Season Post-Mortem

[Proto]

Mike gillis had zero experience running an nhl hockey team when he got hired. I remember the fan base ( including myself) absolutely hating the hire at the time and thinking " this guy is completely clueless , this ship is sinking" he then became the best gm we've ever had,

I don't like the Sbisa signing but I think people's reactions are a bit overboard especially in terms of the end of the year presser. These things are nothing but lip service.

I for one will wait before a jump off a bridge. A lot of good things were done this year.

I loved the Gillis hiring and though getting rid of Nonis in favour of a cut-throat Shark like Gillis was tremendous. My only complaint in retrospect is that Gillis was too nice. Ironic.

 

[tantalum]

President should be, more or less, a PR gig. You have to be smart enough to hire the right guys under you and trust them and smart enough not to interfere but it is mostly a PR thing.

So I can see Linden. He's a folk hero and rightfully so. The problem comes in that I think not only is Linden providing input and approving hockey moves but so to is ownership. And that last thing is the root of the issues that surround this team. Ownership wants to be the general manager and coach. Ownership wants to give friends and idols jobs.

It took the better part of a decade for Katz to realize that is not how you do things. I wonder how long it takes the Aquilini's.

 

[Balls Mahoney]

Speaking of Gillis, he should be getting another job anytime now, shouldn't he?

I would have thought teams would be lining up to hire this genius, new-wave innovator?

I wonder if the Bruins are looking at him, that would probably make a scary amount of sense.

 

[arsmaster*]

Mike gillis had zero experience running an nhl hockey team when he got hired. I remember the fan base ( including myself) absolutely hating the hire at the time and thinking " this guy is completely clueless , this ship is sinking" he then became the best gm we've ever had,

I don't like the Sbisa signing but I think people's reactions are a bit overboard especially in terms of the end of the year presser. These things are nothing but lip service.

I for one will wait before a jump off a bridge. A lot of good things were done this year.

Mike Gillis was a player agent, intently involved in Free Agent negotiations with NHL general managers.

His first hire, an experienced NHL executive with 15 plus years in the industry.

Linden was PR and solely PR. It's why he talks about Pat Quinn all the time, for the nostalgic "feels".

 

[tantalum]

I wonder if the Bruins are looking at him, that would probably make a scary amount of sense.

Gillis and Gilman would get them out the cap hell they are in in short order and be assured to never be in it again.

 

[Barney Gumble]

Mike gillis had zero experience running an nhl hockey team when he got hired. I remember the fan base ( including myself) absolutely hating the hire at the time and thinking " this guy is completely clueless , this ship is sinking" he then became the best gm we've ever had,

Difference was Gillis was still involved in the business of hockey while the other guy was off in an another area of business for a number of years.

I don't think Linden is clueless; only that he might've been better served being an assistant first due to the fact he was away from the game (I'm not just talking as a player) for a few years.

Speaking of Gillis, he should be getting another job anytime now, shouldn't he?

I would have thought teams would be lining up to hire this genius, new-wave innovator?

Probably is getting a pretty big cheque from Aquaman. Gives somebody the option of being more picky in future areas of employment.

 

[Balls Mahoney]

President should be, more or less, a PR gig. You have to be smart enough to hire the right guys under you and trust them and smart enough not to interfere but it is mostly a PR thing.

So I can see Linden. He's a folk hero and rightfully so. The problem comes in that I think not only is Linden providing input and approving hockey moves but so to is ownership. And that last thing is the root of the issues that surround this team. Ownership wants to be the general manager and coach. Ownership wants to give friends and idols jobs.

It took the better part of a decade for Katz to realize that is not how you do things. I wonder how long it takes the Aquilini's.

You're right. Linden is just a figurehead and front man. But at the same time, he's the President of the organization and Benning and Desjardins are on him. Its no wonder the scouting department which hasn't changed since the Burke days is regressing given the nepotism at play.

 

[arsmaster*]

Difference was Gillis was still involved in the business of hockey while the other guy was off in an another area of business for a number of years.

He was a PR figurehead in his other areas of Business too. Any local business would be smart to attach Trevor Linden's name to their businesses.

If Pavel Bure moved back to the Lower Mainland, you could open a bunch of Roller Rinks called Club 10.

 

[Alan Jackson]

Probably is getting a pretty big cheque from Aquaman. Gives somebody the option of being more picky in future areas of employment.

Yeah, Gillis is being picky. That's probably it.

 

[opendoor]

Speaking of Gillis, he should be getting another job anytime now, shouldn't he?

I would have thought teams would be lining up to hire this genius, new-wave innovator?

I never got the impression that he was looking for more work at this point. Didn't he even say that had considered stepping down from the Canucks' job a couple of years ago?

He's probably enjoying getting paid millions of dollars to do nothing for the next couple of years.

 

[Proto]

Yes and I think that person is his boss more than anything....

Look, if that's true, then Desjardins is coaching like a coward whose scared to disappoint his boss, in which case he's even worse, isn't he?

I dunno. I just don't see enough positives from Desjardins to give him the benefit of the doubt here. He's going to have to adjust radically next season. I just don't have any hope left for this group. I hated them last summer, tried to come around and see what they were doing and why they were doing it, and was cautiously optimistic right up until they re-signed Sbisa and Dorsett. Then the house of cards came down.

 

[Alan Jackson]

I never got the impression that he was looking for more work at this point. Didn't he even say that had considered stepping down from the Canucks' job a couple of years ago?

He's probably enjoying getting paid millions of dollars to do nothing for the next couple of years.

I believe he interviewed for the Capitals job last summer.

 

[shortshorts]

I believe he interviewed for the Capitals job last summer.

Speculation by their fans that got shut-down if I remember correctly.

Could be wrong.

 

[opendoor]

I believe he interviewed for the Capitals job last summer.

All I ever saw was that they were interested in him among others. I don't recall any reports that he ever actually met with them. If they were interested and no interview was conducted then it's probably a safe assumption that he wasn't seeking the job.

 

[polarbearcub]

Is linden the gm? Sounds like it in here.

Our gm is extremely experienced.

 

[Proto]

I never got the impression that he was looking for more work at this point. Didn't he even say that had considered stepping down from the Canucks' job a couple of years ago?

He's probably enjoying getting paid millions of dollars to do nothing for the next couple of years.

I think he might actually be selectively looking at work. He probably wants a situation where he could go in and take one more crack at it.

I believe he was interested in the job in Washington when McPhee was fired, probably because he figured he could go clean up the mess of another of the rejects from the old boys club in Vancouver. Not sure if that was ever confirmed as interest, though.

 

[Jyrki21]

Hiring a guy who has been used as a greeter for real estate developers and a pitch man for cheap local TV ads since his hockey days ended to be the guy to rebuild what was once an elite hockey team makes no sense. Maybe its because I'm not from and don't live in Vancouver but I just don't get the appeal of Linden.

The appeal is mainly just that the 1980s Canucks were absolutely terrible – like, waaay worse than anything this generation of Canucks fans has known – and Linden was basically the first bright spot to come along since the 1982 Cinderella Cup run. People here will tell you the love from him comes from the 1994 playoff run, but that's not true; anyone who was a fan of the club beforehand knows that there was already a lot of hero-worship for him from his rookie year onward. And in fact Pavel Bure's arrival in 1991 (this will shock everyone on HFBoards) kind of split the fan base as to whose fanboy they were going to be. Not in a really vicious sort of way – it takes the Internet to do that – but there was definitely something of a Team Trevor and Team Pavel, and this was well before the 1994 playoffs.

Obviously if the Canucks had been a better team historically, you wouldn't see the same nostalgia for Trevor (or Stan Smyl). The fans were just hero-starved, which is why we remember a lot of the former players as being much better than they were.

And I love Trevor (except in his current capacity). Just calling it like it is.

 

[Ernie]

Mike gillis had zero experience running an nhl hockey team when he got hired. I remember the fan base ( including myself) absolutely hating the hire at the time and thinking " this guy is completely clueless , this ship is sinking" he then became the best gm we've ever had,

That's the thing about Gillis. The people who were the most supportive of him at the beginning are now the most critical of Linden.

That's not a coincidence. Gillis may have made a few PR mistakes early, but he always sounded like a very smart man with a clear strategy to make the team a contender. He had a vision for what a modern sports franchise looked like and he delivered on it.

Linden and Benning both sounded like dummies from the beginning. And now their actions are dumb actions. Their outlook is stuck in an era long gone.

There is no equivalency.

Would have been totally fine if the hiring was jointly done as part of a hiring with an experience GM, rather than handing the GM-hiring duties to Linden. That has been baffling since Day 1.

No quality GM is going to sign on to report to a lightweight like Linden. When you hire a Linden as President, you get a GM like Benning.

 

[Proto]

No quality GM is going to sign on to report to a lightweight like Linden. When you hire a Linden as President, you get a GM like Benning.

That's sort of what I meant, though. It would have to be a clear message that Linden is in charge of the club but only has 'input' on hockey moves, with the final call belonging to the GM. Right now, it's almost impossible to tell who exactly is responsible for each dumb move that's made.

Aquilini finally got his wish though: now he has a yes man in charge of the team that can enforce all his stupid, childish, fanboy wishes.

 

[Ernie]

I have to wonder whether Victor de Bonis is the guy who can push Aquilini to pull the plug early on this management group.

Both the Dorsett and Sbisa signings are just poor business decisions. Anyone doing any shred of analysis on them would have to reach that conclusion.

 

[Ernie]

That's sort of what I meant, though. It would have to be a clear message that Linden is in charge of the club but only has 'input' on hockey moves, with the final call belonging to the GM. Right now, it's almost impossible to tell who exactly is responsible for each dumb move that's made.

Aquilini finally got his wish though: now he has a yes man in charge of the team that can enforce all his stupid, childish, fanboy wishes.

So basically the Aquilinis should have hired a GM and then installed Linden as his assistant?

Yes, you're right, that's exactly what they should have done.

 

[carolinacanuck]

You're right. Linden is just a figurehead and front man. But at the same time, he's the President of the organization and Benning and Desjardins are on him. Its no wonder the scouting department which hasn't changed since the Burke days is regressing given the nepotism at play.

what does this even mean?

thought we had a pretty good draft year last year.

 

[Wisp]

what does this even mean?

thought we had a pretty good draft year last year.

lol. The only pick I feel good about is McCann. There was lots of bad decision making, all over the place, with 'meat and Potatoes' at the expense of actual elite skill and talent. Drafting a goalie with a second and 3e coke machines in the later rounds didn't inspire confidence.

One of the merits in which Virtanen was drafted (at the expense of likely superior players in Ehlers and Nylander) because he was from BC boy. If that doesn't tell you they value stupid things, I don't know what to tell you.

Now, 2013, that was a good draft.

 

[carolinacanuck]

lol. The only pick I feel good about is McCann. There was lots of bad decision making, all over the place, with 'meat and Potatoes' at the expense of actual elite skill and talent. Drafting a goalie with a second and 3e coke machines in the later rounds didn't inspire confidence.

One of the merits in which Virtanen was drafted (at the expense of likely superior players in Ehlers and Nylander) because he was from BC boy. If that doesn't tell you they value stupid things, I don't know what to tell you.

Now, 2013, that was a good draft.

ya 2013 was good but i still like the top 3 and maybe 4 of last year's draft.

 

[Pavel96]

Meanwhile, we have a well-meaning goof in charge of our team that thinks the NHL playoffs were just like the Calder Cup playoffs, didn't line match anybody, was barely coerced into even sort of adjusting his insane ice time deployment, played his worst defenseman more minutes than anyone else on his team in the 2nd period of an elimination game (with a two-goal lead), and came out of the season apparently happy with everything that happened and with no immediate plans to adjust anything.


Unfortunately, well said.