Canucks & NHL News, Rumours, and & Fantasy GM | Summer Doldrums

[biturbo19]

Defensive trade targets this season from Drance today:

Rasmus Andersson
MacKenzie Weegar
Adam Larsson
Neal Pionk
Colton Parayko

The thing about Rasmus Andersson, is that he's significantly better than Hronek. So that'd be a f***in' thing to pull off. I doubt we have anything like the assets to do it. But i'd throw all of everything at it if possible. That contract with a couple years remaining at bargain dollars is sooooooooooo valuable.

 

[Lat]

Hard to see how we get Andersson without one of Lekk or Willander going the other way. Maybe that's worth it, I dunno.

Larsson would be a great get as well, hopefully Seattle faceplants.

I'd easily flip Lekk to get Andersson, and maybe Larsson. Not Willander though.

 

[Vector]

Really? I think they should be more comfortable with Soucy on the 2nd pair than Myers.

Assuming they roll:
Hughes - Hronek
Soucy - Myers
Forbert - VD

Bringing Andersson to play with Soucy, or Larsson to play with Hughes and bump Hronek down makes more sense to me than running with Myers in bigger minutes.

If you get an RD you're pushing Desharnais out of the line-up and I don't think they are committing that contract to him with the intention of sitting him in the press box. Plus the expected 7th and 8th defencemen are right handed. Forbort has a lesser cap hit and his, and Soucy's, recent injury history is concerning.

Say you get Matheson, purely as an example, and you play him with Desharnais. That doesn't mean he's suddenly on the the third pair but rather Soucy/Myers have their total TOI reduced. We saw this with Zadorov coming in and how the TOI would flucutate between the four non-1st pair guys but would all average about a minute or two less a game than before. Essentially turning both the 2nd and 3rd pair into two second pairs.

 

[Lat]

If you get an RD you're pushing Desharnais out of the line-up and I don't think they are committing that contract to him with the intention of sitting him in the press box. Plus the expected 7th and 8th defencemen are right handed. Forbort has a lesser cap hit and his, and Soucy's, recent injury history is concerning.

Concur - the weakest link right now is Forbort. The biggest need in my opinion is a second pairing LD.

Also, depth-wise, Juulsen and Friedman are both RD as 7/8D too.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

I'd agree, but the issue is I don't see much flexibility not to have Hoglander in the top six, unless you bump Garland or Joshua up the line-up. Heinen will be on one of the top two lines in all likelihood, so that leaves you one last spot. I think we're all done with any of the fourth-line wingers in the top six, and while Sherwood may get some time there, I don't think they'll throw him there off the hop.

Hoglander would look fine on the third line, in my opinion, but how do you get him there with the current roster is the question. Given his cap hit and 2023-2024 production, he's a pretty tempting trade chip since you could move him out for either an upgrade on winger or defense, without overly impacting the rest of the line-up.

That is a scenario I don't really see happening. Any meaningful upgrades = larger cap hit than Hog's $1.1m. We have what, like $700k in cap space assuming we sign a backup goalie for $1m (can't check Capfriendly anymore, stupid Washington!)? Who is Allvin going to target as an upgrade that makes less than $2m? Like in theory yes, Hog is definitely a good trade chip in a vacuum, but then who can we realistically get in return that fit under the cap? And if we add another roster player to the trade, then it doesn't really fit your narrative that "without overly impacting the rest of the line-up" until we see which other player gets moved.

Also, and I can't stress this enough, injuries does happen! We are very likely to have at least 1 player in the top 6 hurt somewhere along the way. Having the luxury to plug in a 20 goal winger, for all his flaws, all at the lost cost of $1.1m, is something we should hold on to. Even without injuries, you don't think one or more of our wingers gets on a cold streak? Having the ability to move Hog up (if he starts on the bottom 6) gives us so much flexibility throughout the season. Not to mention his scoring from the bottom 6, no matter who he plays with, gives us another dimension. And if he does start out on the top 6, that means he had a good camp and earned the spot, which is also a good thing.

 

[StreetHawk]

I agree. Big cap hit spending done. Would need to send someone like Garland out to make it work.

Canucks have to get some offensive production from Hogs and Pod. Absolutely need it if they are going anywhere.

 

[Vector]

That is a scenario I don't really see happening. Any meaningful upgrades = larger cap hit than Hog's $1.1m. We have what, like $700k in cap space assuming we sign a backup goalie for $1m (can't check Capfriendly anymore, stupid Washington!)?

Heavily depends on how they want to utilize LTIR and the roster space. With a full 23-man roster and a back-up goalie at 1m they have 0 cap space. However, reducing that to 22/23 by waiving Aman and going with Patera instead bumps that just under 0.3m then when you place Poolman on IR (or include him in a trade) you essentially bump it up to 2.8m and that's with a 23/23 roster. If it's Hoglander or Podkolzin included in a trade you can essentially say that they thave room for just under 4m to add to the roster.

 

[Vector]

Something to note, the Canucks are at 48/50 contracts with Silovs unsigned.

 

[TruGr1t]

Something to note, the Canucks are at 48/50 contracts with Silovs unsigned.

They are carrying too much depth though, there is no way Aman, PDG, Friedman and Juulsen are all carried through the season, I don't think. As you mentioned above, they can easily manipulate the roster, use LTIR, and generate just north of $4M in cap if they trade Hoglander.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

Heavily depends on how they want to utilize LTIR and the roster space. With a full 23-man roster and a back-up goalie at 1m they have 0 cap space. However, reducing that to 22/23 by waiving Aman and going with Patera instead bumps that just under 0.3m then when you place Poolman on IR (or include him in a trade) you essentially bump it up to 2.8m and that's with a 23/23 roster. If it's Hoglander or Podkolzin included in a trade you can essentially say that they thave room for just under 4m to add to the roster.

That is a viable option, but 2 issues.
1) I'm again not sure what kind of meaningful upgrade you can get from sub-$4m cap hit. I don't see many top 4D or top 6F making that kind of salary. If they are, chances are they are not available, or not available for anything other than a severe overpay.
2) If they need to move Poolman back to LTIR, then there are no ways to accumulate cap space throughout the season. I was under the impression that Allvin really want to accumulate cap space so that he can load up at or near the deadline. That is obviously not priority #1, but it takes away his flexibility (which is one reason he was able to add Zadorov early and cheaply last season).

I guess they can just carry a 20-men roster and open up about $1.5m more by waiving PDG and Friedman (for example). But you are really playing with fire if the team runs into any short term injuries.

 

[StreetHawk]

I guess they can just carry a 20-men roster and open up about $1.5m more by waiving PDG and Friedman (for example). But you are really playing with fire if the team runs into any short term injuries.

Then the Canucks really need to match up their home schedule with Abby to run on a 20/21 man roster for portions of the season. But, once you go on the road, you need to have the spare Dman and F with you. Can't bet that the A club can get a player to an NHL city in time as they operate more out of smaller airports at other AHL cities.

Surprised that the Canucks are pushing that hard against the contract maximum. In terms of NCAA players, Wallinder would need to be signed by the end of the season. So, along with signing Silovs, that would get the Canucks to 50 contracts.

But, see if any of the vets get claimed off waivers. Would like to only go into the year with at most 48 contract spots used.

 

[credulous]

Then the Canucks really need to match up their home schedule with Abby to run on a 20/21 man roster for portions of the season. But, once you go on the road, you need to have the spare Dman and F with you. Can't bet that the A club can get a player to an NHL city in time as they operate more out of smaller airports at other AHL cities.

Surprised that the Canucks are pushing that hard against the contract maximum. In terms of NCAA players, Wallinder would need to be signed by the end of the season. So, along with signing Silovs, that would get the Canucks to 50 contracts.

But, see if any of the vets get claimed off waivers. Would like to only go into the year with at most 48 contract spots used.

you need waiver eligible players to do this (or you need to be willing to play guys no one is going to claim on waivers). no one projected for the canucks roster is waiver exempt**. vancouver could waive pdg, podkolzin/aman and friedman in preseason and play sasson, mueller and kudryavtsev as their three spares but this seems unlikely to me

if they can't move poolman's contract i expect they'll operate in ltir again. the cap space they can generate with the current roster just isn't significant enough to forgoe the nearly 4.5m in cap space they are sitting on if they use ltir

** except silovs, but you can't have less than two goalies on your roster so this doesn't really help much unless silovs gets a big raise)

 

[iceburg]

Quiet! If anyone notices it'll be taken away from us!

In all seriousness, this wasn't an official date. The July 5th time was mentioned by Friedman, I believe, but the Capitals have just said the website will go offline sometime during the summer.

I guess I should have kept quiet

 

[StreetHawk]

you need waiver eligible players to do this (or you need to be willing to play guys no one is going to claim on waivers). no one projected for the canucks roster is waiver exempt**. vancouver could waive pdg, podkolzin/aman and friedman in preseason and play sasson, mueller and kudryavtsev as their three spares but this seems unlikely to me

if they can't move poolman's contract i expect they'll operate in ltir again. the cap space they can generate with the current roster just isn't significant enough to forgoe the nearly 4.5m in cap space they are sitting on if they use ltir

** except silovs, but you can't have less than two goalies on your roster so this doesn't really help much unless silovs gets a big raise)

At the same time, how many clubs would be interested in using a contract slot to claim PDG for example? It would have to be guys that you are confident can clear. For Pod, his development needs to be in 1 team, not going up and down. Same with the other kids who would be on elc. Stay in 1 place and play. that is why running a bare minimum roster isn't a great idea.

 

[Vector]

That is a viable option, but 2 issues.
1) I'm again not sure what kind of meaningful upgrade you can get from sub-$4m cap hit. I don't see many top 4D or top 6F making that kind of salary. If they are, chances are they are not available, or not available for anything other than a severe overpay.
2) If they need to move Poolman back to LTIR, then there are no ways to accumulate cap space throughout the season. I was under the impression that Allvin really want to accumulate cap space so that he can load up at or near the deadline. That is obviously not priority #1, but it takes away his flexibility (which is one reason he was able to add Zadorov early and cheaply last season).

I guess they can just carry a 20-men roster and open up about $1.5m more by waiving PDG and Friedman (for example). But you are really playing with fire if the team runs into any short term injuries.

The problem with trying to accumulate capspace is you need about 1m in space to begin with to accumulate a meaningful amount. They also wouldn't able to absorb any long term injuries without placing a player on LTIR. They can't play the daily capspace game with the projected roster since no one is waiver exempt.

But really, it's whether they feel they can make a meaningful upgrade now and believe Hoglander/Podkolzin's value is at it's highest or work the cap enough to accumulate space and make multiple upgrade in-season.

 

[Just A Bit Outside]

The problem is Myers should not be in the Top 4. He should be on the bottom pairing and only move up when necessary.

But Desharnais was signed and you have Hronek on the right side.

So if Hronek stays with Hughes, what do you do? That would be the rationale for trading for a Top 4 RHD.

If the intention is to try Hronek on his own on the 2nd pair, that moves Myers down but again, what do you do? Do you try and play Desharnais with Hughes in the preseason to see if it works?

On the left side, Hughes is clearly 1st pair. I think Soucy can play Top 4 minutes but much like Myers, you want to keep that a minimum over the long haul. So to me, Soucy and Myers are connected no matter what pairing they are on.

Forbort is someone who can play but really going to depend on his health. He could start with Hronek on a 2nd pair but starts to become a 7th dman if Soucy stays with Myers and team wants to keep Hughes and Hronek together.

So to me, you have:
Hughes-Hronek/Desharnais
Forbort/Player X - Hronek/Player X
Soucy-Myers
Freidman
Juulsen

Personally think they ride it out for awhile and see how things shake out.

Depending on what happens, that will dictate whether they go after a Top 4 LHD or RHD.

 

[Nick Lang]

Tons of people want to trade him right now.

It's just roster management. You can't just keep everyone. People don't want to trade Garland, which is fair. People don't want to trade Boeser, after he finally delivered. Which is also fair. We just signed Joshua, Heinen, Blueger, and Sherwood. We have Miller, and Petterson signed long-term. We have Lekkerimaki, and Raty, plus Bains, Podkolzin, Karlsson, ect., coming up as well.

If we're playing Joshua and Garland on the third line it doesn't really make financial sense to pay a guy $2.5 - $4 mil to plug away on the fourth line if he's not scoring 25-30 on the top 2 lines.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

It's just roster management. You can't just keep everyone. People don't want to trade Garland, which is fair. People don't want to trade Boeser, after he finally delivered. Which is also fair. We just signed Joshua, Heinen, Blueger, and Sherwood. We have Miller, and Petterson signed long-term. We have Lekkerimaki, and Raty, plus Bains, Podkolzin, Karlsson, ect., coming up as well.

If we're playing Joshua and Garland on the third line it doesn't really make financial sense to pay a guy $2.5 - $4 mil to plug away on the fourth line if he's not scoring 25-30 on the top 2 lines.

I understand the exercise, but I just can't see how the team can get better value at $1.1m if you move on from him. Even if somehow he is the center piece to upgrade to Necas (for example) and Carolina for some reason accept, you are paying like at least $5.5m more this season. You can dump Poolman with a pick, carry a 21 men roster for the season, and still won't be able to fit Necas under the cap. And guess what, Necas and Hoggy scored the exact same number of goals last season, while Necas is 2 years older.

For a team as close to the cap as they are, you just aren't going to get a better "bang for bucks" than Hoglander, IMO.

As for his future pay, so much can happen this coming season, its too early to worry about it. He can either take a huge step and become a legit top 6er, and you'll feel silly dumping him early. Or he can regress, then he won't be expensive going forward and you might even move on from him. He can have a repeat season and you decide next summer what to do, I'm sure you can then send him to a rebuilding team for a pick, the Hawks and Sharks would surely take a 24 year old 20-goals scorer for a mid pick. At the end of next season, he is a RFA and we have control, so there is no need to think too far ahead.

 

[ohnoeszz]

Why does this place think Soucy is more of a top 4 than Myers? Why do you think Tochett gave Myers more minutes and responsibility? Does anyone want to say Myers wasn't good in the playoffs?

I like Soucy but he does not have the puck-handling confidence and play-reading confidence to be more than he is right now. He is a plus as a defender and a skater but relies on his teammates to establish and carry the play. He's uncomfortable jumping into the offense despite having the speed and skating to do it.

He's an excellent #5.

We might need to trade him for cap space next year to upgrade the roster.

-----

The best fitting Dman I see on the trade market is Marcus Petterson in Pitt.

He's really stepped up the last couple years on a declining team. I feel like he's quietly evolved from a solid shutdown guy into a real solid #3 that can eat 20-22 minutes.

He's also a pending UFA on a poor team that might need to consider trading him for futures. His expiring contract means we could actually fit him this year - potentially with no cap sent back if we wait until close to the deadline to make the trade.

He's Swedish so no obvious attachment to playing in the states and we tend to do well pitching the location to swedes. His next contract could potentially be fit in with a minor move or two like moving Soucy during next year's FA.

It makes a lot of sense to me to trade futures for Petterson (I would do a 1st+ but would balk at Lekk or Will) to maximize the D corps this year and swap him in for Soucy going forward.

 

[SelltheTeamFrancesco]

Defensive trade targets this season from Drance today:

Rasmus Andersson
MacKenzie Weegar
Adam Larsson
Neal Pionk
Colton Parayko

Andersson is coming off a bad season going to be interested to see how he rebounds. He played with Hanifin primarily before last season and they were very good. Last season he played with Weegar exclusively, they were okay but Weegar carried that pair and played better away from Andersson at times.

 

[Nick Lang]

I understand the exercise, but I just can't see how the team can get better value at $1.1m if you move on from him. Even if somehow he is the center piece to upgrade to Necas (for example) and Carolina for some reason accept, you are paying like at least $5.5m more this season. You can dump Poolman with a pick, carry a 21 men roster for the season, and still won't be able to fit Necas under the cap. And guess what, Necas and Hoggy scored the exact same number of goals last season, while Necas is 2 years older.

For a team as close to the cap as they are, you just aren't going to get a better "bang for bucks" than Hoglander, IMO.

As for his future pay, so much can happen this coming season, its too early to worry about it. He can either take a huge step and become a legit top 6er, and you'll feel silly dumping him early. Or he can regress, then he won't be expensive going forward and you might even move on from him. He can have a repeat season and you decide next summer what to do, I'm sure you can then send him to a rebuilding team for a pick, the Hawks and Sharks would surely take a 24 year old 20-goals scorer for a mid pick. At the end of next season, he is a RFA and we have control, so there is no need to think too far ahead.

I get what you're saying and I agree ... we're not likely getting any better value this season than he is currently providing. The problems I see are in future roster construction. One problem is falling into the Benning trap of just acquiring/holding onto players who in isolation are good players for their cap hit, but have no defined role on the team, and just end up wasting cap space. It's not the stock market, there are a limited number of roster spots available.

The second problem is I think he becomes virtually worthless if you keep him until next summer. Especially if his goal totals regress his arbitration including last seasons statistics likely still nets him a decent contract, which no one will want any part of, including us. Besides his shooting %, he's not likely going to get the same opportunities in the top 6 with 3 new winger additions on the team, and it'll be tough for the team to repeat it's hot start as well. It doesn't seem likely he'll repeat his goal totals (but hey who knows).

In that sense I would have no problem keeping him for the year and hope he can repeat his performance on the fourth line. Then just walk away next summer. I am of the mind that it doesn't pay to roster players for a whole season as a form of currency simply to hope for a fourth round pick in return a year later. If management doesn't see him in future plans it might be wise to trade him while his value is the highest, or at least at the deadline for an upgrade or team need.

On most teams this is the exact type of player you want developing on your third line ... but our third line is occupied by Joshua and Garland and we're in competitive mode, so that's a significant issue as well.

 

[krutovsdonut]

It really is that bad...

In the last 20 years the Canucks have drafted 19 players (out of 126 picks) who have since played more than 100 games in the NHL. These 19 players are:

Podkolzin
Hoglander
Hughes
Pettersson
Gadjovich
Boeser
Gaudette
Virtanen
McCann
Demko
Forsling
Horvat
Gaunce
Hutton
Schroeder
Connauton
Hodgson
Grabner
Raymond

Now it's fair to say that 2 to 4 players out of the last 3 drafts should go on to play more than 100. But it's also fair to say that 4 to 5 of the 19 were/are fringe NHLers at best. In other words, in the last 20 years the team has a hit rate of a little over 10% over all rounds. And that comes while drafting 7 times in the top 10 (excluding 2005).

To assure myself that I wasn't just being overly negative I compared with 10 teams at random.

Edmonton 33 drafted players played more than 100 games in NHL
Pittsburgh 30
Washington 32
Montreal 28
Toronto 33
Carolina 36
Florida 29
Los Angeles 43
Anaheim 37
Dallas 31

This is an average of 33 over a range of 28 to 43.

To be clear, I am really hopeful that the current management is committed to drafting and developing players, even though it does feel like draft picks still get traded too easily. As others have said, drafting and developing is the most effective way to have sustained success. Even if that means trading younger players from a position of strength when the team is in a position to win now. But also with a mindset to have a minimum number of roster spots allocated to players on elcs so they can afford to pay and retain more established higher end players on contracts close to market value.

there's a thread in the draft forum where you have to make the best current roster you can using draft picks of a team that have played at least 1 nhl game. it's pretty sobering, although being allowed to include ufas who were signed to an elc helps quite a bit.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

I get what you're saying and I agree ... we're not likely getting any better value this season than he is currently providing. The problems I see are in future roster construction. One problem is falling into the Benning trap of just acquiring/holding onto players who in isolation are good players for their cap hit, but have no defined role on the team, and just end up wasting cap space. It's not the stock market, there are a limited number of roster spots available.

The second problem is I think he becomes virtually worthless if you keep him until next summer. Especially if his goal totals regress his arbitration including last seasons statistics likely still nets him a decent contract, which no one will want any part of, including us. Besides his shooting %, he's not likely going to get the same opportunities in the top 6 with 3 new winger additions on the team, and it'll be tough for the team to repeat it's hot start as well. It doesn't seem likely he'll repeat his goal totals (but hey who knows).

In that sense I would have no problem keeping him for the year and hope he can repeat his performance on the fourth line. Then just walk away next summer. I am of the mind that it doesn't pay to roster players for a whole season as a form of currency simply to hope for a fourth round pick in return a year later. If management doesn't see him in future plans it might be wise to trade him while his value is the highest, or at least at the deadline for an upgrade or team need.

On most teams this is the exact type of player you want developing on your third line ... but our third line is occupied by Joshua and Garland and we're in competitive mode, so that's a significant issue as well.

First point. I'm not sure which player(s) you are referring to? Very few players Benning acquired are "good players for their cap hit". Maybe Motte? But he does have a defined role. Vrbata? He also has a defined role. Can't really think of any other "good players for their cap hit".

Second point. Chicago was so desperate they traded us a pick for a pending UFA Beauvillier, who carried a $4m cap hit and somehow managed only 2 goals in 22 games with us prior to the trade. SJ's top goal scorer and top point getter on their starting lineup are both 32 years old. I'm sure either one of them will trade a 3rd or something for Hog next summer, and those are just the first 2 teams that popped into my head. Washington, Montreal, Boston, etc can all use a 24 year old that can score 15-20 goals from their bottom 6, just quickly glancing at their roster on Dailyfaceoff.com right now. And what is his trade value right now "at his peak" anyways? I read in the previous pages that we might get a 2nd for him, so do we really lose much value waiting 1 year? Most people want to include him as a piece for an upgrade, but we already established that for this season, we can't really get a better "bang for bucks" player. Might as well just use him as a self-rental and reassess next summer.

As for future roster construction, I think maybe you guys are much more optimistic about our prospects than I am. I don't see any of Pod, Bains, Sasson, Raty, etc ever scoring 20 even strength goals from 4th line deployments and PP2 time. I don't even see any of them being NHL regular at this point, although I sure hope they prove me wrong! Aside from Lekk, we don't really have any young, offensive players coming up. I don't think we can risk losing the only proven one we have, at least not until we absolutely have to.

 

[sting101]

This team absolutely should be running a minimum roster to gain cap space...who are we afraid of losing?

 

[TruGr1t]

This team absolutely should be running a minimum roster to gain cap space...who are we afraid of losing?

They don't even need to run a minimum roster, they just need to send two of PDG, Aman, Friedman, Juulsen down, as well as Patera once Silovs contract is finalized. I'd expect PDG and Friedman to be on waivers relatively quickly. I suppose if they want to add a $4M+ player and dip into LTIR they could send them all down, but I don't view that as particularly likely.

Conversely, our cap space is literally the predicted difference between Silovs and Patera's salaries, so they could carry them all, remain out of LTIR and just carry one goalie. As long as Silovs makes ~$1M AAV. I think they'll have issues with roster limit, though, so probably one guy will get waived. Probably Friedman.

I suspect all that will happen is sign Silovs, waive Friedman, and go into camp with the basically current roster. Only wildcard is if they find some way to move Poolman's salary.