Confirmed with Link: [VAN/CHI] Canucks acquire 5th Round Pick for F Anthony Beauvillier

[Pastor Of Muppetz]

That was the price we paid to enact the trade period. Horvat's 5.25M going means salary coming back.

The only way Drance's position is valid is if he knows that management held onto Beau even though there were deals to be had to deal Beau without salary coming back and we therefore incurred an opportunity cost by not dealing him. But given the precious commodity that cap space is league wide, such a deal is likely a figment of Thomas Drance's imagination.

NYI had been trying to trade Beauvillier for months before they traded him to us...So he was indeed a cap dump by the Islanders (according to their Athletic reporter)...We were taking a big contract back in that trade, that was non negotiable.

Thats just awful hindsight from Drance.

 

[F A N]

That was the price we paid to enact the trade period. Horvat's 5.25M going means salary coming back.

The only way Drance's position is valid is if he knows that management held onto Beau even though there were deals to be had to deal Beau without salary coming back and we therefore incurred an opportunity cost by not dealing him. But given the precious commodity that cap space is league wide, such a deal is likely a figment of Thomas Drance's imagination.

NYI had been trying to trade Beauvillier for months before they traded him to us...So he was indeed a cap dump by the Islanders (according to their Athletic reporter)...We were taking a big contract back in that trade, that was non negotiable.

Thats just awful hindsight from Drance.

I read Drance's article in the Athletic and I don't take issue with the points that he made: The cap space freed up in the Beau to Chicago trade is worth more in the offseason than it is now; We didn't just "add a 5th round pick" to the Horvat trade; We didn't "rent" Beau for 8 months in order to pick up an extra 5th round pick; There was a cost to that and that was cap flexibility in the off season.

Many of us (including myself) made the same points at the time of the trade and I don't think there's much disagreement here. Beau was a cap dump and we took on his contract at the time where we couldn't trade Garland after signing Mik and not trading Myers in the off season. For reference, we unloaded Dickinson's contract for a 2nd and to pick up Stillman's contract. Beau should absolutely be valued as a negative asset that likely takes something similar to the price we paid to get rid of Dickinson's contract.

Drance isn't wrong. He's just poo pooing an awesome trade that surprisingly materialized.

 

[Diversification]

I read Drance's article in the Athletic and I don't take issue with the points that he made: The cap space freed up in the Beau to Chicago trade is worth more in the offseason than it is now; We didn't just "add a 5th round pick" to the Horvat trade; We didn't "rent" Beau for 8 months in order to pick up an extra 5th round pick; There was a cost to that and that was cap flexibility in the off season.

I see. That's a weird way of thinking about it because no one would willingly take on an overpaid winger with limited versatility in order to collect a late round pick further down the road, much less one after the offseason was over. That's a classic strawman and a deliberate misunderstanding of the value exchanged in the Horvat trade. Please note that I'm not accusing you of making a strawman argument, I'm referring to Drance.

What I take issue with is that this strawman is the premise for his critique of opportunity cost. A fairer assessment is that management was able to free up 4.15M in cap space without parting with a sweetener. It took until the quarter mark of the season to do so because there wasn't a market until that point. And, in my opinion, adding 4.15 M in cap flexibility mid-season without parting with picks and prospects is better than parting with picks to gain that flexibility in the offseason given the team's early season success that can still be built upon with cap flexibility created in-season.

 

[Izzy Goodenough]

Drance's arguments are generally of the variety of "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride".

They are simply nonsense, what if, arguments stated forcefully as criticisms.

However, this trade is more evidence that their Hockey Ops department acts rationally; which separates them from the GMJB era.

It is also interesting to see that "Showcasing" a player (Beauvillier) by elevating him to a top six role (with JT and BB) is still a real thing in the NHL,

and probably predicts a future trade when it happens again (see Garland etc.).

But, who should the Canucks pick in the Draft with the extra 5th rounder...

haha

 

[TruGr1t]

I do wonder about the deals they're passing on that we don't hear about. But I do generally like the deals they end up making so I'm not too put off by it.

Yes, I don't have a ton of issues with this series of events. I would have flipped Beauvillier way earlier since it would have been relatively straightforward and given you more cap flexibility at key points over the past 6-8 months, but they obviously liked him coming off his post-trade performance last season and held onto him until it became evident he was effectively the only contract that could be moved at wing, for a variety of reasons. He's also not been particularly good this season.

I'd add, I get Drance's point but it seems pretty nit-picky to me in the grand scheme. Yes, you could have possibly gotten a nominally higher return for Beauvillier earlier (maybe in the summer) and re-optimized cap space, but I don't think it's particularly material.

 

[andora]

I'd add, I get Drance's point but it seems pretty nit-picky to me in the grand scheme. Yes, you could have possibly gotten a nominally higher return for Beauvillier earlier (maybe in the summer) and re-optimized cap space, but I don't think it's particularly material.

Yeah - it cant be material without knowing specific things or context which only a small group would

 

[Diversification]

Yes, I don't have a ton of issues with this series of events. I would have flipped Beauvillier way earlier since it would have been relatively straightforward and given you more cap flexibility at key points over the past 6-8 months, but they obviously liked him coming off his post-trade performance last season and held onto him until it became evident he was effectively the only contract that could be moved at wing, for a variety of reasons. He's also not been particularly good this season.

I'd add, I get Drance's point but it seems pretty nit-picky to me in the grand scheme. Yes, you could have possibly gotten a nominally higher return for Beauvillier earlier (maybe in the summer) and re-optimized cap space, but I don't think it's particularly material.

The question is, how? How would you have accomplished this? Literally no one league wide could dump salary without taking something back or adding significant assets. Dumping Beau with no retention and getting anything back whatsoever is practically a minor miracle under the present circumstances.

 

[WetcoastOrca]

The question is, how? How would you have accomplished this? Literally no one league wide could dump salary without taking something back or adding significant assets. Dumping Beau with no retention and getting anything back whatsoever is practically a minor miracle under the present circumstances.

That’s the way I see it too. I mean we couldn’t even trade Boeser who had a much better pedigree.
I’m honestly shocked we didn’t have to retain on Beau given his production and cap hit. For comparison we needed to add a second to move Dickinson at a much lower cap hit. This was a very shrewd move by a patient management group that took advantage of the turmoil in Chicago. Kudos!

 

[m9]

The question is, how? How would you have accomplished this? Literally no one league wide could dump salary without taking something back or adding significant assets. Dumping Beau with no retention and getting anything back whatsoever is practically a minor miracle under the present circumstances.

The obvious answer is flipping him to Chicago in the summer since they were signing/trading for wingers and obviously think Beau is at least a serviceable player considering they just traded for him despite him being a ghost through 20 games this year. It would actually be kind of strange if there weren't some sort of discussions for him this summer given they ended up trading for him.

I also wonder if there were opportunities at the trade deadline last year when he was playing well and has had some playoff success. Maybe you can take back an expiring deal.

*I agree the trade is still great though and I think Drance's spin on it is a bit unnecessary

 

[Ernie]

There was no movement on the winger market this summer. Players like Tarasenko signed for $5m. The idea that they would have been able to move Beauvillier without sending an asset or eating salary is nonsense. He's a 3rd liner with no PK abilities making $1.5m above market value.

Going back to the Horvat trade and 2nd guessing every component is ridiculous. Hindsight is always 20:20. Beauvillier was not a player the Islanders thought could help them make the playoffs, he was a cap dump. The Canucks were patient and waited for another team to become desperate. Good trade.

 

[TruGr1t]

The question is, how? How would you have accomplished this? Literally no one league wide could dump salary without taking something back or adding significant assets. Dumping Beau with no retention and getting anything back whatsoever is practically a minor miracle under the present circumstances.

Given his contract, I don't think Beauvillier would have been hard to move at any point. He was playing better last year and may have carried more value heading into the summer than he does now. I don't think they had much interest in moving him until they moved away from trying to trade Garland.

To put it another way, I think they believe Beauvillier had more on-ice value to the team than a mid-round pick up until recently when it became evident he was basically the only fungible salary they could move. Plus, he hasn't been as effective this year and we've had guys step-up internally at wing.

 

[theguardianII]

If a trade needs to be done it can be done.
If it was easy then anyone could do it.

This was a good trade for the Canucks, a great trade.

NOW there are other teams that have massive pressure and can't wait for a summer or two to go by

 

[MarkMM]

This should have be done ages ago, but at least they finally got around to it. Obviously option “B” to trading Garland, but it was always doable.

The question is, how? How would you have accomplished this? Literally no one league wide could dump salary without taking something back or adding significant assets. Dumping Beau with no retention and getting anything back whatsoever is practically a minor miracle under the present circumstances.

We'll never know for sure but given the cost to trade Dickinson and other comparables around the league and th fact that this only happened when Chicago got into a bizarre situation of losing two players in a week makes me think this deal was never on the table until now, otherwise we would have moved Beau or anyone else much sooner.

 

[StreetHawk]

That was the price we paid to enact the trade period. Horvat's 5.25M going means salary coming back.

The only way Drance's position is valid is if he knows that management held onto Beau even though there were deals to be had to deal Beau without salary coming back and we therefore incurred an opportunity cost by not dealing him. But given the precious commodity that cap space is league wide, such a deal is likely a figment of Thomas Drance's imagination.

Seen teams acquire Hall via trade. Each guy who has a contract with another team it’s going to come down to type of play of the player and what that club is looking for. Chicago wanted Hall to play with Bedard. So we get that. Foligno is a veteran who is gritty. Also get that.

 

[andora]

Given his contract, I don't think Beauvillier would have been hard to move at any point. He was playing better last year and may have carried more value heading into the summer than he does now. I don't think they had much interest in moving him until they moved away from trying to trade Garland.

To put it another way, I think they believe Beauvillier had more on-ice value to the team than a mid-round pick up until recently when it became evident he was basically the only fungible salary they could move. Plus, he hasn't been as effective this year and we've had guys step-up internally at wing.

I think he lost value going into the off season when everything opens up in theory.. as teams move on from guys and ufa and beau drops down the desirable list

 

[drax0s]

Was just reflecting on the trade again this morning and I really dig how quickly PA pounced on this to help solve a roster issue with a temporarily avail window. Benning and Weisbrod would've absolutely sat on their hands after finding there was no market for their overpaid wingers earlier on in the season if they hadn't already been forced into attaching assets to clear Beauv's contract after painting themselves into a corner by acquiring Zadorov.

 

[Pastor Of Muppetz]

Given his contract, I don't think Beauvillier would have been hard to move at any point. He was playing better last year and may have carried more value heading into the summer than he does now. I don't think they had much interest in moving him until they moved away from trying to trade Garland.

To put it another way, I think they believe Beauvillier had more on-ice value to the team than a mid-round pick up until recently when it became evident he was basically the only fungible salary they could move. Plus, he hasn't been as effective this year and we've had guys step-up internally at wing.

Disagree...Given the cap crunch climate this last off season, there was no way you were cap dumping a $4M contract , and getting something in return...Thats next level hindsight.

The Canucks #1 goal this last summer was to create cap flexibility..and they couldn't move anybody. (forcing them to buy out OEL)

The market was flooded with wingers, and there's no doubt that Beauvillier and Garland were on the table in the summer...I dont think that Beauvillier (a soft skill winger) was ever in the long term plans of the Canucks, despite having a career season last year...He would have been traded at the upcoming TDL, or just walked at the end of the season.

 

[vancityluongo]

this is a great trade

drance's point isn't necessarily unfair or incorrect, but i also don't think it's fully correct. for the very same reason why it would have been beneficial for the canucks to have that $4m of cap space in the summer; no one was going to take on beauvillier in the summer without a big sweetener to effectively destroy their own cap space. it may have been "better" if the canucks could have pulled it off, but you can't premise every single move relative to the assumption that the market has a moron ready to be taken advantage of. benning isn't back in the league yet.

the canucks also had a massive hole (or two) at wing heading into the season, and beauvillier had as good a chance as any to fill in that gap. it's probably good that they waited 20+ games to see who came out of the offseason ready to separate themselves from the glut of wingers in the organization.

on july 1st we were generally spitballing kuz, beauv, pod and ?? (likely boeser, by default... but maybe garland) as the top-6 wingers. right now, it's boeser, pdg, mikheyev and kuzmenko (when he isn't healthy scratched) with hoglander, garland and lafferty knocking on the door. the opportunity cost of missing out on overpriced free agents (a gap that was filled much more effectively with the lafferty trade) is not nearly as high as if we picked the wrong winger to trade based on an assessment at the draft.

 

[VanJack]

Obviously Hoglander's emergence also made Beauvillier expendable. Really hope his departure means the end of the 'healthy scratches' for Hoglander.

He's still a young winger who needs the opportunity to play through his mistakes.

 

[m9]

Disagree...Given the cap crunch climate this last off season, there was no way you were cap dumping a $4M contract , and getting something in return...Thats next level hindsight.

The Canucks #1 goal this last summer was to create cap flexibility..and they couldn't move anybody. (forcing them to buy out OEL)

The market was flooded with wingers, and there's no doubt that Beauvillier and Garland were on the table in the summer...I dont think that Beauvillier (a soft skill winger) was ever in the long term plans of the Canucks, despite having a career season last year...He would have been traded at the upcoming TDL, or just walked at the end of the season.

I think it's really easy to say there was "no way" they could dump a $4 million contract but you are completely ignoring that Chicago - the team they just traded him to - made these moves in the summer:

-Traded for Taylor Hall (2 x 6 mil)
-Traded for and signed Nick Foligno (1 x 4 mil )
-Traded for & signed Corey Perry (1 x 4 mil )
-Signed Ryan Donato (2 x 2 million)
-Re-signed Andreas Athanasiou (2 x 4.25 mil)

Is it reasonable to think that they could have trade Beau there by attaching a small sweetener like a late round pick or whatever given all of those signings/trades? IMO, yes. Clearly they were looking to upgrade the wings with vets on short-term deals and clearly they liked Beau at least a bit.

I don't think it really matters at this point - they got it done eventually - but to say there's no way they could accomplish moving that contract in the summer just doesn't add up to me.

 

[I am toxic]

We can argue about sweeteners and cap dumps all day long, but the fact remains:

Ruthervin >>>> Mittens >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Benning

Them's the facts. Suck it, grammar nerds!

 

[biturbo19]

Perhaps Chicago was asking for too much of a sweetener in the summer when they had the option to overpay for free agents instead of helping another team out with their cap situation.

I'm sure management knew what the cost was to dump Beau in the summer and weighed that against what options they had to spend that potential freed up cap on. Ultimately they decided it wasn't worth it. Without knowing all those details and permutations it's hard to judge.

That said, open cap space in general is a valuable asset even if you don't have a plan for it right away. However, in the end, I'm just happy with getting rid of a negative value asset with the pick being the cherry on top.

Yeah. I get what Drance is saying there. There's an "opportunity cost" to having had that $4.125M cap hit on the books going into the season. That could've been money put toward a better forward, or more importantly more defensive help.

But the reality is, hanging onto Beauvillier and even just acquiring in that Bo trade in the first place, was just the cost of doing business. It was a bad contract dumped on us to offset salary and make the trade work. There was likely zero interest in him over the summer. It would've been a, "pay to dump him" scenario. Teams like the Blackhawks, Ducks, etc. with spare cap space were trying to hold the league hostage...because they could. They largely opted to go out and just use their superior cap flexibility to overpay their own hand selected UFAs.


Obviously they wanted certain types of players in there as "mentors". The whole Perry thing obviously imploded, and that's what opened the doors to make this deal. But that's more the case of the Blackhawks suddenly being put on the back foot, flipping the trade leverage around a little bit to where they're kind of desperate to get a decent, competent forward in there. Things haven't worked out for their gambles with injuries, bizarre off-ice stuff, and other guys just straight up playing like turds.

But you can rest assured, if a trade like this for Beauvillier was on the table this summer...they would've jumped at the opportunity to be rid of him then. It just took some time for the opportunity to actually materialize.


So while Drance makes a somewhat fair point...it's also an imaginary, hypothetical scenario that didn't really exist. His scenario opens the door to questions about what the "opportunity cost" of holding Beauvillier actually is. Is it the different between "gaining a high 5th round pick" vs "giving up a 3rd round pick"? Personally, i'd wager no. But that's also contingent on what exactly they would've been able to reallocate that cap space toward. They already landed two good defencemen and two decent centers, plus another in trade as it was. Were they going to be able to land another good UFA Defenceman or Center worth having?

 

[Pastor Of Muppetz]

I think it's really easy to say there was "no way" they could dump a $4 million contract but you are completely ignoring that Chicago - the team they just traded him to - made these moves in the summer:

-Traded for Taylor Hall (2 x 6 mil)
-Traded for and signed Nick Foligno (1 x 4 mil )
-Traded for & signed Corey Perry (1 x 4 mil )
-Signed Ryan Donato (2 x 2 million)
-Re-signed Andreas Athanasiou (2 x 4.25 mil)

Is it reasonable to think that they could have trade Beau there by attaching a small sweetener like a late round pick or whatever given all of those signings/trades? IMO, yes. Clearly they were looking to upgrade the wings with vets on short-term deals and clearly they liked Beau at least a bit.

I don't think it really matters at this point - they got it done eventually - but to say there's no way they could accomplish moving that contract in the summer just doesn't add up to me.

Looks to me like the players Chicago brought in were veterans for character/ mentorship/toughness, precisely the kind of players you would want on a young inexperienced core.

Anthony Beauvillier (a soft skilled winger) isnt any of those.

 

[m9]

Looks to me like the players Chicago brought in were veterans for character/ mentorship/toughness, precisely the kind of players you would want on a young inexperienced core.

Anthony Beauvillier (a soft skilled winger) isnt any of those.

They literally just traded for Beauvillier for an asset to the same team/GM, obviously he's a player/player type they have some level of interest in.

I'm not going to dig in further becuase it's a waste of time - I just find the characterization that they would have had no chance to trade Beau earlier an unlikely premise given what just happened and to which team and I'll leave it there.

 

[MarkMM]

They literally just traded for Beauvillier for an asset to the same team/GM, obviously he's a player/player type they have some level of interest in.

I'm not going to dig in further becuase it's a waste of time - I just find the characterization that they would have had no chance to trade Beau earlier an unlikely premise given what just happened and to which team and I'll leave it there.

What just happened was Chicago lost two fairly substantial pieces within a week and were desperate to add a warm body who could contribute; the fact that this desperation only made them give up a 5th shows that Beauvillier had no value.