The Canadiens were ready to throw their salary cap out the window for Kirill Marchenko

Charles-Alexis Brisebois
The Canadiens were ready to throw their salary cap out the window for Kirill Marchenko
Credit: Capture d'écran/YouTube

The Canadiens let Kirill Marchenko slip away. And for the next seven years, he'll be in their division.

We can all agree that the #1 reason the Russian is in Toronto is because the Maple Leafs had a player of Matthew Knies' caliber to trade.

The Habs would have gotten him if the 2026 trade deadline had been pushed back by a minute—ah, never mind.

All that to say that the Canadiens were in the mix. They wanted to land the Blue Jackets player, but they didn't have the resources to make it happen.

They couldn't have traded Ivan Demidov to get Kirill Marchenko. That would have been ridiculous.

Elliotte Friedman, in an article (Sportsnet) on the subject, said that in the end, the Canadiens got creative. Kent Hughes tried to bring in a third team to make the salaries and the Blue Jackets' demands work.

Of course, it didn't work out.

But most importantly, Friedman mentioned that the Canadiens would have been willing to break their salary cap structure to fit Marchenko into the team's salary picture.

The $12.5 million (2027–2033) per-season contract signed by the new Maple Leafs player? Yes, Hughes would have been willing to go that far to sign him.

And since we know the Russian wanted to come to Montreal before signing with Toronto, it really comes down to the fact that the Canadiens' GM couldn't reach an agreement with his counterpart in Ohio on the price to pay.

And let's just say I don't blame Don Waddell for any of this. Landing Knies when he wasn't necessarily in a position of strength is still a great achievement.

In fact, even though he wasn't perfect this summer, Waddell kept Zach Werenski in town, maximized the return on Kirill Marchenko, and signed Adam Fantilli to a six-year deal. He didn't lose everything.

The only problem? The Winnipeg Jets are showing us that he may have only bought himself some short-term breathing room. The GM had handled the situations with Pierre-Luc Dubois, Mark Scheifele, and Connor Hellebuyck well… but now, it's back to square one.


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