This is a draft article that I have dragged out for years without ever developing to my liking. It was about taking preconceived notions out of hockey and seeing to what extent they are truths or myths to be debunked. For example, are there really players presented for the purpose of trading? Can a player really reveal strategic elements that an opposing team could use by being too talkative to the media?

And among those things that had to be validated, there was the benefit of watching games from the press box.

At the time, I asked defenseman Mike Reilly, who came from the Wild and had been left out many times in Minnesota last season. His coaches had asked him to watch games from the top of the bridge and keep an eye on teammates Jared Spurgeon and Jonas Brodin to understand small details of defensive play, such as how these two closed the gap on their opponent, as the Wild was the victim of a turnover.

Joël Bouchard, then head coach of the Laval Rocket, didn’t believe in the technical merits of leaving a player in the stands. With a stuck player, it was mostly a way to stimulate him to come back with the knife between his teeth.

“A player can definitely go up, he’s not going to see anything or two things in a game he doesn’t know anything about. They all know the answers, Bouchard argued. Whenever I make a video with the guys, I always stop and ask them: What’s wrong here? And they all know it.

“Looking from above is taking a step back, doing a self-assessment and looking in the mirror. But that’s not the strategic side; You know how to play. I think the message is a lot more about taking a step back than Xs and Os.”

You don’t have to have a thousand answers and do a big survey to smell that the pretense of “seeing things from a different angle” is of varying usefulness from coach to coach. For some, it’s a very relevant exercise to disguise the decision to remove a player from others. Having dealt with many trainers over the years, we suspect there are several in the second category.

Which brings us to Cole Caufield and the Canadiens’ young players.

Caufield’s season is over as he is due to have surgery on his right shoulder next Wednesday. The young sniper is bored just throwing the puck – “They took my sticks away from me! he lamented, laughing – and there’s nothing physically he can do to stay in the game.

However, Martin St-Louis is aware that watching games from the top of the bridge can at least improve Caufield mentally, especially as Caufield has rarely had the opportunity to do so over the years. Not only was he rarely injured, but his notoriety on every team he played on precluded that possibility.

St-Louis presented him with the thing as an option to seize.

“I know from my own experience that it can be surprising because I saw National League games from above and I loved it,” St-Louis said. I didn’t like not being in training, but I liked seeing the game from that angle. How the game moves, how spaces and holes are created. Of course it’s a lot more slow motion when viewed from above, but there will come a time in your career when you’ll play that Game like you’re watching from above, because everything will slow down. This is when players who have a lot of potential make a catch. That means for them, the Game slowed down. Every player is different, there are some that take longer, but seeing a game from above is damn good practice. »

What should not be ridiculed here is that St. Louis can attest to the impact this had on his game during these phases and that his personal, work-oriented approach and desire to improve have helped him become the player who he was. When St-Louis talks about his own experiences, it’s not overstated. It’s an experience that carries special weight, that has special credibility, and is part of what should make him a good coach.

For him, that doesn’t mean sending a player out of uniform to think. It’s a learning opportunity.

After signing his entry-level contract with the Canadiens and joining the team last season, Jordan Harris didn’t immediately spring into action. St-Louis let him watch certain games from the press box, and Harris said he learned a lot.

“The coach always talks about systems and concepts, like movement in the neutral zone, and it was good to see that from the press box,” said the new signing at the time. It’s more difficult on the ice rink, it’s much faster there. And on TV it’s also difficult because of the camera angles. It was good to watch the overall game from above. »

Of course, it’s up to every player to play their part and treat each game as a duty and be diligent enough to give it the attention it deserves. But the fundamental problem here is finding a way to keep Caufield as involved as possible, even if his season ends early. The Canadian knew from the start of the season that it was a year of development for him and that his young players’ progress would be crucial. Caufield’s season is over, however, and so is Juraj Slafkovsky’s likely, while Kaiden Guhle will miss at least five more weeks of activity.

CH cannot afford to see three of their most important youngsters twiddling their thumbs as they await their return to the ice.

The coaching staff will encourage them to stay in the team’s wake as much as possible, but St-Louis mentioned that during the week-long union break he would come up with a plan that the CH would use to make money during that period.

Video work should certainly be on the menu.

“It’s not easy because the season goes on and you play every two or three days,” agreed the coach. But you have to find a way to push these guys forward even when they can’t be on the ice. »

Assistant coach Trevor Letowski has previously offered to offer catch-up appointments to young injured players if they have to miss team meetings, so they can keep up with what’s being taught in the rest of the group and that they’re aware of the message being conveyed.

Of course, nothing can replace learning on the ice. But if it’s true that nothing is left to chance, that hockey is the business of inches and every detail can make the difference, the Habs don’t have the luxury of leaving Caufield, Slafkovsky and Guhle broke. He needs to find a way to make sure their unhappiness isn’t 100% wasted time.

And when these three young people reach their limits and feel idle between two rehabilitation sessions, former Olympian Alain Métellus will always help them improve their French!

(Photo by Cole Caufield: Francois Lacasse/NHLI via Getty Images)