I absolutely ADORE this for the Montreal Canadiens...

We have another huge trade for Montreal as they absolutely robbed the St. Louis Blues landing one of the most promising two-way players in the league in 22-year-old Quebec native Zachary Bolduc with Logan Mailloux going the other way a guy who was slightly redundant in the Habs system and Ken Hughes continues to absolutely cook on the trade market. We got talks about Zachary Bolduc how a Jordan Kyrou trade also nearly went through and what this means for the future of the Montreal Canadiens forward core and so much more all this coming up on this episode of Habs Digest Jesse I mean Zachary Bolduc 22 years old two-way player we'll get into his stats in a bit this is just a straight up one for one now Pierre LeBrun came out and said there was a framework a bigger framework to land Kyrou as well that ended up falling through but Zach Bolduc coming to Montreal that's him on the left there wearing that beautiful barber pole jersey I mean just looking at Montreal's 25 and under core and looking at Bolduc's stats I am absolutely thrilled with this trade is it the 2C we wanted no because he plays mostly wing but this dude has such insane potential even blues fans are so upset that they lost out on this guy for sure and getting those prospects and those picks to help this team that was the more for Ken Hughes and he's delivering so far it's not the 2C but is it a young player that can help this team very much at just 22 years of age going forward absolutely probably a fresh start for Logan Mailloux which is going to benefit him a lot going forward but again at 22 with Dobson at 25 we're just adding to this nucleus of this team that continue to grow together and when i look at the makeup of stanley cup winning teams they got guys like a Bolduc on them that can provide depth all throughout your lineup right on a really good team he might be on the third line there's a world Josh where he's going to be competing with it on that second line for Patrick Liney like tomorrow Josh if they're going head to head like who are you giving that spot to Patrick Liney or Zachary Bolduc I mean oh this is so tough i mean honestly based on what we've seen i think a healthy Liney will surprise people i will stick with that but i think if you're looking at a line with Ivan Demidov on one wing i think a guy like Bolduc just makes so much sense on the other wing a guy that played less than 13 minutes a game and still scored 19 goals including seven power play goals because he took over the Blues power play as a 22 year old but also Jesse he hits he had 107 hits in 72 games this year he has that physical edge he's a bit mean and I think that kind of style of player with Ivan Demidov makes a lot of sense you can see here his 13 goals in 24 games during St. Louis's run post four nations were tied for 14th most in the league he can rip the hell out of the puck and look I love Patrick Liney Jesse but I think if we're talking stylistically i think there's not many better players that fit with a guy like Ivan Demidov on the other wing than a two-way guy will get into his defense in a moment two-way guy that hits and can snipe the puck right and it's probably for that reason that he's gonna get on the second line i love that they're getting somebody on that second line that's gonna be that dog to get after the puck because Ivan Demidov he's gonna need that puck on his stick to be effective Zachary Bolduc can very much help make that happen again i think it's only fair that we talk about what's going the other way it's not that we didn't give this up for nothing Logan Mailloux would be loved by habs fans during his time with us and for a good reason because when he's out on the ice that shot is just always a threat he's gonna score goals for the st louis blues we know this it's just with the emerge if we didn't have Lane Hudson on our team a young offensive defenseman as well similar to the role that Mailloux plays winning the calder this past year if we didn't have Lane Hudson josh i'm holding on to Logan Mailloux for dear life but because we have a hudson coming out playing in the way that he does obviously dobson's adding to that equation you throw in a matheson i mean just so many guys kind of playing that same brand of hockey you have to feel like this is going to be a fresh start there has been a couple things with logan mailloux were maybe being in a new environment a little bit less pressure will help him he's done a lot to really um kind of display some some good changes going forward both on and off the ice so you know we wish him definitely the best luck in his next endeavor but we're having somebody that's going to help somebody this year for Mayu this year how much would he have been able to make the team he's competing against Reinbacher was negligible he might have got in there for a couple games probably be able to help but not to the degree that i think Zachary Boldy because of the need and really just being a little bit older to really help this team now in our bid to get back in the playoffs we got a little bit of a taste and K Hughes is going for it and do i think that we're done here going forward and no but i think that this is a really positive move that josh i'm a big fan yeah exactly and look again Logan Mayu i think he'll do great in St Louis they need young defensemen he's a great young defenseman to come in i'm sure his stats will be great over there but again like like you said Jesse i just feel like Logan Mayu's contribution to what he'll be able to do in St Louis is always going to be better than what he could have done with Montreal in the current deal you mentioned Hudson you mentioned Dobson it's like Dobson locked up for eight years who is an offensive style defenseman though improving his two-way game it's like you're kind of blocking people out there and Logan Mayu especially when you have Reinbacher was expendable whereas a guy like Zachary Boldy's a lot harder to find don't really have that kind of prototype of guy that's ready to step into the NHL right now and again i just want to point it out again 19 goals seven power play goals this guy took over their power play it's like it's just a flip teams they swap what they need with each other but again even blues fans are not thrilled that Bolduke is the guy that's going out here just imagine if this was a Kairu trade but there is one aspect of Bolduke that we haven't even mentioned yet Jesse and that's the defense now this comes from Evolving Hockey and Hockey Stack cards 96 positive value probability market value is 6.4 million now he is an RFA after this year you'll need to sign him to a contract after this year or he can extend at some point we'll have to wait and see but you can see 87th percentile in defensive rating 95th percentile in five on five defense now he hasn't played great on the penalty kill when he's gotten a little small sample of of chances there but again with Christian Dvorak who was on our second penalty kill or even first at times gone to Philadelphia Joel Armia still up in the air we need some defensive players five on five this guy's straight up one of the best in the league and he's 22 but it's not just that stat card we have Rono Hockey's stat card as well that has him in the 91st percentile on defense right 94th percentile in impact now again the role difficulty has not been that high but Bolduc is one of those guys you can see here Jesse 89th percentile in finishing but a guy that can play fantastic 5v5 defense is like we talked about something that is kind of sorely missing from our honestly like I don't want to say bottom nine because like Jake Evans can kind of do it but like there's kind of that uh you know no one is really that kind of prototype and now you can put Bolduc I know we talk about it's a good fit with Ivan Demidov he's a good fit on any line no matter what line needs him if you put someone who can pass with him this guy can just provide impact no matter what line he's on and I think again if we're talking about a playoff push in the future a finisher that can play fantastic defense no matter who he's out there with like I don't know I just feel like if you're looking at the grand scheme of this team the makeup of making a Stanley Cup contender what Zachary Bolduc could be in a few years even if it's just a middle 6-4 and scores 20-25 goals who gets 120 hits and you know gets a couple penalties and plays good defense what else could you possibly want and you have to feel like he has the potential to even be a 30 goal scorer if at this young of age right like he's already getting around the 20s that obviously he's going to be able to hit the 30 as he's coming to his own so there's a world where he's getting around the same goal scoring totals as a Jordan Kyrou except he's playing a much more complete game which is for me I actually like I think we're talking about like Stanley Cup contenders winners Zachary Bolduc probably has a net better impact on the Montreal Canadiens than a Jordan Kyrou we love the goal the goal scoring but we know like Kyrou would have a hard time in Montreal he's not going to play physically we've already seen with line eight like we know what we want and we don't want to really sacrifice when we're coming to our players we want them to bring forth that effort every single night it's really non-negotiable for the culture of this team kind of going forward line it's a little bit of an experiment here in all this but I think going forward we know what this team really wants going forward so I mean I think it's just a huge addition I think it kind of fits better Jordan Kyrou you'd have to put him on the second line it kind of maybe restricts what you're able to do at the 2C where Zachary Boldak you're getting that goal scoring but you're getting a little bit more roster flexibility but also just that all-around game which i think is so important when we're looking to really win more stuff, absolutely and you know the final question for this we just saw today that Noah Dobson is taking the immortal Victor Metevier number 53 or Ryan White pick your poison with 53, Bulldog wore 76, I got a funny feeling he's not gonna wear that in Montreal but hey we'll have to see what he does I don't know if PK will want to give that to him or not but like we'll have to wait and see regardless it's fun we got two young natives Zachary Boldak a complete game player best of luck to Logan Mailloux best of luck to Kaiden Premo best of luck to Christian Dvorak all these guys that are going to new teams but Jesse Rutkowski continues to cook and I don't think we're done just yet but hey that'll do it for this episode of Habs Digest if you enjoyed leave a like comment subscribe to the channel we got a lot more videos just like this coming out when any kind of news drops so make sure you stay tuned I'm Josh Goss my co-host Jesse Poirier. We'll catch you in the next one.