Montreal Canadiens
Canadiens Could Sign Monahan To Special Contract Due To Injury
The Montreal Canadiens may not have been able to trade Sean Monahan at the NHL Trade Deadline, but they could keep him and try again next year.
The Canadiens now have the ability to offer Monahan a second chance to redeem himself in the NHL in the form of a one-year, bonus-laden contract.
Normally, performance bonuses are only found in the contracts of young players on entry-level deals or for players that are above 35 years of age.
There is, however, a third option, which is very rare to see in the NHL, but relevant to Monahan.
The Rules
According to the NHL’s Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), a player who has played 400 or more games in the NHL and spent 100 or more days on Injured Reserve (Or Long-Term Injury Reserve) in the last year of their contract, is eligible
Here is the exact wording from the CBA:
“Players who are “400-plus game Players” for pension purposes, and who: (i) in the last year of their most recent SPC, spent 100 days or more on the Injured Reserve List; and (ii) have signed a one-year SPC for the current or upcoming League Year.”
With Monahan having played 681 games up to date and having missed the last 89 days and counting, the Canadiens will have some interesting options with Monahan should he not return to play before March 16.
How Montreal Canadiens Could Make It Work
For starters, there are two types of performance bonuses in the NHL:
Schedule A Bonus: Basic conditions like playing 60+ games, scoring 20 goals, etc (max of $1M)
Schedule B Bonus: League-wide award (Art Ross, Selke, etc) and team-determined parameters (max of $2.5M)
The Montreal Canadiens could, in theory, offer Sean Monahan a contract worth $2M in base, with an additional $2M available in performance bonuses.
Such a contract could be structured primarily around Monahan’s ability to play games and produce points.
Thus, having bonuses could allow the Canadiens to easily fit him within their salary structure for now, and possibly deferring his performance bonus hits (should he meet them) to the following season; as the Canadiens will likely be using LTIR next season as well.
If the Canadiens were to make those bonuses relatively easy to hit, an interested buyer at next year’s NHL Trade Deadline won’t be on the hook for the carry-over cap hit; only if Monahan achieves the bonus condition while playing for them.
Thus, the Canadiens could sign Monahan to a cheap base contract, absorb all of the bonus hits via next-season carryover, and trade him to a contender next season for a very interesting return; health permitting.
You’ve got to believe that general manager Kent Hughes is likely to consider it, especially if calls on centre Christian Dvorak continue into the summer.
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This would be the only scenario that would interest me in resigning Monahan. The sheer number of surgeries alone this guy has had on his hips, knees, sports hernia, you name it, along with concussions, says stay away in bright flashing lights. I’d rather wait until training camp and see if anyone is ready to make the jump before signing Monahan though. If he wants to sign elsewhere before then, so be it. I really liked what he provided in the 25 games he played, but that’s just it, it was only 25 games. Although, I have to say, it would be funny to trade him at the deadline next year for another 2025 first round pick. That way when we’re drafting in 2025, we’ll have 2 picks in the same first round that came as a result of Monahan. I can just hear the announcers on TV during the draft. “This pick by the Canadiens is a result of the Monahan trade with Calgary.” and then a few moments later, “This pick by the Canadiens is a result of the the trade involving… Monahan. Huh? Say what?” 😂
Monahan was screwed by Hughes , even Hughes admits in hindsight he wouldnt have allowed him to play in CGY or the following 2 games after. He gave the excuse Monahan really wanted to play against his former team as the logic behind it.(No explination for why after that he continued playing injured.
Price last year in the final few games it was the same thing.
He clearly hurt himself but wanted to stay in for what could be his final games in MTL and he wanted to go out with a Win. He got what he wanted in a blowout win for his final game but at what cost.
That 70+ year old Relic incharge of MTL Medical is the real problem with why for as long as i can remember MTL has been plagued by injuries to the point they are usually top 5 most injured team every year without fail.
That to me says the medical staff has to be replaced top to bottom to ensure no knuckleheads are left behind as they’ve failed us more consistently then anyone in the organization
So is it the medical staff that gets the final say or is the coach, player, GM or a combination of all that? Which might explain after the fact why a player is on LTD much longer than expected.
It’s a physical sport. Players play injured. Let’s Make a rule that you can only play while 100%. Now, try icing a roster. I do agree they should have been more careful with monohan. Even more so after he played the flames.
I wouldn’t want to have to carry over his bonus to the following year. I would just offer 1 year , around 4 millon. Especially if we want to be getting better that year more so than the upcoming year.