Should Trevor Linden be blamed as well?

[Kickassguy]

He's a former player with absolutely no management education or experience, performing a role in which he's expected to make smart management decisions. You look at guys like Yzerman, Bergevin, Shanahan, who actually *prepared* for their jobs... it's night and day.

He got the ball rolling with Benning and Willie D. Those moves, to an extent, speak for themselves.

 

[Verviticus]

we said when benning was hired that linden was awfully sure of his pick and that he'd better be right, because there were good quality candidates that he seemed not to care about. he gets as much blame as benning

 

[Fat Tony]

Meh. He's a figurehead. Who is being absolutely wrecked by other President's league wide (Burke, Nicholson, etc.) but did anyone expect he would do better than those guys?

Better than Lowe.

Damned by faint praise.

 

[VeteranNetPresence]

Absolutely, he sounds like he is completely out of his element when talking about managing a team

 

[Domecile]

People dislike Benning. Linden hired Benning. Of course the blame is equal... What are we blaming them for again? I've lost track.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

next time some shady developer raises poorly-built condos in an east van alley to sell to investors in taiwan, they're going to call bieksa to smile and wave.

that's right trev, you did this to yourself. who would want you now?

 

[KDizzle]

I wonder why, then, does Brendan Shanahan have more of a vision despite never being in a position of team management?

I think Linden has his heart in the right place. He knows what he wants to see in a team. He obviously didn't (and still doesn't) know how to get to that goal. Meanwhile, over in Leaf Nation, Shanny brought on guys like Dubas and Hunter to essentially act like his advisors because he knew he needed to identify deficiencies in a quantifiable way and to be able to make decisions based on logic.
Instead, in Canuck Land, Linden hired a GM to try to get his vision into place. Which, if the GM were competent, he'd have put metrics in place to do the same thing Shanahan is doing. The problem is that it turns out Linden hired a scout who GMs like he's trading hockey cards.

So I say yes, Linden's to blame. But Benning moreso. I wouldn't be upset if Linden stays on as President once Benning is fired. I'd be upset, however, if Linden is the only guy responsible for hiring the next GM of the Canucks.