Montreal traded for Robert Lang

While I see the acquisition of Robert as a good one, how the hell does Bob Gainey always manage to get the same kind of players on his team to play center for the 3rd line.

Few years ago we had Radek Bonk, a center that could play really well when given the ice time and the task to score. Radek bonk played center with Daniel Alfredson on his wing and was able to score about 75 points in a season (im not sure if thats correct information but it was a good scoring production). When Bonk joined the Canadiens, he immediately slowed down by a ton in his offensive production obviously he was playing a much different role with the Canadiens, but we just couldnt count on him to score some points at all. On the other hand he did play really well on the penalty kill and was appreciated by the crowd for that.

Last year we signed Bryan Smolinski to replace the loss of Bonk. Smolinski had some good seasons of over 50 points when he was given the proper ice time and good wingers. Once he was in montreal he just completely shut down too and was unable to do anything on offense.

I fear this is the same that will happen with Robert Lang, we will expect him to be able to score alot of points (he had a season of 80 points with the Penguins, and some pretty good years with the Red Wings) but I'm expecting him to slow down alot on offense. Let's just see how he can play on the penalty kill because last year, even if Bryan Smolinski one of our best guy for faceoffs, he didn't quite replace Bonk in the penalty killing role. If Lang can play really well defensively then it should be worth the money.

These 3 centers are just all very similar to me, they are the kind of guys that can play good, but shine a lot if they are paired with really good wingers. They are not the kind of players that will make the others around them shine.

But I've been compairing Lang to the other 2 already, almost forgotting that this year might be a different scenario since with the acquisition of Alex Tanguay we have one other really talented player that we can use to create various line combos and perhaps one will allow Lang to play with some really talented players and be able to make his line the second line.

My prediction for Robert lang this year is that he will score around 30 to 40 points