Jake Allen's agent calls out the Habs management

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Jeff Drouin
April 20, 2022 (12:15)

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Usually, a player's agent is not happy when his client is not used enough during a season. However, it is for the opposite that Allain Roy, who represents Jake Allen, criticizes the Montreal Canadiens organization.

The latter stated, in a polite way, that the CH stretched the elastic with his client too much. This is what led to his latest injury and his rather ordinary statistics.

"I'm not sure I'd choose the words "overused", but that was a lot of games in a short period of time. Maybe if Montembeault had been inserted into the lineup after three or four games (instead of five starts in a row), it could have saved things, but it's too late now. It's a shame, but that was a lot of very active games for him," Allain Roy.

It is quite surprising that an agent would make such a comment. Are we to understand that Allen doesn't want to be used too much during a season and that he is not a number 1 goalie? Let's face it, it's a pretty funny message he's sending across the league!

This season, the 31 year old veteran goalie has played in 35 games while Samuel Montembeault has been used 36 times, even when injured. In Allen's defense, between March 17 and April 9, the Habs relied on him repeatedly, even though he had just returned from injury. He gave up the net in only one of eleven starts before getting hurt again. During this grueling stretch, the CH allowed more than 40 shots to the opposition in 6 of 11 games.

In 35 games this season, Allen had a 9-20-0-4 record while maintaining a .905 save percentage and a 3.30 goals-against average. He has also recorded two shutouts and played 1,948 minutes.

The veteran has one more year left on his contract that will take $2,875 million off the club's payroll. It will be interesting to see if he is still in Kent Hughes' plans or if Hughes will prefer Samuel Montembeault to back up Carey Price next season.