Canucks will be the most improved team next year - Benning GM of the Year?

[J Corso]

RobertKron slaying in this thread. Simply by posting facts.

 

[iceburg]

Because of the cap, even when it goes up in a few years, we’ve maxed out on the number of elite and star players we can have on the team. Besides Pettersson and Hughes, players like Rathbone, Hoglander, and Podkolzin (maybe even Klimovich) are going to require decent contracts, along side Petey Hughes and others, who will still be fairly young when the elc’s sign their next deals. There is no room under the cap for more star players.

So now is as good a time as any to build around these players. The cupboard is bare, but we have a young grout that will be here for many years, and they are only going to get better. This is not a group that is going to be a hopeful wild card team. This is an elite team in the making.

Said every middling contender throughout history...

There are many, many things that need to go right for them to be an elite team. I hope they all go right.

Pettersson is not yet a ppg player. I hope (and believe) he will get there.
Hughes can't yet play defense. I hope he develops into a solid NHL defensman.
I hope Podkolzin is more than a third line grinder.
I hope Hoglander can become a consistent 25/25 guy.
I hope Demko can become a top 10 goalie starting 55+ games per year.
I hope Miller has more years in him and doesn't fall off the 28/29 year old cliff that many forwards do.
I hope OEL can at least be a solid top 4 D man for 4 of his remaining 6 years.
I hope Boeser becomes a consistent 30 goal scorer he has potential to become.
I hope Poolman is more than a bottom pairing guy.
I hope Rathbone becomes a top 4 D man
I hope Woo becomes a solid defenseman D-man at the NHL level with some toughness.
I hope they can find a legitimate top 4 RHD

In the the words of Andy Dufresne, "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies".

But, alas, hope is not a plan.

 

[BrentSopelsHair]

Because of the cap, even when it goes up in a few years, we’ve maxed out on the number of elite and star players we can have on the team. Besides Pettersson and Hughes, players like Rathbone, Hoglander, and Podkolzin (maybe even Klimovich) are going to require decent contracts, along side Petey Hughes and others, who will still be fairly young when the elc’s sign their next deals. There is no room under the cap for more star players.

So now is as good a time as any to build around these players. The cupboard is bare, but we have a young grout that will be here for many years, and they are only going to get better. This is not a group that is going to be a hopeful wild card team. This is an elite team in the making.

I’d love to clarify here. Are you saying that due to our cap situation and the contracts that are already on the books we can’t add any more star players? Or are you saying that in a capped system one can only have so many good players, and we’ve already got the required amount of good players that a contender would need and therefore we should stop building and go for it?

 

[logan5]

Said every middling contender throughout history...

There are many, many things that need to go right for them to be an elite team. I hope they all go right.

Pettersson is not yet a ppg player. I hope (and believe) he will get there.
Hughes can't yet play defense. I hope he develops into a solid NHL defensman.
I hope Podkolzin is more than a third line grinder.
I hope Hoglander can become a consistent 25/25 guy.
I hope Demko can become a top 10 goalie starting 55+ games per year.
I hope Miller has more years in him and doesn't fall off the 28/29 year old cliff that many forwards do.
I hope OEL can at least be a solid top 4 D man for 4 of his remaINING 6 YEARS.
I hope Boeser becomes a consistent 30 goal scorer he has potential to become.
I hope Poolman is more than a bottom pairing guy.
I hope Rathbone becomes a top 4 D man
I hope Woo becomes a solid defenseman D-man at the NHL level with some toughness.
I hope they can find a legitimate top 4 RHD

In the the words of Andy Dufresne, "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies".

But, alas, hope is not a plan.

Hope is not a plan, but it appears that you want to keep drafting high draft picks and hope one turns out better that Pettersson, and hope another and another turns out better than Hughes and Boeser. That is not likely to happen.

 

[iceburg]

Hope is not a plan, but it appears that you want to keep drafting high draft picks and hope one turns out better that Pettersson, and hope another and another turns out better than Hughes and Boeser. That is not likely to happen.

A very weak debate strategy is to put words in someone's mouth and then tell them they're wrong. You can do better

I firmly believe there is a time to go all in. This summer was not that time. JB was faced with a choice between:

1. Make the Arizona trade for OEL and Garland at the cost of this year's 9th overall, next year's 2nd and 7th, and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick, or
2. Wait 9 to 10 months until $12M was off the books and use that money to acquire a top 6 winger and a younger top 4 defender, and keep his picks.

Basically, if he waited 10 months, he could have had an even better team and retained all his picks. Choice seems simple to me.

 

[logan5]

I’d love to clarify here. Are you saying that due to our cap situation and the contracts that are already on the books we can’t add any more star players? Or are you saying that in a capped system one can only have so many good players, and we’ve already got the required amount of good players that a contender would need and therefore we should stop building and go for it?

It's the latter. We can definitely keep adding through the draft though, and move younger players in for older guys. Draft another Hoglander or 2, and if/when OEL gets bought out in 4 years (if he needs to be) these guys will still be in their prime. but we have reached the saturation point on elite and star players. It's time to start building towards a Stanley Cup.

 

[logan5]

A very weak debate strategy is to put words in someone's mouth and then tell them they're wrong. You can do better

I firmly believe there is a time to go all in. This summer was not that time. JB was faced with a choice between:

1. Make the Arizona trade for OEL and Garland at the cost of this year's 9th overall, next year's 2nd and 7th, and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick, or
2. Wait 9 to 10 months until $12M was off the books and use that money to acquire a top 6 winger and a younger top 4 defender, and keep his picks.

Basically, if he waited 10 months, he could have had an even better team and retained all his picks. Choice seems simple to me.

I apologize if I misinterpreted what you were saying (though I did qualify with "it appears"), but with this post it looks like you think we need to keep adding high draft picks eg - "and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick", and miss the play-offs for another year.

First off, you run the risk of creating a losing culture, and having a miserable environment, like they have in Buffalo, and did in Edmonton, and second, imo, we already have the important pieces in place to become a contender. If you think we don't have the right pieces then yeah i guess you would want to keep drafting high. I think we are ready, you don't. So that's that.

 

[chaputonyou]

So now is as good a time as any to build around these players. The cupboard is bare, but we have a young grout that will be here for many years, and they are only going to get better. This is not a group that is going to be a hopeful wild card team. This is an elite team in the making.

Everyone wants to dump on the argument the 'cupboards are bare' - the cupboards have young stars - Demko, Hughes, Boeser, Hoglander, Podkolzin, Rathbone...with good 25+ players in Garland, Horvat, Miller, Motte, Dickinson...I get it - stop trading draft picks, but for now the Canucks have a decent young(er) core group of players and I really like the fact that both Dickinson and Garland are being added to this core.

In 2007-2008....the Canucks had Luongo....Bieksa...Edler...Burrows, Daniel, Henrik, Kesler, Hansen....

The best part about the current crop I listed above is that they are still young - Hoglander is going to get BETTER. Hughes and Pettersson should get BETTER. Same with Demko, etc.

Everyone points to VGK. Ask yourself in 3 years how much better Stone, Pietrangelo, Lehner, Pacioretty got better....

More work needed on the defense, but I am optimistic.

Chaput

 

[iceburg]

I apologize if I misinterpreted what you were saying (though I did qualify with "it appears"), but with this post it looks like you think we need to keep adding high draft picks eg - "and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick", and miss the play-offs for another year.

First off, you run the risk of creating a losing culture, and having a miserable environment, like they have in Buffalo, and did in Edmonton, and second, imo, we already have the important pieces in place to become a contender. If you think we don't have the right pieces then yeah i guess you would want to keep drafting high. I think we are ready, you don't. So that's that.

There is definitely a risk of developing a losing culture. I agree. And maybe part of the apparent stressors in the locker room this past year were in part due to a frustration with losing.

But be clear, it's not about the picks. It's about the best use of the assets the team has. Think of it this way. If the team kept the picks this year and acquired a lottery pick next year, they could trade those prospect/picks a year from now. The team would then have a top 4 D, and the top 6 forward (from the $12M) and another elite piece acquired by trading the picks. That could be the tipping point from competitive payoff team to Stanley Cup contender, all if JB had waited 10 months.

It's about the best use of any assets the team has in the moment whether they're picks, prospects, NHL players, or cap room.

 

[Pastor Of Muppetz]

They went from being 7-11-1 after 19 games to being 16-18-3 at the break.

They were, I believe, 2 points back of Montreal having played six more games, and would need to go 12-6-1 down the stretch to make the playoffs, which is coincidentally the level of play that you thought they had exhibited during that middle portion of the year. Given that you thought they were playing at that level when they were, in reality, playing .500 hockey, it seems unlikely that there was enough headroom for them to improve that much more.

You thought that the team was performing at a rate that - if sustained - would make the playoffs, but they were actually playing at a rate that would have seen them still fall well short. It's okay to be wrong, and to re-evaluate your judgement of the season when you realize that you had completely misjudged what had happened.

Aside from the enormous misunderstanding of what you were seeing, it's totally understandable to have thought that they could realistically make the playoffs when you believed that they were already playing at a level that would get them there.

Knowing now that you were very wrong: to believe that they were already playing at a level equivalent to a top-10 team in the league, and then think that it was realistic that they would then improve way way more down the stretch seems bizarre. The improvement that you expected, when you already believed that they were performing at a near elite level, is vaguely equivalent to the difference in P% between like Montreal, who you said were bad, and Tampa, who are obviously really good. Given that you already thought they were playing like a top10 team, you're saying that you expected them to become the best team in the league, by probably a significant margin, down the stretch. You really think they realistically had the horses for that? Demko was already putting up like a 950 just for the team to be able to tread water for a month or so.

Where did I say (or infer) that if the team was performing at the sustained rate..they would make the playoffs..?...I just said they would make it interesting...

"Maybe you should chill out...Clearly the season was pretty much lost in the first 3 weeks, and their chances of being a playoff team were cooked right there...but they fought back...and with a full week off, and a recharged Demko..they could have made the playoff race quite interesting..as Montreal and Calgary preceded to go right in the toilet."...post #55​

 

[Bleach Clean]

I apologize if I misinterpreted what you were saying (though I did qualify with "it appears"), but with this post it looks like you think we need to keep adding high draft picks eg - "and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick", and miss the play-offs for another year.

First off, you run the risk of creating a losing culture, and having a miserable environment, like they have in Buffalo, and did in Edmonton, and second, imo, we already have the important pieces in place to become a contender. If you think we don't have the right pieces then yeah i guess you would want to keep drafting high. I think we are ready, you don't. So that's that.

Like with many of your posts logan5, your opinion here is the clear outlier. Here are the reasons why:

The "losing culture" argument is a subjective threshold invented to justify burning the future for the present. It's also used to justify poor contracts to veteran players (Beagle/Roussel/Sutter). This team is 26th in Points% since 2014-15. What exactly have they averted?

The pieces required to build a contender are judged by the pieces already present in other contenders. Using Tampa as a template, this team is so far behind in overall roster value that the only way to get close is to leverage ELCs. Hence, the focus on the draft.

But regardless of what fans want, Benning has already scorched the earth to try and win now. The course is set.

 

[RobertKron]

Where did I say that if the team was performing at the sustained rate..they would make the playoffs..?...I just said they would make it interesting.

"Maybe you should chill out...Clearly the season was pretty much lost in the first 3 weeks, and their chances of being a playoff team were cooked right there...but they fought back...and with a full week off, and a recharged Demko..they could have made the playoff race quite interesting..as Montreal and Calgary preceded to go right in the toilet."...post #55​

Again, how can your opinion of the outcome for the team remain unchanged after you discover that they were playing like a .500 team instead of a top10 calibre team as you had thought? You thought they would make the playoff race quite interesting - whatever that means - when you thought the team had gone 12-6 and was playing at the level of a Tampa Bay. Obviously that team would have made the race much more interesting than the real life team that was playing .500 hockey despite Vezina-calibre goaltending over that stretch, and was still on pace to miss by more than a handful of points.

 

[wonton15]

If Demko plays lights out, OEL plays like 75% to his ability, and Poolman can be a serviceable defenseman, there's a small small chance. But it's probably not happening.

 

[BrentSopelsHair]

It's the latter. We can definitely keep adding through the draft though, and move younger players in for older guys. Draft another Hoglander or 2, and if/when OEL gets bought out in 4 years (if he needs to be) these guys will still be in their prime. but we have reached the saturation point on elite and star players. It's time to start building towards a Stanley Cup.

Love to hear it, because that is the significantly more ridiculous stance. It would be believable if the Canucks were the only team in existence, but unfortunately there are different data points against which to compare the Canucks' roster (often referred to as "the other teams in the NHL"). As you confirmed, you believe that the Canucks, as currently constructed, have filled the star player requirement and therefore can move on to the "building a non-AHL rest of the roster" stage (as if those two steps happen one after another, but that seems like the Benning Expectations tax and I can live with it).

Back to your point, if we compare the "star" level players on actual contenders to the Canucks, we should see that they would not have more than us, because there's no way that they might be able to better fit more stars under the cap due to better management and a coherent plan. So I'll use Tampa and the Avs as examples, and list stars cores from each team from highest utility to lowest utility (feel free to argue with the inclusion of players, I am trying to be fair)

Canucks
Pettersson, Hughes, Horvat, Miller, Boeser, Demko, Garland (?)

Tampa
Point, Kucherov, Hedman, Vasilevsky, Sergachev, Stamkos, McDonagh, Cirelli

Avs
MacKinnon, Makar, Rantanen, Landeskog, Kadri, Toews (with one of the best prospect pools in the league in star talent)

So if the goal is to try to accrue talent, then sure the Canucks look to be about where these good teams are. The unfortunate thing is that these good teams have been building out the non-star portion of their rosters at the same time, and the Canucks have blown their load reaching for stars and anchors. When we're discussing if the Canucks will improve next year, the answer is almost undoubtedly yes, due to the fact that the bar is currently around last in the worst division in hockey. But is this team well-built for future contention? To me, the answer is no, and this roster will need massive, major, creative surgery to become a contender, and it looks like Benning's best idea on how to do that is to trade valuable, scarce assets for a massively declining Dman who will likely only be a hindrance on future contention. As someone who wants to see actual, sustainable success, rather than resume building for a Make-a-Wish GM, I just can't see how Benning's efforts to build this team deserve anything other than scorn

 

[Cogburn]

In:
OEL, Garland, Dickinson, Halak, Poolman, Schenn, Di Giuseppe, Petan, Klimovich, Hunt, most of an AHL team (I only listed guys that have a shot at regular duty)

Out:
Edler, Eriksson, Beagle, Roussel, Holtby, Virtanen, Schmidt (by apparent request), Spooner's cap hit, 3/4s of Sutter's cap hit, our 9th overall pick in a weird, randomized draft, Benn, Boyd, Chatfield, Gaudette (?), Lind, Rafferty, Vesey

I'd say we did improve, significantly. Our depth will be tested, but I think the guys further down the roster will hold up ok. I don't think the improvement will vault us into a guaranteed playoff spot or anything, given how low we sunk, but better is better.

Benning isn't GM of the year spending valuable assets to fix his mess.

 

[Zippgunn]

A very weak debate strategy is to put words in someone's mouth and then tell them they're wrong. You can do better

I firmly believe there is a time to go all in. This summer was not that time. JB was faced with a choice between:

1. Make the Arizona trade for OEL and Garland at the cost of this year's 9th overall, next year's 2nd and 7th, and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick, or
2. Wait 9 to 10 months until $12M was off the books and use that money to acquire a top 6 winger and a younger top 4 defender, and keep his picks.

Basically, if he waited 10 months, he could have had an even better team and retained all his picks. Choice seems simple to me.

If he waited 10 months (and basically tanked the season) he would probably be fired before he could make any moves. He is in career save mode at this point in time...

 

[bandwagonesque]

I think the team will be greatly improved in the short term, mostly due to the presence of Garland and increased forward depth. Yeah, the defence sucked, but what killed this team last year more than anything was a lack of creativity and depth among the forwards. Entire games watching forwards get the puck in the neutral zone and maybe advance it 30 or 40 feet into a congested area then get turned back, or dump the puck in. The only players who could really do much were Hoglander and occasionally Boeser or Horvat. The bottom two lines did absolutely nothing.

The defence was mediocre at its best and will be mediocre again. I don't think you lose all that much swapping OEL and Poolman in for Edler and Schmidt, and Rathbone should be ready.

 

[racerjoe]

I apologize if I misinterpreted what you were saying (though I did qualify with "it appears"), but with this post it looks like you think we need to keep adding high draft picks eg - "and the chance at a 2022 lottery pick", and miss the play-offs for another year.

First off, you run the risk of creating a losing culture, and having a miserable environment, like they have in Buffalo, and did in Edmonton, and second, imo, we already have the important pieces in place to become a contender. If you think we don't have the right pieces then yeah i guess you would want to keep drafting high. I think we are ready, you don't. So that's that.

I can’t imagine having a losing culture and being objectively and statistically one of the bottom five team over a prolonged seven year stretch… what would that look like?

 

[Grub]

To me it all depends on Pettersson. Is he going to be that 100 point dude that we all predicted or his he just going to be a ppg player. If he is like last year then we are screwed.

 

[Oddleifson]

All Jimbo-Bob did was rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic FASTER... in the vain hope that most (apathetic) Canucks fans won't notice, but, will fallaciously believe something GOOD happened. I suspect even top-level managemnet (who shall remain nameless...) are IMPRESSED by the shell game Jimbo-Bob pulled off here. They likely equate VOLUME of change with QUALITY of change. These are NOT the same thing.

More failure and hilarity are ALMOST guaranteed to ensue...
See ya in JUNE for the CUP parade...!!


(not saying which city it will be in )

 

[Javaman]

If he waited 10 months (and basically tanked the season) he would probably be fired before he could make any moves. He is in career save mode at this point in time...

Which is why he should have been fired immediately at the end of last season.

FAQ also should have placed a moratorium on all transactions* once it was clear the Canucks were likely going to miss the playoffs again.

*Edit: transactions that increased cap commitments (like signing Pearson) or decreased draft picks (like the Arizona trade).

 

[Lonny Bohonos]

Wasn't that you?

Lol its like the old soviet tactic of planting a story to smear the US or other western country in some obscure newspaper (say the Bombay Times) in which ITAR TASS would then pick it up as a story.

 

[Ita]

This thread is an obvious bait. It's not even subtle.

 

[logan5]

W

Lol its like the old soviet tactic of planting a story to smear the US or other western country in some obscure newspaper (say the Bombay Times) in which ITAR TASS would then pick it up as a story.

Who’s using Soviet tactics? It wasn’t me that suggested Benning gm of the year, first.

 

[Hollywood Burrows]

OP after 5 pages of replies: