I have to agree with you there AB. I have been a little dissappointed with some of the moves that have occured.

1) We give up Garon for nothing. We could've had Bonk or anyone else for nothing. Sign Bonk for much more than he's worth.

2) Signs Theo to way too much money and too long.

3) Overpaid for Kovy in my opinion but that's ok if he can bolster the first line.

4) Gave away Ward and Hossa for nothing when we have no depth. For example Ribs and Dags are sucking the bag, so say we want to shuffle things up and send Dags to the minors and bench Ribs. We put Pleks with Zed and Ryder when Zed is back on the second line, we are then missing a 4th line player, Hossa or Ward would've been perfect. Ward preferably as he's shown the heart to make it.

5) Signs Ivannis to a 2 way deal and keeps him and signs that other guy to a one way deal and sends him down. Now who do we have that can protect our team, NO ONE!

So with the new CBA, Bob isn't looking like such a genious anymore. I don't want to get on BG's case cause he has brought class back to the organization. He makes most of his players want to be here and some other players want to come here. I'm just not sure about the moves I've stated above.

JohnM. I do agree that Theo is over-paid. The unfortunate thing about montreal is that being the GM involves a great deal of politics. The Montreal people are proud of the french culture and desperately want a french canadian superstar( so much so that they are willing to make Ribero captain over Koivu ).

Gainey really had no choice but to sign Theo to big money. simply put, if he didn't Gainey would not last as GM for more than a year( even if Montreal had a great year). They would have to win the cup for the french media to be satisfied after trading their beloved Theo.

Building a winner nowadays in Montreal requires intelligence and patience and the ability to out think the media crazed environment. I think Gainey deep down knows that Theo is very average. That is why he selected Price in the first round. He signed Theo to a long term contract so that he could involve him in a big trade in a year or so. If he did not sign him long term Theo would have simply had enough of the pressure and left as a free agent anyhow for nothing. Its like a chess match really...Gainey is thinking two steps ahead. Montreal is the only environment that you need to navigate in a smart manner. Without Gainey I doubt Montreal would ever win a cup again.

The key thing to remember is that Gainey does not intend on winning the cup this year(Ottawa  has that all tied up I think). This is a 3-4 year plan we are talking about. We are in year two at this time.

That is true. I always liked Ward to be honest, he had heart. I think they let him go to give him a chance to see if he could flourish elsewhere( classy thing to do). Dags over hossa I do not know, unless it was to complete the Kovalev transaction? I don't like players like Hossa anyhow, all talent and no determination/heart. He will likely never be on a cup winning team in his career. He may score 20-30 goals regular season, but come crunch time, turtle up like a weasel in the corner somewhere( Kinda like Ribs in the playoffs 2 years ago).  

Dags...I really have no answer for that guy. Maybe they thought his size and the fact that he got 17 goals in 50 games earned him a 5-10 game shot this year? In any case bu-by I think at this point.