Claimed off Waivers: [PHI] Zack MacEwen claimed off waivers by the Flyers from the Canucks

[3074326]

Jimmy B ? Is that you ?

 

[Siludin]

Gadjovich stings more because he had more runway to develop but Zack MacEwan is probably not going to suddenly get a lot better. He needs to learn the PK to find a permanent role on the roster.

 

[Vertain]

I don't know the player that well: but it appears he left the Canucks with a bit of class; didn't bad-mouth anybody, and did not burn any bridges. So at least he has character.

 

[BKarchitect]

Like-able player but completely replaceable 4th liner. Some serious overreaction going on as par for the course with any Canucks move right now. We get it, Benning sucks and I don’t disagree but the Canucks could literally waive a traffic cone right now and the majority of Canucks fandom would be “OMG of course we did, what a dumb move, THIS is why we suck, you’re going to LOVE this traffic cone, it really competes hard, no idea why we got rid of it!!!”

(Now spending a high 1st on said traffic cone in the first place…now that outrage I can get behind)

 

[Gert B Frobe]

Looking at his fight card Flyers fans can't complain. The Rangers and Caps both have idiots that try to injure everybody, and Johnston needs somebody to play with. He's good to have available with Morin out for a while.

 

[Mikeshane]

Canucks forwards already seemed kinda small and non-physical with MacEwen.

 

[DingDongCharlie]

I don’t understand this. Yeah Chiasson is more experienced but for the Canucks already being a soft team this makes no sense

 

[Boondock]

Likeable person, hard working PEI boy, willing to stick up for his teammates, tough - all the things you want in a 4th liner. I liked the player for all the effort, the skill is easily replaceable. Good luck in Philly - Gritty will like Mac.

 

[LickTheEnvelope]

I don’t understand this. Yeah Chiasson is more experienced but for the Canucks already being a soft team this makes no sense

Somehow Dowling, Chaisson and Petan are in Green's good book.

Chaisson and Petan enough that I think they are in the Nucks top 6 and top PP now.

Going to be bizarre to watch.

 

[Three On Zero]

I don't understand much about the Canucks.

Neither do Canuck fans

 

[notsocommonsense]

Lmao. Expected. All the best to Zack. Hard nosed, hard working player who had a down year last season but has been on an upward trajectory.

You'll enjoy him, Flyers fans.

My team is stupid.

Is Vancouver the softest team in the league? It's like Benning and Green are allergic to toughness

 

[Three On Zero]

Benning has now lost us TWO great depth players and got us….. Chiasson

 

[StreetHawk]

I don't know the player that well: but it appears he left the Canucks with a bit of class; didn't bad-mouth anybody, and did not burn any bridges. So at least he has character.

He is a borderline nhl player. So he at least knows his role and standing within the NHL.

Philly needs to make the playoffs so he needs to perform to both get in the lineup and remain on the roster.

 

[MarkovsKnee]

With Rangers gearing up with some toughness, and Caps & NYI, he'll be useful in the Metro division for Philly. Good pickup.

 

[Ovechkins vodka]

Wtf, how does Petan and Chaisson have roster spots on the Canucks and Gadjovich and MacEwen don't

 

[wonton15]

One of the best pound for pound fighters and has shown that he could -maybe- play on a 4th line. Hasn't shown it in a year, but he isn't a complete goon and you do want to root for him. Totally likeable dude.

 

[kcunac]

MacEwan brings more to the Nucks than Petan, Dowling, and Chiasson, all of who are on the opening night roster.

All those rumours about us scouring the waiver to find some players and we end up loosing two, both better than players we have on the roster.

Not that Gadjovich and MacEwan were that tough, but they were the two toughest players we had. We're so soft now. Wait until we get manhndled one night and Jim goes out and trades picks to aquire a Reeves-like player.

 

[platotld]

 

[biturbo19]

Like-able player but completely replaceable 4th liner. Some serious overreaction going on as par for the course with any Canucks move right now. We get it, Benning sucks and I don’t disagree but the Canucks could literally waive a traffic cone right now and the majority of Canucks fandom would be “OMG of course we did, what a dumb move, THIS is why we suck, you’re going to LOVE this traffic cone, it really competes hard, no idea why we got rid of it!!!”

(Now spending a high 1st on said traffic cone in the first place…now that outrage I can get behind)

It's funny to me. A lot of the people crying about the "asset management", seem to themselves, be leaning on a sunk cost fallacy, and succumbing to endowment effect. A fallacious "asset management" principle in itself. Thinking our garbage bubble players are better, just because they're ours.

Yes, it's certainly poor optics to lose two "homegrown" depth forwards back-to-back like this. No getting around that. But homegrown depth is really only useful, up to the point that it can be used as "depth". Either to functionally ferry up/down through waivers as needed (by clearing, or exemption). Or by actually upgrading your current roster, and providing more "value" there than the alternatives. Beyond that..."homegrown" and "what pick you used to get them" doesn't really matter so much outside of sentimentality, and maybe a marginal advantage in being a familiar "known commodity" within the organization. It's a nice "story", but of negligible real asset value.


The reality is...MacEwan is an eminently replaceable 4th line/depth forward. Like a lot of limited fringe NHL forwards, he's showed some scoring ability at lower levels but been unable to translate it to the big leagues. He's 25 years old now. He is what he is. He's not going to suddenly become much more than a big body who isn't very dynamic, doesn't score much, and doesn't really contribute to special teams.

There are plenty of players on waivers, or even being signed off the street still...who are plenty serviceable depth filler, or may even have a little bit of upside to offer somewhere. The Canucks have even slipped some others through waivers already. There will continue to be guys like that available, as we see better NHL players returning from injury/covid protocols over the next while. And quite frankly...neither of MacEwan/Gadjovich really earned a spot on the roster over others. Which is where an organization has to fundamentally decide how they're going to approach "asset management". Are you going to protect this completely non-tangible, non-contributing "value" by keeping the players who performed inferiorly if they're deemed a bigger claim risk? Or are you going to go with the tangibly bigger contributors through camp, and deal with the consequences if you end up losing some other fringe roster players? It's about whether speculative non-tangible "asset value" and "anticipated future growth projection" is more important to you than "tangible contributions right now" or vice versa. Though with MacEwan...i don't think you can even really claim it's about future growth projection, given his age and experience at this point. It's more about sentimental value, and how much that's worth.


I think the Juolevi trade illustrates that they're not just purely floundering around in the dark on this "asset management" stuff. They took a guy in Juolevi who they stood a reasonable chance of losing for nothing on waivers...and swapped him for a comparable already cleared RHS defenceman, and a guy like Lammikko who should be a serviceable MacEwan replacement/upgrade who can actually contribute to the PK as you want from a depth forward. That makes sense, and protects some "value" from a guy who wasn't working out but still held some "value" as an asset.


Optically...it's been a heck of bad week for perceived "asset management" bleeding "homegrown" players to waivers and depth swaps. But that's all it is. Optics. I don't see these kind of "losses" really hurting the Canucks team on the ice. They're a better team overall for the shuffling, in spite of the "losses". Though at the end of the day, these moves are all the sort of negligible impact tinkering that amounts to very little, if the big guns don't come to play. Hardly worth making a big fuss about.

 

[izzy]

interesting moves by vancouver by letting their developed assets go for free and replace them with tweeners

 

[HuGo Sham]

unsurprising, they were looking at pezzetta with habs and settled on zack after his kassian scrap

 

[crowi]

Hope Aquilini is happy to keep his sock-puppet GM as their team is actually paying for it.

 

[AHLdepth]

As far as the optics are concerned this is not ideal, losing multiple players who could have played the roles their stand ins are currently occupying just as well stings. Benning needs to take one of those "how well do you understand NHL roster building" quizzes.

That said all Philadelphia did was pick up a super dime a dozen, willing (if not great) combatant, and that's about it. He's the standard "every now and again you'll notice him in a good way" kind of guys, otherwise you tend to forget about him.

 

[kanucks25]

Ehh, I'm not really that high on Mac. His max upside is a physical 4th liner who's willing to drop the gloves.

His lack of explosiveness limits his forechecking and defensive value, which removes a lot of utility that you'd want from a 4th liner. He doesn't have the hockey IQ or processing speed to really be an offensive player or defensive player (loses coverage often). His straight-line speed is okay and he has decent hands for a big man, so he can make a play on the rush or if he has time and space, but you can say the same for umpteen fringe NHLers.

The waiver claim is really emblematic of the bigger story of Benning's (lack of) asset management ability.

Like-able player but completely replaceable 4th liner. Some serious overreaction going on as par for the course with any Canucks move right now. We get it, Benning sucks and I don’t disagree but the Canucks could literally waive a traffic cone right now and the majority of Canucks fandom would be “OMG of course we did, what a dumb move, THIS is why we suck, you’re going to LOVE this traffic cone, it really competes hard, no idea why we got rid of it!!!”

(Now spending a high 1st on said traffic cone in the first place…now that outrage I can get behind)

Agree with these takes.

Hasn't really shown me anything to suggest he's a legit NHLer (albeit I had kind of checked out when he had his good little run a few years back).

 

[thebigbea]

I guess canucks like to get smaller and smaller.