After first hinted at on twitter by Dave Stubbs of the Montreal Gazette, the Montreal Canadiens waited until after 5pm to save a day of salary against the cap to call up right winger Christian Thomas from their AHL affiliate, the Hamilton Bulldogs.
Thomas missed the first 19 games of the season recuperating from a sports hernia, but has been one of Hamilton’s top scorers since returning, with 14 points in 23 games (seriously, the Bulldogs don’t score a lot). He’s scored in his last two games, adding an assist as well, and has a +2 rating while firing 60 shots on net so far (2.61 per game).
Thomas is a speedy, small winger, which doesn’t really make much sense as a profile to call up when Marc Bergevin continues to reiterate that he’s looking for size, but perhaps it should teach everyone to not put much value in the public words of a general manager.
The real question this move raises is, what does this mean for Louis Leblanc? Leblanc has played excellently for the Canadiens in two call ups this season, but didn’t get much of a chance to produce, and couldn’t generate a single point. Is his time with Montreal coming to an end?
