Waited a whole day to post as I didn't want to let my emotions cloud rational thought. However, I'm still really upset with the return.
Hypothetically, even if this was the greatest return that Lack could get, Jim Benning had to evaluate Lack's intrinsic value to the team versus his market value. He also has to weigh that against the context of the organizational strategy and the direction he wants the team to go during his tenure. Finally, he needs to weigh all of this against ownership constraints to determine if his strategy is feasible given his most important stakeholder's preferences.
So, how does one go about valuing Lack's intrinsic value to the team? I'm not going to go into depth on this, but one way you could do it is to see how many more goals the team would've allowed without him last season. You could also check to see how many fewer goals the team would allow this with him as a backup or starter next season given his prior year's results and the results of the goalie's who he'd be replacing (Miller as a starter, Markstrom as a backup). I think Pitseleh slightly covered it in this thread, but losing Lack probably costs you about 5-15 goals which is about 1-4 wins over the course of the season.
The above assumes prior year results can be correlated with future year results. In reality, the correlation isn't perfect. However, if you follow the school of thought that Miller is in decline and that Lack is entering his prime, the results might be even more drastic. It also doesn't take into account that Jacob Markstrom *could* replace Lack's production and step into a starter's role, but this is fairly uncertain given his prior year results and struggle in adapting to the NHL game thus far.
What about organizational strategy? Independent of this deal, management has stressed the need to get younger while staying competitive over the next few years. This is where things get really bizarre for me. He's a better goalie than the alternatives (as a backup or as a starter as shown above), is the age management is looking for, and keeping him would net you more wins in the coming seasons. If the team wanted to tank, then trading Lack for whatever you can get makes sense. That isn't the case though, which makes the team's strategy incoherent. I understand that Markstrom is younger than Lack and the assets received for Lack are also young, but the difference in age between the goalies is marginal while the competitiveness of the team lost is significant.
To be fair to Benning, he's constrained in that he likely can't buyout Miller or trade him this season. I don't think that would be the case next year with only year on his contract (especially if they retain salary), which is important if you're concerned about not being able to sign Lack after this year. It appears though that Benning thinks that Miller is a better goalie, and wants to role with him as a starter going forward based on all his comments. Based on any analysis in the goalie community, this is absurd and the fatal flaw in Benning's logic. Miller is a worse goalie AND doesn't fit the stated organizational strategy as well as Lack does. This isn't even accounting for his salary, which represents a huge opportunity cost relative to Lack's deal and is preventing the team from improving in other areas.
Finally, even if we assume Lack was to be the backup next season, I still don't think this deal makes sense. I'd much rather have Lack than Markstrom and a third given the team's desire to compete. Lack provides high quality goaltending, takes away difficult starts from Miller, and provides a solid insurance policy against an aging goaltender. There is flight risk for next season, but the increase in competitiveness this year and the potential that he could take over if Miller completely messes up more than makes up for that given the team's strategy moving forward.
If Benning wants the Canucks to get younger and completely rebuild, then this deal makes more sense. However, that's completely incoherent with his other moves thus far. Benning would have to start shipping out veterans like Hamhuis and Vrbata before I believed that this was his intention, and there hasn't been any signs that this is the case. Overall, I hate the deal more because of the logic that went behind it than the actual result. If the Canucks had gotten a 1st round pick back I could see an argument that the value of the youth provided in the deal is greater than the increase in competitiveness that Lack provides in the coming year, but at the moment I can't see how one believes that Lack's intrinsic value to the team is less than what he got on the open market.
Good post.
This aligns with a lot of my thoughts on the whole thing. Ultimately, if
that was "all the market would give" on Eddie Lack, quite simply...you keep him. His potential value to the team next year as a proven, high end backup who can at the very least - spot start down the stretch, is worth something to a team that intends to "compete now". And it doesn't feel like that contribution was really weighed into the value equation here.
That said, i have some issues with the way the bolded seems to be fairly liberally applied here. The issue with equating "x amount more goals over the year = x amount fewer wins" is that it matters so much, when exactly those extra goals against happen to come.
For example:
Lack comes in, plays a rock solid game in the "tougher half" of a back to back where the team lays an egg ---> loses 2-1 in a game that shouldn't have even been close.
Markstrom cones in to that same hypothetical game, gets completely lit up as is apt to happen to him from time to time ---> lose 8-1 in a blowout.
In the end, it still goes down as a loss either way. You can add tons of goals against like that, without changing the W-L result on the season. Not that it's guaranteed to end up that way either, but it's entirely
possible.
And with the way this coaching staff managed their goaltending situation last season, i'd say it's even bordering on quite plausible that it may end up that way.
That is, i think a lot of people here are still applying their own ideas of how to manage a goaltending situation to the future here...rather than the type of approach i think we should probably expect from WillieD and Co., based on last seasons behaviour.
Last season, (to a soundtrack of much griping by the Lack fans)...Miller was typically given the more "winnable" games. I don't think that's about giving Miller the "easy starts", so much as a deliberate concerted effort to "take the gimme points" basically. Throw most of your weight into winning the games you
should win. Those "2nd of back to backs, flying into Los Angeles for a matinee" or whatever it may be...those are kind of "throwaways" tossed to the backup. If the backup "steals" a game - bonus! But beware, the team is probably going to mail it in. WillieD's "backup" basically has the expectations of "try to hit .500 W%" (which is all Eddie really mustered last year in that role).
It's basically a "path of least resistance" to the playoffs type philosophy. When it comes to making the playoffs, it doesn't matter where you get your wins...just that you get them. To quote Dominic Toretto, "it doesn't matter if you win by an inch or a mile".
Which is where those "blowout losses" or "close losses" don't really tally up all too differently at the end of the year. And where i think the staff are probably looking at the fact that Lack was something like 6-7-2 before Miller went down with injury last year, and figuring maybe Markstrom can replace that.
People here immediately scoff at the idea of "wins" as a goaltender stat, but there is still some application for it. And while it is a "team stat", at the end of the day, there is still a goaltending component to it, and it is still the one stat that matters most.
Fundamentally, i can grasp what they seem to be going for here, and honestly i don't disagree with it in principle. The place where it kinda falls apart for me though, is simply when it comes down to Markstrom's mental toughness to handle that sort of burden. I don't know how he'll hold up to the possibility of posting a "losing record" behind an overall "winning team". How he'll respond to those games where the team in front of him completely mails it in. Those are games where the backup's biggest job, rather comically boils down to, "just don't get pulled" - those
must be a full night off for the starter (Miller), both physically AND mentally. That's where i'm not convinced Markstrom can hold up his end of the bargain. But i guess we'll find out.
And on the flip side of that coin, maybe the idea of coming in as a backup knowing that a lot of those starts are kind of "throwaway" games is exactly what Markstrom needs to not feel overwhelming pressure to perform where he's had a history of getting inside his own head. Maybe coming in with the realistic baseline of expectations set at something like, "just don't get yanked" is a situation where he can finally get over that mental hurdle of playing in the NHL.
I'm skeptical still, but who knows.