Tell Me Im Wrong- Canuck Version

[Horse McHindu]

Tell me I'm wrong:
Troy Stetcher is currently the best D man on our roster with Edler declining and Tanev missing ½ the games every year.

Wrong.

I think Tanev and Edler are still better. Stecher is probably our third best right now though.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Tell me im wrong Canucks finish top 5 in Pk percentage this yr

Your heart is in that right place but I don’t see this happening.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Tell me I’m wrong:

Hutton draws back into the line-up this year and finally takes the leap that we’ve been expecting from him since 2015.

 

[Nomobo]

Tell me I’m wrong but I believe Juolevi is here by Christmas as a gift to us all!

 

[IceNeophyte]

Wrong.

People have pretty much accepted what Leipsic is. I don’t think anyone will be disappointed though. I think Leipsic will get his fair share of goals and points and will have some nice flashes of brilliance, but he’s not going to be the next Brad Marchand or Johnny Gaudreau.

Not sure you understood. A career year for Lipstick won't need to amount to much.

 

[Javaman]

Tell me I'm wrong....this team will make the playoffs and destroy fan dreams of draft lottery goodness.

Wrong.

I think the Canucks will do better than what pundits have projected, it they won’t make the playoffs this year unfortunately. Would love to be wrong though.

You're both partly wrong. The Canucks will miss the playoffs AND fan dreams of draft lottery goodness will still be destroyed. Damn lottery balls.

 

[Bojack Horvatman]

You really think Pettersson can bank that many goals in off him?

40-45 is probally more realistic but he is one of the few people on the team that can make tape to tape passes. I just hope he doesn't get stuck with Sutter or ends up in Green's doghouse.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Tell me I’m wrong:

Not this year, but next year, the Canucks should package their 2020 1st round pick with two of Sutter/Eriksson/Gudbranson/Gagner, etc. so that they can clear major cap space.

This cap space can not only be used to comfortably re-up inevitable RFA’s such as Pettersson and Hughes when the time comes, but can also be used to perhaps bring in a high ticket UFA to complement our current core......a core that will have Pettersson and Hughes on ELC’s still.

After their 2019 pick this year, the Canucks should have enough ‘core’ players moving forward to build around......and I think the shifting priority should be in bringing complementary pieces.

 

[Peter10]

Tell me I’m wrong:

Not this year, but next year, the Canucks should package their 2020 1st round pick with two of Sutter/Eriksson/Gudbranson/Gagner, etc. so that they can clear major cap space.

This cap space can not only be used to comfortably re-up inevitable RFA’s such as Pettersson and Hughes when the time comes, but can also be used to perhaps bring in a high ticket UFA to complement our current core......a core that will have Pettersson and Hughes on ELC’s still.

After their 2019 pick this year, the Canucks should have enough ‘core’ players moving forward to build around......and I think the shifting priority should be in bringing complementary pieces.

Wrong, they should just fire the idiot who signed these contracts.

 

[xtra]

Tell me I’m wrong:

Not this year, but next year, the Canucks should package their 2020 1st round pick with two of Sutter/Eriksson/Gudbranson/Gagner, etc. so that they can clear major cap space.

This cap space can not only be used to comfortably re-up inevitable RFA’s such as Pettersson and Hughes when the time comes, but can also be used to perhaps bring in a high ticket UFA to complement our current core......a core that will have Pettersson and Hughes on ELC’s still.

After their 2019 pick this year, the Canucks should have enough ‘core’ players moving forward to build around......and I think the shifting priority should be in bringing complementary pieces.

Don’t you think a proper manger wouldn’t have signed those contracts instead of making us waste assets to get rid of them?

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Such fail. Such major, total, complete fail.

The Canucks are short pretty much an entire D corps and two top six wingers before they can even start to be taken seriously.

Get rid of the guy who can't scout dmen or sign cost-effective contracts. That's a start.

Also, Virtanen with more goals than Boeser. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Wrong, they should just fire the idiot who signed these contracts.

Fair enough.

I know that you dislike Benning, but I still believe that at THAT time, the Canucks simply didn’t have any prospects/young guys within the system to fill those roles. Anyway - we’ve discussed that to death. Let’s agree to disagree.

The point to focus on after this year’s draft, is that the Canucks should have a very good core to move forward with:

Centers: Pettersson + Horvat
Winger: Boeser
Defense: Hughes
Goaltending: Markstrom (is he for real?) + Demko (Incase Markstrom isn’t).

Our 2019 1st will likely factor in there somewhere.

Young supporting cast: Virtanen, Baertschi, Hutton, Stecher, Motte,......I’ll include Tryamkin.

Incoming prospects likely to make team very shortly: Gaudette, Juolevi

Incoming prospects that are wait and see: Madden, Dahlen, Jasek, Lockwood, Woo, Chatfield, Dipietro, etc.

Vets: Edler, Tanev, Beagle, Roussel

Try and get rid of: Sutter, Eriksson, Gudbranson, Pouliot, Granlund, Goldobin

#####-Pettersson-Boeser
Baertschi-Horvat-Virtanen
Roussel-Gaudette-####
Motte-Beagle-####

[our 2019 1st likely fills one of the above “####” in 2020/2021. Maybe Dahlen cracks the line-up next season as well].

Edler-####
Hughes-Tanev
Hutton-Tryamkin

[Using the 2020 1st as part of a package, I think a good argument can be made that some of those big long term contracts can be moved with zero retention. Using that freed up cap space, the Canucks go after a high ticket UFA on RIGHT DEFENSE. I would personally stay away from Karlsson as that will cost too much money. I would try and target someone much younger here].

Markstrom
Demko

Juolevi In Utica....Hutton gets moved out once OJ is ready.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Such fail. Such major, total, complete fail.

The Canucks are short pretty much an entire D corps and two top six wingers before they can even start to be taken seriously.

Get rid of the guy who can't scout dmen or sign cost-effective contracts. That's a start.

Also, Virtanen with more goals than Boeser. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

I do admit that I made that last comment. I predicted that Boeser would have a sophomore slump while Virtanen would break out this year. Things seemed to start out that way but it didn’t pan out. Happy and relieved that Boeser started to look good again after rehabbing his injury.

 

[Peter10]

Fair enough.

I know that you dislike Benning, but I still believe that at THAT time, the Canucks simply didn’t have any prospects/young guys within the system to fill those roles. Anyway - we’ve discussed that to death. Let’s agree to disagree.
...
[Using the 2020 1st as part of a package, I think a good argument can be made that some of those big long term contracts can be moved with zero retention. Using that freed up cap space, the Canucks go after a high ticket UFA on RIGHT DEFENSE. I would personally stay away from Karlsson as that will cost too much money. I would try and target someone much younger here].
.

Well ok then but wasnt one of the main excuses for the poor signing that "cap space doesnt matter" during a rebuild (dont really remember whether you said this too though)? Now all of a sudden we should trade a first rounder (which realistically could still be a lottery pick) because we run out of cap space to sign our young players?

 

[ProstheticConscience]

#####-Pettersson-Boeser
Baertschi-Horvat-Virtanen
Roussel-Gaudette-####
Motte-Beagle-####

Edler-####
Hughes-Tanev
Hutton-Tryamkin

Markstrom
Demko

And that's a team that still barely makes the playoffs every year. It's just not good enough, period.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Don’t you think a proper manger wouldn’t have signed those contracts instead of making us waste assets to get rid of them?

Again - at the time, we didn’t have any young guys in the system that could fill those roles.

-Bonino is a great 3rd Line Center but proved in 2014-2015 that he’s not 2nd Center material. As a result, we needed to upgrade on Bonino. Horvat was close to being ready for that role but wasn’t quite there yet. No one else in the system was ready. Hence, the Sutter trade. Obviously - Sutter turned out to not be the guy either, but management made the correct move by moving Bonino.

Same thing for the other examples:

-Prust brought in because Gaunce wasn’t quite ready (along with no other prospects) and the Canucks also had no one other than Dorset for toughness.

-Eriksson and Vrbata were brought in because Burrows was washed up, Virtanen was too green, and Boeser was a complete unknown at the time. No other prospects within the system. Hansen was literally our only good RWer.

-Gudbranson = same thing. We had absolutely nothing on RD outside of Tanev.

Again, we can question the previous regime’s inability to adequately fill the pipeline (so that Benning wouldn’t have had to fill these spots with vets instead of the kids that SHOULD HAVE been ready to fill in these spots), but that type of discussion belongs in another thread.

We could also argue the merits of signing cheap PTO vets to fill in those spots, but again.....in terms of creating a culture where the kids respect the vets (ie vets that were formerly elite, or were leaders, or are currently successful NHL’ers), management may have done the right thing by paying a premium price for leadership and intangibles. We shall soon find out as to whether that was the correct approach to take.

As I’ve always maintained.....a good rebuild takes 5-7 years, and this team started rebuilding in 2014 with the Luongo deal.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Well ok then but wasnt one of the main excuses for the poor signing that "cap space doesnt matter" during a rebuild (dont really remember whether you said this too though)? Now all of a sudden we should trade a first rounder (which realistically could still be a lottery pick) because we run out of cap space to sign our young players?

It may have been yes. But again - If two important things during a rebuild is to....

1) Place kids in a position where they are challenged (so they can grow their games), but not over-exerted (to the point where they are out of their element and lose confidence).

2) Have respected veterans in the line-up that are/were elite players at one point, and/or have been leaders, and/or still got game, then....

I think making those big moves for said vets were the correct moves to make.

People have to remember that when teams are nosediving or are near the bottom of the league, UFA’s won’t come cheap. Of course the money and term is not going to be as favorable as we’d like. Why else would said vets sign with us.....as opposed to a playoff team.....or as opposed to a “cool” city like New York, any original 6 team, or any of the warm Californian cities?

The less expensive option would be too target PTO vets, but again......

1) Do you expect said kids to really respect PTO vets in the lockerrom and what they have to say? They’re PTO/fringe players for a reason.

2) Will kids realistically believe that they can compete for and make the playoffs heading into a season if the vets helping them on the team are PTO guys?

3) Will the players on the team really feel that management has confidence in them and has their backs IF management only brings PTO guys?

4) What type of message does it send to the players if management only brings in PTO vets? “Oh - management doesn’t think much of us right now. We’re building for the future. Let’s not take our craft seriously this year. Let’s dog it in practice. Let’s party and stay up late at nights even if it’s game day the next day. This year doesn’t really matter anyways eh?” Remember - a lot of these kids are aged between 18-23, and so this is the type of risk you take if you don’t bring in respected vets (that the kids will respect) to set the culture.

So long story short - yes - I do believe that
Management initially made the correct decision by paying a premium price for leadership. An example - I feel that guys like Hutton and Virtanen would have been lost long ago if we didn’t have the right leadership in place.....but now, they appear to be trending upwards.

After this season however, I think we can really start to shift our focus from “bringing in veteran leaders to aid our youth,” to “reupping our upcoming RFA core players and complementing them with the right talent.”

Guys like Horvat, Boeser, and Pettersson are the culture carriers now, and are the types of guys that are fit to lead a team. Beagle, Roussel, Edler,
And Tanev are enough to assist these guys in these areas. Use the 2020 1st as a sweetener to get rid of the aforementioned contracts (Sutter/Guds/Eriksson/Gagner). They will have served their purpose after the conclusion of this season and the conclusion of the 2019 draft.

 

[Horse McHindu]

And that's a team that still barely makes the playoffs every year. It's just not good enough, period.

Maybe, maybe not, but we don’t know.

Pettersson, as good as he is, will likely get even better.

More than a handful of pundits are claiming that Quinn Hughes will be a future Norris candidate. Some of these pundits are from Toronto.....and those guys f***ing hate us. They are the last people to willingly “pump the tires” of anything Canucks related and so when THOSE guys are singing the praises of Hughes, you KNOW that it’s real.

Markstrom seems to be blossoming at a later age.....which if I recall correctly, is something that Tim Thomas did as well. Maybe we have something in Markstrom? If not - Demko seems to be growing well.

Who will we draft in 2019 with our 1st? Another Pettersson/Hughes/Boeser prospect would make a huge difference.

With freed up cap space by packaging our 2020 1st with atleast two of Sutter/Guds/Eriksson/Gagner, which high ticket UFA do we land?

If we take into consideration all of the above, then I think this team is good enough to compete for a cup. Whether that makes us 2010-2015 Chicago or 2010-2015 St.Louis/Minnesota I don’t know. What I do know is that the above punches us into the conversation for a lengthy period of time.

 

[Peter10]

It may have been yes. But again - If two important things during a rebuild is to....

1) Place kids in a position where they are challenged (so they can grow their games), but not over-exerted (to the point where they are out of their element and lose confidence).

2) Have respected veterans in the line-up that are/were elite players at one point, and/or have been leaders, and/or still got game, then....

I think making those big moves for said vets were the correct moves to make.

People have to remember that when teams are nosediving or are near the bottom of the league, UFA’s won’t come cheap. Of course the money and term is not going to be as favorable as we’d like. Why else would said vets sign with us.....as opposed to a playoff team.....or as opposed to a “cool” city like New York, any original 6 team, or any of the warm Californian cities?

The less expensive option would be too target PTO vets, but again......

1) Do you expect said kids to really respect PTO vets in the lockerrom and what they have to say? They’re PTO/fringe players for a reason.

2) Will kids realistically believe that they can compete for and make the playoffs heading into a season if the vets helping them on the team are PTO guys?

3) Will the players on the team really feel that management has confidence in them and has their backs IF management only brings PTO guys?

4) What type of message does it send to the players if management only brings in PTO vets? “Oh - management doesn’t think much of us right now. We’re building for the future. Let’s not take our craft seriously this year. Let’s dog it in practice. Let’s party and stay up late at nights even if it’s game day the next day. This year doesn’t really matter anyways eh?” Remember - a lot of these kids are aged between 18-23, and so this is the type of risk you take if you don’t bring in respected vets (that the kids will respect) to set the culture.

So long story short - yes - I do believe that
Management initially made the correct decision by paying a premium price for leadership. An example - I feel that guys like Hutton and Virtanen would have been lost long ago if we didn’t have the right leadership in place.....but now, they appear to be trending upwards.

After this season however, I think we can really start to shift our focus from “bringing in veteran leaders to aid our youth,” to “reupping our upcoming RFA core players and complementing them with the right talent.”

Guys like Horvat, Boeser, and Pettersson are the culture carriers now, and are the types of guys that are fit to lead a team. Beagle, Roussel, Edler,
And Tanev are enough to assist these guys in these areas. Use the 2020 1st as a sweetener to get rid of the aforementioned contracts. They will have served their purpose after the conclusion of this season and the conclusion of the 2019 draft.

What type of message does it send to the young guys if you bring in guys like Eriksson (who has dialed it in since singing the contract) or Prust (who threw a tantrum over being finally scratched after playing terrible for a while)?

I agree that you need to have some quality veterans on the team when rebuilding but we had those guys in the Sedins, Edler, Hamhuis, Burrows. There was absolutely no reason in my opinion to bring in guys who just want to cash in as UFAs and otherwise dont give a rats a** about the team. And give them term on top of it. Beagle and Roussel might be decent additions for this year if not looking at the contracts but if those contracts are the reason to lose a 1st rounder while this team is still severly lacking all sorts of talent it is just mindboggling terrible.

 

[Horse McHindu]

@Peter10

1) Prust: Agreed with you on Prust. He acted like an idiot when he found out that he wasn’t going to play that night. If I recall correctly, management took care of the problem right away and sent him to the minors. Kudos to management for admitting fault and sending him down before he created a toxic environment for the kids. It sucks because Prust had been a “character guy” all throughout his career. Even when he first came to Vancouver, he was playing fairly well up until that (leg? ankle?) injury. He was never really the same after that and his play suffered from then on out.

2) Eriksson is a fascinating study case. On the one hand - yes, he is clearly overpaid. Guys making the kind of money that Eriksson is making should be able to produce consistent offense, along with driving offense themselves.

On the other hand - Eriksson does many little things right that it’s hard to hate him as much as we should. He is extremely good defensively, is a great PK’er, and very rarely makes mistakes. In this regard, he is the EXACT player you want your young kids looking up to, in terms of learning how to play responsible and relatively error free hockey.

I also think Eriksson’s intensity is understated. While he’s not foaming at the mouth looking to run people over, I do think he puts in an honest effort. His personality is just very “Swedish” (as he is) and most Swedes don’t exactly outwardly display the intensity on their faces.

3) Losing a 1st to get rid of bad contracts:

I completely agree that this is not an ideal situation - at all - but Benning was really caught between a rock and a hard place in my opinion.

Again - when Benning arrived here, there was literally nothing in the pipeline. No kid in the system was ready to step up and take roles. As I discussed earlier, I do believe that Benning pretty much had to make a play here for vets, and he decided to pay a premium for proven and relatively successful vets rather than PTO vets (for reasons that I already stated).

I don’t want to turn this into a “If Mike Gillis had done blah blah,” debate (Gillis had his own pressures to deal with from ownership in terms of going for the cup and so it wouldn’t be appropriate or fair to blame Gillis), but Benning literally had Jack shit for prospects in the pipeline when he got here. Hence - the initial need to trade 2nd rounders and other picks for young reclamation projects to inject some immediate youth to possibly replace vets. Some big misses here obviously, but Baertschi and Motte were modestly decent wins. It was nice to see Baertschi successfully replace Higgins.

So yeah - it would suck if Benning had to move a 2020 1st to get rid of anchored contracts, but I still think Benning made the correct play when he came here.

 

[Peter10]

@Peter10

1) Prust: Agreed with you on Prust. He acted like an idiot when he found out that he wasn’t going to play that night. If I recall correctly, management took care of the problem right away and sent him to the minors. Kudos to management for admitting fault and sending him down before he created a toxic environment for the kids. It sucks because Prust had been a “character guy” all throughout his career. Even when he first came to Vancouver, he was playing fairly well up until that (leg? ankle?) injury. He was never really the same after that and his play suffered from then on out.

2) Eriksson is a fascinating study case. On the one hand - yes, he is clearly overpaid. Guys making the kind of money that Eriksson is making should be able to produce consistent offense, along with driving offense themselves.

On the other hand - Eriksson does many little things right that it’s hard to hate him as much as we should. He is extremely good defensively, is a great PK’er, and very rarely makes mistakes. In this regard, he is the EXACT player you want your young kids looking up to, in terms of learning how to play responsible and relatively error free hockey.

I also think Eriksson’s intensity is understated. While he’s not foaming at the mouth looking to run people over, I do think he puts in an honest effort. His personality is just very “Swedish” (as he is) and most Swedes don’t exactly outwardly display the intensity on their faces.

3) Losing a 1st to get rid of bad contracts:

I completely agree that this is not an ideal situation - at all - but Benning was really caught between a rock and a hard place in my opinion.

Again - when Benning arrived here, there was literally nothing in the pipeline. No kid in the system was ready to step up and take roles. As I discussed earlier, I do believe that Benning pretty much had to make a play here for vets, and he decided to pay a premium for proven and relatively successful vets rather than PTO vets (for reasons that I already stated).

I don’t want to turn this into a “If Mike Gillis had done blah blah,” debate (Gillis had his own pressures to deal with from ownership in terms of going for the cup and so it wouldn’t be appropriate or fair to blame Gillis), but Benning literally had Jack **** for prospects in the pipeline when he got here. Hence - the initial need to trade 2nd rounders and other picks for young reclamation projects to inject some immediate youth to possibly replace vets. Some big misses here obviously, but Baertschi and Motte were modestly decent wins. It was nice to see Baertschi successfully replace Higgins.

So yeah - it would suck if Benning had to move a 2020 1st to get rid of anchored contracts, but I still think Benning made the correct play when he came here.

I guess we will indeed have to agree to disagree on some points but nevertheless good to see that we also can have a good discussion on it (not really used to that between the two of us).

My main problem with those deals is the term rather than the money and if the argument is that we would not have gotten the likes of Beagle or Eriksson without the term then I would say we should have gone for other options. Neither is make that much of a difference that he couldnt be replaced with another player making less money over a shorter term.

As for the "cap issues" I think those are still manageable albeit far from ideal. Sutter I am sure you could deal for a pure futures package at the deadline, heck even Gudbranson should be tradeable as long as Tallon is in Florida. For Eriksson its probably a bit more difficult but if you retain 50% then at a 3m cap hit he might indeed have some value to other teams. All that would give enough wiggle room get everyone signed and maybe some more depending on the cap increase. However, that shouldnt be wasted at a big UFA deal. If the some of young guys done at the farm indeed make it up here they will look for increases too which all will add up. And the other free agents will ask for bigger money too, considering the UFA deals Benning handed out I would assume negotiations wont be that easy.

 

[Var]

Tell me I'm wrong, the phrase "hot take" has got to go.

 

[xtra]

So compound bad moves (the contracts) by another bad move trading the first.

You still haven’t shown how there is a material difference between a 6 million place gap holder and someone making 2 million, giving up one of term or dollars is fine if you want to lure a player in but giving up both is incompetence.

Please note also that horvat, and Hutton were on the team and in the pipeline - forsling who’s playing in the nhl was also there before being traded by benning; suddenly that’s depth (plus tradable assets that you dismiss) for him to work with but let’s not rehash that.

The beat move to win a cup for this franchise is to replace benning.

 

[Cogburn]

Tell me I'm wrong:

Our scoring depth would be a little less inconsistent with Gagner in the lineup for us.

He didn't look awful for us during his time called up. He didn't look stellar but he was far from our worst player on the ice. Another offensive forward that could take even a little focus of Horvat or Boeser or Pettersson or Virtanen would be a positive. Having Schaller or Sutter (from a purely offensive standpoint) moved away from an offensive role would make far more sense then shoehorning a player with 0 offensive sense into a playmaking role for another player.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Tell me I'm wrong:

Our scoring depth would be a little less inconsistent with Gagner in the lineup for us.

He didn't look awful for us during his time called up. He didn't look stellar but he was far from our worst player on the ice. Another offensive forward that could take even a little focus of Horvat or Boeser or Pettersson or Virtanen would be a positive. Having Schaller or Sutter (from a purely offensive standpoint) moved away from an offensive role would make far more sense then shoehorning a player with 0 offensive sense into a playmaking role for another player.

Can't tell you you're wrong because you're not.

Honestly didn't think Gagner was all that bad when he was up this season and can't think he'd be any kind of downgrade from Goldobin, Granlund, Schaller...who else...Leipsic but he's gone now...probably more.