After yesterday's storm, when we had a wave of firings in the Habs organization, many are now wondering who the newcomer Jeff Gorton is. We know that he was the former general manager of the New York Rangers, but what were Gorton's good moves in the Big Apple? There were a few!
First of all, he was the one who managed to acquire Mika Zibanejad and a second round pick in exchange for Derick Brassard and a seventh round pick. I don't need to tell you that this transaction turned out to be largely in favor of the Rangers when Brassard only played two seasons with the Ottawa Senators.
Then, he traded Rick Nash to the Boston Bruins for Ryan Spooner, Ryan Lindgren and a first round pick in 2018. And that's not all! Spooner was then traded to the Oilers in return for Ryan Strome and the first round pick acquired in that trade became K'Andre Miller. Once again, it was the Rangers who came out on top!
However, his best move came on April 30, 2019. In a deal with the Carolina Hurricanes, Gorton had acquired the most recent Norris Trophy winner, Adam Fox, in return for second and third round picks. Wow!
He was even the one who had Artemi Panarin under contract in the summer of 2019. In short, this is quite an acquisition that the Habs just made. We can understand Mr. Molson to be very happy to see him join his organization.
