from Brendan Kelly of the Montreal Gazette,

It started with the trade of a flashy, puck-moving D-man whose name I am no longer allowed to say because the real haters will go into hating overdrive. But I think losing Alex Radulov also hit the fans hard.

He was an immediate fan favourite and was a spark plug each and every night, and he also happened to be one of the few guys who understood that you come to play in the playoffs (not stand around and mope). But the thing that might’ve hurt the hardcore fans the most was the cavalier way Habs management treated Andrei Markov.

Management let the longest serving Hab (Markov) of the modern era go without even bothering to take five minutes to talk to the media about his departure and to explain why they wouldn’t keep him once he’d agreed to lower his demands and take a one-year deal.

Many feel Bergevin and his colleagues simply don’t care what the fans think or how they feel. And that’s a dangerous path to go down.

When your fan base turns on you, watch out.

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