For someone who has watched the hockey landscape evolve for almost four decades now, things such as free agency and rental player propositions at the trade deadline still don't sit well with me. Call me an old - schooler, but I've always felt that teams losing players to free agency should be in some way compensated. Players becoming free agents as early as 25 years of age truly throws a monkey wrench into long term planning by teams. For such reasons, there will likely never again be dynasties in the true sense of the word. A dynasty by today's standard is a watered down version that could consist of anything from simple back to back Cups to something like three championships in seven seasons.

Losing players for little or no return reminds me of the late 1970's, early '80's period for Montreal, where their greats retired with no dividend to the team. While I'm all in favor of great players playing their entire career for one team, the Habs were somewhat decimated by a whole roster of uncashable assets by the end of the '70's dynasty.

Towards the end of the Canadiens four Cup run in 1979, Genaral Manager Sam Pollock retired and coach Scotty Bowman, upset at not being handed the GM's job, fled to Buffalo. Neither position was ably filled.

I've chosen a group of 28 players who participated in 5 Cups wins between 1973 and 1979 to illustrate what happened to the Habs dynasty. The lack of talent continuity is obviously apparent as diminishing returns prevented the Canadiens from maintaining previous heights. Although they managed 2 more Stanley Cups in the interim, the depth has never been replaced.

The group of 28 players, divides itself a first group of 14 and a second one of 14. The first group are players that the Canadiens received no dividend from as they all retired due to different scenarios. While some were simply destined to retire as career long Canadiens, other reasons played into it as well. 

They are Jacques Lemaire, Jacques Laperriere, Mario Tremblay, Bob Gainey, Serge Savard, Frank Mahovlich, Pierre Mondou, Rejean Houle, Bill Nyrop, Henri Richard, Yvan Cournoyer, Marc Tardiff, Ken Dryden and Guy Lafleur.

This group of 14, including 9 Hall of Famers, left the Canadiens with no return value to the team. Richard, Savard, and Gainey retired due to their age. Laperriere, Cournoyer, Tremblay, Houle, and Mondou retired due to injury. Mahovlich and Tardiff went on to the WHA. Dryden, Lemaire, and Nyrop retired with much hockey left in them. Guy Lafleur was forced to retire as the Canadiens would not exercise his wish for a trade. Tardiff returned to the NHL with Quebec Nordiques.
Savard and Nyrop made brief returns to the NHL with other teams.

The second group of players are Larry Robinson, Steve Shutt, Guy Lapointe, Michel Laroque, Doug Risebrough, Doug Jarvis, Rod Langway, Brian Engblom, Pete Mahovlich, Pierre Larouche, Yvon Lambert, Rick Chartraw, Mark Napier and Pierre Bouchard.

This group of 14 includes players the Canadiens were able to get some return on, however small they were. Eight players descending from that group were members of Cup teams in 1986 and 1993. Here is how these players left and what the returns on them were. 

Larry Robinson (FA Los Angeles)

Steve Shutt ( for future considerations to Los Angeles, reaquired at same price)

Guy Lapointe ( for St.Louis' 2nd rd pick, 1983 - Sergio Momesso)

Michel Laroque (to Toronto for Robert Picard)

Doug Risebrough ( to Calgary for 2nd and 3rd rd picks '83,'84 - Todd Francis, Grahame Bonar)

Doug Jarvis ( with Englom, Langway, and Laughlin to Washington for Ryan Walter, Rick Green)

Brian Engblom ( with Jarvis, Langway, and Laughlin to Washington for Ryan Walter, Rick Green)

Rod Langway ( with Englom, Jarvis, and Laughlin to Washington for Ryan Walter, Rick Green)

Pete Mahovlich ( with Peter Lee to Pittsburgh for Pierre Larouche, Peter Marsh)

Pierre Larouche ( to Hartford for 1st rd pick '83 - Petr Svoboda)

Yvon Lambert ( claimed by Buffalo in '81 waiver draft)

Rick Chartraw ( to Los Angeles for 2nd rd pick '83 - Claude Lemieux )

Mark Napier ( to Minnesota with Keith Acton for Bobby Smith)

Pierre Bouchard ( claimed on waivers by Washingston)

It is interesting to note that backup goaltender Michel "Bunny" Larocque, two trades later, parlayed into Patrick Roy, just by sheer great luck. The return on Roy, as you will see detailed below, was equally dismal. Four players - Robinson, Shutt, Lambert and Bouchard - from this group gave the Canadiens no return at all, though had things been better managed, that could have turned out differently.

Descendants of the second group of 14, only the following 7 players were in the organization in the '84-85 period. Five of them were on the '86 Cup winner, if you exclude Roy, who had just been drafted. The final piece falling into the lineup was Brisebois, who would be on the '93 Cup winner.

Here is what those 7 players assets brought about.

Sergio Momesso ( to St. Louis with Vincent Riendeau for Jocelyn Lemieux and 2nd rd pick '89 - Patrice Brisebois)

Robert Picard ( to Winnipeg for 3rd rd pick '83 - Patrick Roy )

Ryan Walter ( FA Vancouver)

Rick Green ( to Detroit for Brad Layzell)

Petr Svoboda ( to Buffalo for Kevin Haller)

Claude Lemieux ( to New Jersey for Sylvain Turgeon)

Bobby Smith ( to Minnesota for 4th rd pick '92 - Louis Bernard

From the newer 7 assets listed above, only Roy, Brisebois, and Haller are descendant players from the 1970's dynasty that remained for the Cup in '93. Those 7 assets translated into 5 more player assets.

Jocelyn Lemieux ( to Chicago for 3rd rd pick '90 - Charles Poulin)

Patrice Brisebois (FA Colorado)

Patrick Roy ( with Mike Keane to Colorado for Jocelyn Thibeault, Andrei Kovalenko, Martin Rucinski)

Kevin Haller ( to Philadelphia for Yves Racine)

Sylvain Turgeon ( claimed by Ottawa in expansion draft)

After the trading of Roy in 1995, the returns dimished at an even thinner rate. The 3 players received for Roy were turned over for a total of 12 players in 8 seasons. No assets remain today from the descendants of the Roy deal.

Jocelyn Thibeault ( with Dave Manson and Brad Brown to Chicago for Jeff Hackett, Eric Weinrich, Alain Nasreddine, Chris Dyment)

Andrei Kovalenko ( to Edmonton for Scott Thornton)

Martin Rucinski ( with Benoit Brunet to Dallas for Donald Audette, Shaun Van Allen)

Yves Racine ( waivers San Jose)

Jeff Hackett ( to San Jose for Niklas Sundstrom)

Eric Weinrich ( to Boston for Patrick Traverse)

Alain Nasreddine ( to Edmonton with Igor Ulanov for Christian Laflamme, Mathieu Descoteaux)

Scott Thornton ( to Dallas for Juha Lind)

Donald Audette ( FA Florida)

Shaun Van Allen ( FA Ottawa)

Patrick Traverse (FA Dallas)

Niklas Sundstrom ( FA )

Juha Lind ( FA )

Christian Laflamme ( FA St.Louis)

As a result of the Roy deal, two successive goaltenders stopped pucks for the Canadiens, Jocelyn Thibeault, and then Jeff Hackett. 

By 2007, only Thibeault, Thornton, Rucinski and Brisebois remain as active NHL'ers. Brisebois, in his second term with Montreal, was the final active asset that desended from the 1970's team.

All in all, a sad return on a glorious dynasty.