{"id":108348,"date":"2021-04-28T11:09:04","date_gmt":"2021-04-28T15:09:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=108348"},"modified":"2021-04-28T11:09:04","modified_gmt":"2021-04-28T15:09:04","slug":"jonathan-drouin-leave-of-absence-ltir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/04\/28\/jonathan-drouin-leave-of-absence-ltir\/","title":{"rendered":"Jonathan Drouin Takes Indefinite Leave of Absence, Placed on LTIR"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/04\/26\/last-word-on-habs-pod-montreal-canadiens-urgency\/\" target=\"_self\">Montreal Canadiens<\/a> announced Wednesday morning that winger <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/d\/drouijo01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jonathan Drouin<\/a> has been placed on long-term injured reserve. He will take an indefinite leave of absence from the club due to personal reasons. The move is not retroactive to a particular date, meaning that Drouin will be away from the team for at least 24 days.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Forward Jonathan Drouin will take an indefinite leave of absence from the team for personal reasons.<\/p>\n<p>He was placed on long-term injured reserve by the club. We ask everyone to respect his privacy. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/bfy5F7afY6\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/bfy5F7afY6<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Canadiens Montr\u00e9al (@CanadiensMTL) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CanadiensMTL\/status\/1387418929052766211?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 28, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Jonathan Drouin Takes Leave of Absence, Out Indefinitely<\/h2>\n<p>Now in his fourth season as a Canadien, the Quebec-native left-winger had amassed just two goals (but 23 points) in 44 games this season. As a Hab, Drouin has set a career-high in assists (35) and tied his career-high in points (53). A reliable but often-criticized middle-six winger, Montreal should miss his playmaking ability even if he wasn&#8217;t finishing many chances this year.<\/p>\n<p>Drouin would still be on pace for 43 points in a full season with his 23 points in 44 games. While it would be his lowest mark in a full season since his rookie year, it&#8217;s a testament to his consistency over the years when not injured. He&#8217;s a near-lock to score between 45 and 55 points and fits well on either a team&#8217;s third or second line.<\/p>\n<p>Drouin hasn&#8217;t played since April 21st against the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/oilers\/\" target=\"_self\">Edmonton Oilers<\/a>. He had one assist in his last five games before coming out of the lineup due to what the team said was a non-COVID-19 related illness.<\/p>\n<h3>What This Means for the Future<\/h3>\n<p>In terms of the salary cap, the strapped Habs are now able to do some increased maneuvering. Rookie <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/c\/caufico01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cole Caufield<\/a> will now be able to stay up with the team longer-term, which also effectively means that he can replace Drouin&#8217;s spot in the lineup and begin to replace his offence. Caufield made his debut in Montreal&#8217;s last game, playing alongside <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/t\/tatarto01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tomas Tatar<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/d\/danauph01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Phillip Danault<\/a>. Montreal will now look to bring up defenceman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/r\/romanal01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Alexander Romanov<\/a> back up from the taxi squad as their cap space increases as they look to hold on to the final playoff spot in the North Division.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<br \/>\n<a id=\"Pe4qmjRGSvlz6g5iwrJWVQ\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1232452644\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'Pe4qmjRGSvlz6g5iwrJWVQ',sig:'2R4V7B-fkkhA_IKzHn8s9AeWAus0sdTiKKUGnWQezZA=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1232452644',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Montreal Canadiens announced Wednesday morning that winger Jonathan Drouin has been placed on long-term injured reserve. He will take an indefinite leave of absence from the club due to personal reasons. The move is not retroactive to a particular date, meaning that Drouin will be away from the team for at least 24 days. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3006,"featured_media":108349,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,4547,4548],"tags":[585],"class_list":["post-108348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-canadiens","category-hockey","category-nhl","tag-jonathan-drouin"],"modified_by":"Josh Erickson","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3006"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108348\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}