Grub's Canucks & NHL News, Rumours, and & Fantasy GM | The Boys of Summer

[Vector]

Vegas is the cream of the crop for me. Hanifin/Theodore/Pietrangelo is a strong top 3, Korczak looks like he will be a good one, McNabb and Whitecloud are probably top-4 defenders on most teams, and Hague and Hutton are reasonably regular NHLers. Washington is up there though. Carolina’s D looks strong 1-6 and New Jersey could be in the conversation if their young defenders progress.

Agreed but I already know what I am getting with the Golden Knights. I was more just surprised with how good the Capitals now look with Chychrun and Roy. Hurricanes should still be good but I think that's a step back from last season and much shorter. New Jersey should be better but need their new guys to gel and the young guys to develop.

 

[Diamonddog01]

for me this team still sorely lacks another top 6 forward and a top 4 defender. they have a lot of guys who are okay or alright filling in there for a while but not a lot of guys you look at and say yeah that guy needs to be in the top 6/top 4

Hmm I would agree they need another top 4 defender but I think you're being a tad unrealistic regarding the forward group. Very, very few teams have 6 actual top 6 forwards in their top 6. Florida as an example had Bennett and Rodrigues on their second line - I think they are both better players than Heinen and Sprong in particular but the production is similar. Plus Vancouver has Garland on the third line, who outproduced all of those players. But like I said, here's to hoping they can acquire another top 4 LD puck mover at some point for a reasonable price.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

All I know is the roster right now looks better, at least on paper, than the roster going into last season, and we won our division last season. I'm optimistic about our chances this year. Of course an injury to a key player can change everything, but we still won the division even though we lost Demko for awhile last season and have Petey playing injured for half the year, so things aren't so dire. We have 2 1C and a lot of players that can play up and down the line up, so we should be fine there. Goaltending is solid but our system is so good that we don't have to rely on A+ goaltending to win. The only player I say will cripple us if injured is Hughes, but overall I think we have a pretty deep team top to bottom.

 

[Phrasing]

Your opinions on Myers being a bottom pairing defenseman, and Forbert a seventh defenseman in the nhl, are both bad and wrong by basically every possible perspective. Both have proven abilities to handle tough minutes when healthy.
Forbert (+ Desharnais) coming into a better system/coaching will have an impact, likely the same impact we saw it have on Myers, just a few months ago.

Relatedly, the opinions our defense "badly needs" another top four, or pmd, are also bad. Every team in the league would like to add another top4D, but who and at what cost/cap?
Our current top twelve fwds, six defenseman, and goalie are solid, easily top ten if not five.

Still have time, assets, flexibility and cap space to make improvements if the opportunities arise, so I really don't see cause for complaints and would prefet someone with some to explain in detail their reasoning and solutions.

How could/can they have done better?
Just dropping myers sucks, Forbert sucks worse/ahler and team badly needs another top four dman with absolutely zero support or solution is pretty useless.

I’m not sure I care that you think my opinion on Myers and Forbert are wrong. I think you’re overrating both. Myers spot duty in top 4 is good depth, but for deployment purposes I view him as bottom pairing based on the entirety of his performance with this team and his age as well. No I don’t believe every player that comes into this system will some how be better. I hope they will be, but it wasn’t the case for every Canuck last year.

I agree Canucks have time to fix and make the situation ideal if and when the opportunity arises, which I hope it does.

How could they have done better? How do I know? I’m not criticizing the management, just my opinion the current weakness that should be addressed as the first priority. I’m not sure where you get the rest of the made up opinions like Forbert is an Ahler.

 

[credulous]

Hmm I would agree they need another top 4 defender but I think you're being a tad unrealistic regarding the forward group. Very, very few teams have 6 actual top 6 forwards in their top 6. Florida as an example had Bennett and Rodrigues on their second line - I think they are both better players than Heinen and Sprong in particular but the production is similar. Plus Vancouver has Garland on the third line, who outproduced all of those players. But like I said, here's to hoping they can acquire another top 4 LD puck mover at some point for a reasonable price.

i'm not asking for six top six forwards i'm asking for 4 or 5. miller, pettersson and boeser are all good. debrusk is probably fine but i have some concerns. then you're looking at like hoglander or joshua or heinen as the last two and that's just not good enough imo

 

[Diamonddog01]

i'm not asking for six top six forwards i'm asking for 4 or 5. miller, pettersson and boeser are all good. debrusk is probably fine but i have some concerns. then you're looking at like hoglander or joshua or heinen as the last two and that's just not good enough imo

I'd argue that Petterson, Miller, Boeser and DeBrusk are all top 6 forwards. So there is 4, and then Garland produces like one in limited minutes. So 4.5? There aren't many teams who have 5, let alone 6.

You say it's not good enough but personally I like the way our forward group stacks up against most of the league. Defense is another story...

 

[wonton15]

Joshua Blueger Garland play collectively like 80% of a top 6 line. That’s what sets us apart from most teams, and shouldn’t be understated. We do have a pretty deep top 9. Pettersson Miller Boeser DeBrusk is fine (for now) as your top 6 staples when you can follow that up with JoshuaGarland, HoglanderSuter, HeinenSherwood filling in the other time on ice gaps.

The deficiencies up front are being slightly overstated especially when we know a trade is inevitable. We are veering towards Dallas level depth up front.

 

[ziploc]

Has it been mentioned that Sprong is taking Zadorov's old 91?

 

[dbaz]

im getting my tin foil hat on...
the team prefers podz over hoglander because hes defensively responsible, tocchet took him under his wing. jt and podz have a good relationship and like to play together. hoglander is also an upcoming rfa.
thus they trade him with poolman. allowing us to sign kylington
suter, aman, sprong can all move around the line up if heinen/podz go cold

debrusk - pettersson - heinen
podz - miller - boeser
joshua - bleuger - garland
shewood - suter - sprong
ex aman, giuseppe

hughes- hronek
soucy - myers
kylington - desharnais
forbort - juulsen

 

[rypper]

I don't think Tocchet has any kind of preference when it comes to Pod or Hogz.

 

[SopelFanThe3rd]

I don't think Tocchet has any kind of preference when it comes to Pod or Hogz.

I'd say judging by playing time it's clearly Hog lol.

 

[rypper]

I think he'd walk away from both in a second.

 

[CanucksMJL]

I think the biggest issue with the perception of the forward group is EP. Recency bias and lingering issues like the falling down problem have folks justifiably worried. However if EP comes back better than ever as he should our forward core is potentially truly elite. There is so much talk about finding the right wingers to unlock EP when the truth IMO is he is good enough to elevate anyone he's paired with. If he shits the bed then it's all for not anyhow. Personally I can't wait to see what we have and I expect to see the best version of EP and as a matter of course a dominant offensive powerhouse team.

 

[Baby Pettersson]

Not worried about Pete at all. I remember when he had a "bad" season not to long ago and the following season he came out playing like a man possessed.

Think we have to just get used to the ups and downs. Fortunately he's about to be on the upswing.

 

[valkynax]

Not worried about Pete at all. I remember when he had a "bad" season not to long ago and the following season he came out playing like a man possessed.

Think we have to just get used to the ups and downs. Fortunately he's about to be on the upswing.

Same, not concerned at all. Pete himself should know VERY well that if his play starts dropping off, he'll be focused on immediately - injury should have healed more or less, and now he has better linemates to play with, and his contract laid down the standards for which he should be playing at.

If he does not even know that, then he has no business playing professional hockey at any level.

 

[rypper]

I'm not worried about Pettersson at all. Even in an off year he still had 89 points in 82 games. Him posing 82 games is pretty big to go with that 89 points.

And he tailed off but still had 36 points in the second half.

 

[LemonSauceD]

I just don’t see Hoglander sticking around after training camp.

His 24 goals were a result of a lot and I mean a lot going right for him. Tap ins, fortunate bounces, some brilliant Pettersson plays even if they were not the greatest together, and of course, a high shooting percentage.

But when you look at his other traits. He’s not good defensively, he’s undersized and gets bullied a lot even if he’s naturally stocky and built for size. He has no sort of structure, he doesn’t drive play, generally poor at puck control which is why he’s terrible on the PP, poor on the transition, and his decision making at times is AHL caliber. He can forecheck and cause havoc (at times looked ineffective tbh) for sure, but doesn’t really possess much of a boards game.

Forget Sprong, having Heinen on the team that can do many of those things above pretty well with even more pace makes Hoglander expendable.

 

[LemonSauceD]

To add to that, I think Podkolzin is someone we should 100% focus on getting most out of. He’s already got the size, speed, and physicality and has the same kind of motor Hoglander has. He may not have the same offensive instincts Hoglander possess, but to me Podkolzin has everything you kind of want in your line up. Like a Jannik Hansen or more recent times a Yakov Trenin. These types have considerably more value than Hoglander types.

A year of playing on the 4th line with the occasional boost and have him develop into an everyday NHL player. 70 hits in 19 games is crazy work.

A 4th line of Podkolzin-Suter-Sherwood is going to be a bitch to play against.

 

[David71]

the forwards are deeper more options for the coaching staff to mix and match players in case miller/petterson goes down. the other guys can step up for the time being. THE DEFENSE IS the biggest questionmark of them all. IF one of hughes/hronek is out. your really playing with fire.. next up myers soucy,forbort,deharnais/friedman/juulsen. reminded me of the the many years ago when dave nonis was gm and he had at least 3/4 regulars out and got weinrich/carney and others to bandage it... it was soo bad.
March 9th, 2006: (In five separate trades) Canucks acquired Eric Weinrich, Sean Brown, Juha Allen, Keith Carney, Mika Noronen, and fourth-round pick…


…in exchange for two second-round picks, a third-round pick, a fourth-round pick, Brett Skinner, and Tomas Mojzis


There isn’t one deadline deal that stands out as the worst, but Dave Nonis’s work at the 2006 trade deadline has to be considered an absolute bust.


Nonis gave up four draft picks and made a league-leading five separate trades to acquire veteran defencemen Eric Weinrich, Keith Carney, and Sean Brown, along with backup goaltender Mika Noronen.

 

[biturbo19]

Yeah. Even without the Sprong signing (which doesn't do a lot for me tbh), i'm not that worried about the Forward group. There's enough there to field a good duo on each line, and enough floaters to fill in the blanks. It's not perfect, but it's fine. Especially if someone like Podkolzin comes to play.

If Podkolzin can get on a run of confidence, he's easily got the potential to be one of, if not the best of our "floaters". His size and puck protection ability when he's "on" could really flesh out whichever line he lands on. Imagine if we get a more "seasoned" and prepared and physical version of "rookie Podz". I think that's easily a 15-20G - 35-40Pts winger, who unlike Hogz with that kind of production, actually plays the sort of game to complement and enhance a line as that puck possession "3rd wheel".

But even if not...i think the Forward group is plenty "good enough". For now at least. As much as another bonafide Top-6 Scorer would be swell...cap constraints and priorities dictate it's not the biggest priority.



It's really the defence that is still...yikes. But it does look like they might just be intent on trying to ride it out 'til the deadline where they can patch it and have their cap dollars go just a little bit further to get a bigger upgrade. Could get ugly, especially if there's injuries. Have to lean on some young guys overperforming in call-ups or something. But this is clearly the track they've decided to take.

 

[TruGr1t]

Didn’t see it anywhere, but Dhaliwal was on SN650 morning yesterday, and said the defenseman he’s asked most often about are Kylington and Barrie, and the Canucks have shown no interest in either thus far.

 

[Phrasing]

Didn’t see it anywhere, but Dhaliwal was on SN650 morning yesterday, and said the defenseman he’s asked most often about are Kylington and Barrie, and the Canucks have shown no interest in either thus far.

I don't think they are the answers either.

 

[SopelFanThe3rd]

Didn’t see it anywhere, but Dhaliwal was on SN650 morning yesterday, and said the defenseman he’s asked most often about are Kylington and Barrie, and the Canucks have shown no interest in either thus far.

Thank God on Barrie.



Are the Canucks able to carry 3 extra forwards and 2 extra D or are they over the cap that way? Like maybe they don't need to waive Friedman, PDG or Aman?

 

[supercanuck]

We need the 100 pt version of EP this year, as I don't think JT/Brock will both be shooting 19+% again, and EP/Debrusk will need to make up some of that slack. The Canuck fan in me also worries that the Garland/Joshua combo will just lose all their magic once the new season starts.

 

[Vector]

Didn’t see it anywhere, but Dhaliwal was on SN650 morning yesterday, and said the defenseman he’s asked most often about are Kylington and Barrie, and the Canucks have shown no interest in either thus far.

He’s mostly just mentioned it in reply tweets.