Ice Breakers: Canadiens Jeff Petry drawing interest as trade deadline approaches

When a team struggles as much as the Montreal Canadiens have this season, virtually no player is deemed untouchable.

As we inch closer to the NHL trade deadline on March 21, one Canadien that’s expected to draw a lot of interest around the league is defenseman Jeff Petry.

Although Petry’s offensive production has drastically lagged beyond past season – six points in 37 games this season, compared with 42 points in 55 games last season – Frank Seravalli said during Ice Breakers on Tuesday’s episode of The Daily Faceoff Show that interest in Petry remains palpable.

This is especially apparent given that Petry remains under contract through the 2024-25 season.

Seravalli: “I think the market for Jeff Petry, I think is a little better than people might realize. They look at the term remaining – three years at $6.25 million.

“Just talking to some in the scouting community that have watched Jeff Petry this closely this season. Obviously, it’s been a disaster in terms of production. But there’s certainly some personal, off-ice issues going on that their new GM Kent Hughes alluded to. His family, Petry’s family had moved back to the U.S. because of the coronavirus restrictions.

“That certainly can impact a player. This is a guy that had 170 points over the last four seasons. In talking to some of the scouts, they’ve said that Jeff Petry just didn’t wake up this season and all of a sudden forget how to play hockey.

“I think there’s some hope that Jeff Petry can rebound. They’re thinking that probably a fair market value, in terms of what that contract might look like as a right shot moving forward, given the productivity in years past, is somewhere closer to three years times $5 million.

“There may need to be some money that the Montreal Canadiens eat or another contract that goes back their way that might alleviate some of that.

“I just want to read you a quick message from a director of pro scouting about Jeff Petry this season: ‘Still effective at driving play. Can still skate, competes well. Relatively durable. Offense can be dependent on teammates. They haven’t scored much this season, but all signs point to the same guy not scoring in the traditional sense, but still very much positively contributing to this team.’

“It’s something we’ll have to wait and see.”

You can watch the full episode of The Daily Faceoff Show here…