. Forward acquired in Vanek-MTL deal didn't pan out. Off to Europe.
Arthur Staple
So, score one for Marc Bergevin and his team of
I don’t think Marc Bergevin walks on water, but I do think he has the team on the right track, despite several reversals this season. Overall, I like his approach, his philosophy.
When I saw the tweet, I figured that’s one in the win column, one for his scorecard, using what he correctly saw as a diminishing asset as part of a package to obtain Thomas Vanek in 2014, a move that supercharged the Canadiens for a while that season. Until Thomas quit on the team.
So I thought I’d point it out, in a season when he rolled craps on Alex Semin, Zack Kassian, P.A. Parenteau, Ben Scrivens, Mike Condon, holding on too long to Tom Gilbert, Brian Flynn, etc, etc…
To me, this is a scintilla of good news, in that he got out while the getting out was good, when it comes to Sebastian Collberg, got something out of the second-rounder we spent in 2012, even if it was ephemeral.
I hate it when we lose assets like Louis Leblanc, Ryan White, Jarred Tinordi, for a big pile of nothing.
I scratch my head when we trade Danny Kristo for Christian Thomas, quatre trente-sous pour une piastre.
But I like when we flip Christian Thomas for Lucas Lessio, something we have too much of traded for something we need. I like when we sign a Mark Barberio on the cheap, park him successfully in the AHL, and bring him up when we need him. He’s now RFA, an asset we can qualify for cheap.
And I like when we flip a depreciating asset like Sebastian Collberg for a top line scoring winger, that’s a win in my book. We can call it a Phyrric victory, but it’s successful asset management.
I prefer to think of it, as the expression goes en français, “sauver les meubles”. You lost the house to a structure fire, but at least had enough time to save the furniture, the contents.
Compare to the Jarred Tinordi fiasco, and Sebastian Collberg is a feelgood story for Canadiens fans.
To those who'll argue that picking Sebastian Collberg is a mistake in the first place, so Marc Bergevin's brain trust shouldn't get brownie points for their rearguard action, I'll argue that the pick was not a wrong decision at the time.
Every Canadiens fan, and I’ll stand on this, I dare anyone to prove me wrong, every poster on social media during the second day of the NHL draft in 2012, was ecstatic about the Sebastian Collberg pick, there was a blizzard of exclamation marks greeting his selection. He was a pretty highly-rated prospect, sort of like Teuvo Teravainen, who fell a little bit, and we were doing handsprings at our luck.
Two summers in a row, spectators who attended the prospect development camp in Brossard swooned at his skill and moves, that he was the best player on the ice by far, too strong for the rest of the players in scrimmages.
So he was a good pick. Not a reach, not a blunder, just a player who didn’t develop, didn’t pan out. This happens when you’re projecting how a 17-year-old will develop. Not every player reaches his potential.
This is only a problem if too many don’t make it. And in 2012, we hit on Alex Galchenyuk in the first round, missed in the second with Sebastian Collberg, the jury’s still out, with extenuating circumstances on Tim Bozon in the third, missed on Brady Vail in the fourth while cutting our losses early and not wasting a contract on him.
We’re close to a hit on Charles Hudon with the fifth-round pick, it looks like we’ll at the very least have an asset that we can turn into something, and in the sixth we missed with Erik Nystrom.
Not a great, but not a bad draft.
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