Management Thread | The Song Remains the Same Edition

[credulous]

SJS and Ana are in very different cycles. Anaheim, if Zegras is on a 100 pt trajectory and is on his 2nd contract, Anaheim would definitely be not tanking anymore. SJS is old as shit and Meier and Hertl are nowhere close to what Petterson is. They tried to build around them and they found out that shit ain’t going work because they aren’t players you build your franchise around. It’s not like they can build around EK who is like 32.

You keep talking about how we lack depth, yes you are right but depth is relatively easier to acquire than a PPG dman and 100pt Center. There are like 5ppg dman and around 10 100 pt players in the whole league. You don’t simply tank and magically find them.

And the point about finding 4-5 more players that are on Petey and Hughes level. Wtf are you smoking? You think we can find like 4-5 PPG/100 point player? Like Colorado was the best last year and they have like 3 guys in that caliber. Tampa was the best prior and they didn’t have like 4 guys at that level.

Elite guys are hard as f*** to acquire, depth pieces are easier to acquire. You are severely underplaying how valuable our 1C and 1D are and basically saying oh we don’t have the enough 2Ws and 3C/W and D so let’s blow it all up. Like 2nd, 3rd line guys, 2nd paring guys are traded and signed in FA every year. 1C and 1D are never in play. The only time it’s in play is when he needs a major neck surgery that freaks owners out.

i don't think this is true. you're right that elite players are hard to acquire but the next level of players the maybe not elite but still very good are extremely hard to acquire. colorado didn't win with mackinnon and makar. they won with those guys plus rantanen, kadri, landeskog, lehkonen, burakovsky, nichushkin, compher, toews, byram, johnson and manson. what does vancouver have that compares to that list? miller, horvat, kuzmenko and maybe bear and garland on their very best days? how do you address that?

rantanen was a top 10 pick, kadri cost them barrie and kerfoot at their peaks, landeskog was a second overall, lehkonen cost them a second and a top prospect, byram was part of the duchense return and compher part of the o'reilly return. burakovsky, toews and manson cost them 4 seconds and a third. erik johnson they acquired a decade ago for a top player at the time. only nichushkin was a free agent and he's considered probably the best free agent pickup of the last five years

you can repeat this exercise for basically every good team in the league. the only one that wasn't built through giving up substantial assets to get good to great players is seattle and vancouver doesn't have the luxury of an expansion draft to get the 7th best player from every team in the league

not only do vancouver not have the depth they need or the assets they would need to trade for that depth but they have to do this with over 25 million in bad money on their books (oel, myers, boeser, poolman, pearson). it's pure fantasy to think this team can be turned around quickly. they'll need multiple years of draft picks, at least a few absolute homerun trades and more success in finding bargains in free agency than any team has experienced in over a decade just to get to respectable. they could do all that and still come up short if they make just one mistake like signing another contract like the myers contract

if it's so easy to build a contender around 2 good players why have edmonton been such a disaster? what's wrong with the predators? are josi, ekholm, forsberg and saaros secretly bad? is barkov, tkachuk and ekblad a bad core? matthews, marner, tavares and nylander not good enough?

 

[Cancuks]

I wish a reporter would ask Rutherford and his puppet why they are so desperate to unload cap this summer.

When they talk about buying out players they have realized they can't move I'm almost certain they're referring to Myers, OEL and possibly Garland.

I doubt they buy out Boeser because they were the ones who overpaid him and that won't sit well with Blueberries. Poolman and perhaps Pearson now stay on injured reserve so we don't need to worry about them. Buying out OEL is almost a given but Myers is just stupid as he will only be owed $1 million after July 1 which a spent thrift team would love to take on to reach the floor and then flip at the deadline for picks.

Buying out Garland is also a bad idea because the team should be able to retain perhaps a million on his contract and at that price he has value.

Rutherford already said JT's mega contract won't hurt in the long run. They have more than enough cap space to re-sign Kuzmenko once Horvat is traded. So what's the desperation?

Well it can only be one thing.... to sign more bad contracts! Considering this summer is one of the weakest free agent crops in a long time, I wonder who has caught Jim Benning... I mean Rutherford's eye.

Severson? Klingberg? Dumba?

Who do you think they'll chase to try and complete this "major surgery?"

 

[Frankie Blueberries]

actually i do think he has involved himself in specific player decisions repeatedly if not habitually, but i can only prove it in limited cases.

but obviously it's more important that i think he sets a lot of parameters for team direction and spending that leads to them trying to do things, and also to having money burning a hole in their pocket with orders to do something with it every july and high expectations from the boss to deliver.

the line is also blurry between direction and players. like i said, i really want to know who decided marky, stecher and tanev all had to go. it's very hard for me to believe that was allowed to happened unless it was aquaman's idea, and it's harder to believe benning kept his job after the next season if it was benning's idea given the way it turned out. it just has aquaman bold move written all over it for me as do some other moves that should have gotten benning fired.

anyway, i will check in again in a year or two to see how you feel about aquaman's level of involvememt

Your argument really just hinges on speculation of Aquilini’s involvement which neither of us will ever really know, so it seems pointless to debate. Both Gillis and PA (so far) have been better with pro scouting acquisitions, so it’s not entirely Aquilini’s fault for Benning’s terrible run. You also had Weisbrod pushing for crappy players like Granlund. That management group sucked, and I see you have called Benning “average” in the past, so let’s just agree to disagree lol.

 

[theguardianII]

it is a fact that gillis pro-scouting wanted to trade for gubranson and sutter. it's also a fact they completely failed to sustain or replenish the 2011 team with moves after that date.

which is why you just cited 5 trades that took place before the scf, which is 3 years before benning was hired.

canucks pro-scouting failed to make a single meaningful help now player acquisition by trade or signing after the scf when the team desperately needed them until gillis was fired. that core just withered away as marco sturm, sammy pahlson, david booth, derek roy and jason garrison skated by, signifying nothing. the kassian trade i understand but it didn't help, and even the luongo trade as a last gasp produced markstrom as a project who would need sheltering for 3 years to be ready.


lol

It would have made much more sense to trade for a #3 overall draft pick at 18 yrs old that had not played a game. He would have been n unproven top player that would have fit with the top level defence the Canucks had at the time to mentor him. Likely would have made him a better player.

Trade for Sutter, okay again Sutter at 21 yrs old was a different player than 5 years later

marco sturm, sammy pahlson, david booth, derek roy and jason garrison
Vey, Etem, Pouliot, Baertschi, Schmidt, Clendening, Larsen

Did Markstrom require sheltering or was it just Miller was an old Benning scouting product and buddy from Buffalo?
And 3 years? Markstrom had almost the same save % as Miller his second year,
Miller was Benning's choice for the #1 job making 6 million there never was going to be any competition for the spot, as a matter of fact no player ever earned a spot on the Canucks under Benning, the roster was set by the cap hit.

I really don't get your position on this, it is almost like you are on Gillis side mentioning these players. Considering the time when you propose he was looking.

 

[Canucks LB]

This is the best post you will see all year

 

[theguardianII]

When they talk about buying out players they have realized they can't move I'm almost certain they're referring to Myers, OEL and possibly Garland.

A Myers buyout would be ridiculous after July 1 his salary is only 1 million for his last year a buyout keeps a 5.34 mil cap hit year one and 333K year two and takes up a buyout spot, the same with OEL a buyout last 8 more years with nothing coming back.
Garland does make sense because the cap hit is so small 800K to 1.8 mil cap hits

Boeser might make sense, no actually any buyout is stupid when the team could retain salary, get something back and create cap space via the retention.

I wish a reporter would ask Rutherford and his puppet why they are so desperate to unload cap this summer

They are desperate to get cap space, Pettersson. Demko, Hoglander, Podkolzin, Rutherford's choice replacement for Horvat, Dobson , the loss of Ferland's LTIR, trade possibilities, Kuzmenko's 7 million , Jiriek

 

[arttk]

i don't think this is true. you're right that elite players are hard to acquire but the next level of players the maybe not elite but still very good are extremely hard to acquire. colorado didn't win with mackinnon and makar. they won with those guys plus rantanen, kadri, landeskog, lehkonen, burakovsky, nichushkin, compher, toews, byram, johnson and manson. what does vancouver have that compares to that list? miller, horvat, kuzmenko and maybe bear and garland on their very best days? how do you address that?

rantanen was a top 10 pick, kadri cost them barrie and kerfoot at their peaks, landeskog was a second overall, lehkonen cost them a second and a top prospect, byram was part of the duchense return and compher part of the o'reilly return. burakovsky, toews and manson cost them 4 seconds and a third. erik johnson they acquired a decade ago for a top player at the time. only nichushkin was a free agent and he's considered probably the best free agent pickup of the last five years

you can repeat this exercise for basically every good team in the league. the only one that wasn't built through giving up substantial assets to get good to great players is seattle and vancouver doesn't have the luxury of an expansion draft to get the 7th best player from every team in the league

not only do vancouver not have the depth they need or the assets they would need to trade for that depth but they have to do this with over 25 million in bad money on their books (oel, myers, boeser, poolman, pearson). it's pure fantasy to think this team can be turned around quickly. they'll need multiple years of draft picks, at least a few absolute homerun trades and more success in finding bargains in free agency than any team has experienced in over a decade just to get to respectable. they could do all that and still come up short if they make just one mistake like signing another contract like the myers contract

if it's so easy to build a contender around 2 good players why have edmonton been such a disaster? what's wrong with the predators? are josi, ekholm, forsberg and saaros secretly bad? is barkov, tkachuk and ekblad a bad core? matthews, marner, tavares and nylander not good enough?

Colorado never had a state where they only had Mack and Makar. Hell they tanked with Mack, Rantanen and Landeskog. You don’t see them going all rebuild when that happened, they just sold some guys off and did a retool.
Nichuskin was signed as a reclamation project after scoring like 10 points in a season with Dallas and even then it took him 3 seasons to blow up with the Avs. You are trying to argue elite players are hard to argue and at the same time listed out how the Avs were able to do it via trades. So yeah it seems like you answered the question of well how hard is it to actually acquire those pieces. Do you realize that the elite pieces, Rantanen, Mack, Makar weren’t simply acquired by trades? And all the pieces you listed took time to acquire. It’s not like anybody is saying we need to be like the Avs next year!!!!! It’s like ok, we have a somewhat equivalent to Mack, Rantanen, Makar, obviously not as elite but it’s probably as close as you can get and we have the better goalie. It’s a base to build from.

So do you think Florida, Toronto should rebuild now? Is that what you are arguing? Winning is hard, let’s just tear shit down and rebuild when you can’t win enough.

Nashville doesn’t have a true 1C and their core is old as f*** now. They are in a completely different cycle. I don’t even know why you would include them in this convo. Yeah let’s compare our core who is 24 and 23 with a team where the whole core is like 30+ and starting to decline.

This goes back to, what the hell are we missing that is so hard to get that we need to tank? We don’t have enough 2nd paring D, 2nd line wingers and centers so we should rebuild to get them?

 

[rypper]

and takes up a buyout spot

There's no limit on buyouts. There is on retention spots however.

 

[RobertKron]

Colorado never had a state where they only had Mack and Makar. Hell they tanked with Mack, Rantanen and Landeskog. You don’t see them going all rebuild when that happened, they just sold some guys off and did a retool.
Nichuskin was signed as a reclamation project after scoring like 10 points in a season with Dallas and even then it took him 3 seasons to blow up with the Avs. You are trying to argue elite players are hard to argue and at the same time listed out how the Avs were able to do it via trades. So yeah it seems like you answered the question of well how hard is it to actually acquire those pieces. Do you realize that the elite pieces, Rantanen, Mack, Makar weren’t simply acquired by trades? And all the pieces you listed took time to acquire. It’s not like anybody is saying we need to be like the Avs next year!!!!! It’s like ok, we have a somewhat equivalent to Mack, Rantanen, Makar, obviously not as elite but it’s probably as close as you can get and we have the better goalie. It’s a base to build from.

So do you think Florida, Toronto should rebuild now? Is that what you are arguing? Winning is hard, let’s just tear shit down and rebuild when you can’t win enough.

Nashville doesn’t have a true 1C and their core is old as f*** now. They are in a completely different cycle. I don’t even know why you would include them in this convo. Yeah let’s compare our core who is 24 and 23 with a team where the whole core is like 30+ and starting to decline.

This goes back to, what the hell are we missing that is so hard to get that we need to tank? We don’t have enough 2nd paring D, 2nd line wingers and centers so we should rebuild to get them?

The problem for the Canucks is that they need to turn over like a third to half the roster, move out terrible contracts to free up cap space, replenish their prospect pipeline, sign significant UFAs to fill major roster holes, etc. and usually doing each of those things requires borrowing from one of those other areas to achieve it.

They basically don't have any significant position of strength from which they can draw to bolster the deficient areas. Like, it'd be one thing if they had a surplus of decent prospects to move or to enable them to be okay moving a number of picks, or a lot of cap space to take on bad contracts, or a logjam of young roster players at centre or D to move for excess help elsewhere. But, unfortunately, they're tight on the cap, have a lot of bad contracts, have almost no prospects of any realistic appeal, and they don't have many pieces to move in real no-brainer win deals that don't leave significant holes in their absence.

 

[arttk]

The problem for the Canucks is that they need to turn over like a third to half the roster, move out terrible contracts to free up cap space, replenish their prospect pipeline, sign significant UFAs to fill major roster holes, etc. and usually doing each of those things requires borrowing from one of those other areas to achieve it.

They basically don't have any position of strength from which they can draw to bolster the deficient areas.

Well we need to be more exact than just “a third of the roster”.

It’s different if that third includes a new 1st line vs a new 3rd line. Or a whole new 1st paring vs a new 2nd paring.

Yeah they will need to get rid of a bunch of players and we will see if they are able to do that.

With us tanking hard right now, I think we are actually in a better spot. If we can stay in the top10, I think we will get a very good center, hopefully a 2nd C or a 1stC stuck behind Petey. Bo’s return is going to be key as well, if he can return a top4 D then the amount of pieces we need to fill will be significantly less.

We have a 1st line right now with Mik, Petey and Kuz. Miller is a 2nd line driver and we’ll see if we need to bring in a 2C to pair with him or we only need really good defensive wingers. If it’s the latter then it is going to be way easier to acquire. We need a 3C bad and that’s pretty much it.
If Bo can return a top4D then we “only” need to get 1 more D because OEL is immoveable.

 

[RobertKron]

Well we need to be more exact than just “a third of the roster”.

It’s different if that third includes a new 1st line vs a new 3rd line. Or a whole new 1st paring vs a new 2nd paring.

Yeah they will need to get rid of a bunch of players and we will see if they are able to do that.

With us tanking hard right now, I think we are actually in a better spot. If we can stay in the top10, I think we will get a very good center, hopefully a 2nd C or a 1stC stuck behind Petey. Bo’s return is going to be key as well, if he can return a top4 D then the amount of pieces we need to fill will be significantly less.

We have a 1st line right now with Mik, Petey and Kuz. Miller is a 2nd line driver and we’ll see if we need to bring in a 2C to pair with him or we only need really good defensive wingers. If it’s the latter then it is going to be way easier to acquire. We need a 3C bad and that’s pretty much it.
If Bo can return a top4D then we “only” need to get 1 more D because OEL is immoveable.

How much money do you think that Kuzmenko, this top4 D, 3C, and really good defensive wingers will cost?

 

[SeawaterOnIce]

Still cannot get over the fact that this management group seemingly added nearly $20 million dollars in Mikaylev, Boeser and Miller last summer. 3 middle 6 wingers locked up.

They proceeded to offer their captain and centerman under 6 million last summer. Really? Come on.

 

[gringo]

I wish a reporter would ask Rutherford and his puppet why they are so desperate to unload cap this summer.

When they talk about buying out players they have realized they can't move I'm almost certain they're referring to Myers, OEL and possibly Garland.

I doubt they buy out Boeser because they were the ones who overpaid him and that won't sit well with Blueberries. Poolman and perhaps Pearson now stay on injured reserve so we don't need to worry about them. Buying out OEL is almost a given but Myers is just stupid as he will only be owed $1 million after July 1 which a spent thrift team would love to take on to reach the floor and then flip at the deadline for picks.

Buying out Garland is also a bad idea because the team should be able to retain perhaps a million on his contract and at that price he has value.

Rutherford already said JT's mega contract won't hurt in the long run. They have more than enough cap space to re-sign Kuzmenko once Horvat is traded. So what's the desperation?

Well it can only be one thing.... to sign more bad contracts! Considering this summer is one of the weakest free agent crops in a long time, I wonder who has caught Jim Benning... I mean Rutherford's eye.

Severson? Klingberg? Dumba?

Who do you think they'll chase to try and complete this "major surgery?"

Because having players like OEL on your squad hurts the team building aspect. It hurts the effort, and team toughness they are trying to build. There’s no f***in way we can carry OELs contract until it expires.

OEL is not the kind of player you want when you’re trying to change the culture.

 

[rypper]

Canucks will refuse to pay Horvat and trade him, only to sign someone equally (or more!) expensive in free agency.

 

[theguardianII]

Tanking is not just for rebuilding it is often for a quick retool and adding depth.

Trades are starting and will only increase.

Horvat looked and played like there was something on his mind, like he got some bad news. Maybe his agent called with a massive offer from the Canucks and he is conflicted because the amount will be publicized and he is a nice guy and doesn't want to be hated in the market when he rejects to play for a cup sooner than 1 one year.

These pressers sometimes have little gems in them, all year management has stated they know how much they have to offer Bo, so would that not mean they know how much other player's contract might cost already? Information "you won't know"?

So now with the third coach and his blast of how bad the team is, that is what major work means and calling the team soft.

DEFENCE! - Make a trade with Columbus and get Jirieck a young stud, make the trade happen with NYI for Dobson or Romanov, make a deal with the NYR for Miller or Schnieder. Get some NAME dmen, young, big with attitude.

NYI need a veteran center that can score, Miller would be perfect for them because they are a veteran team with solid leadership that would keep Miller in his place. Even if it was retaining 1 mil and/or adding a late pick and/or Rathbone.

Columbus could use Horvat, they are pretty good on defence already without Jirieck and in a win now window. Horvat for Jirieck and a pick or Rathbone

New York Rangers, all teams want more scoring, Garland with retention for either young dman, maybe add another late round pick and/or retention.

Minnesota could take a chance on Boeser a Brackett pick. Boeser for Greenway with some retention if needed. Have to take some salary back from this team.

Promote Hoglander, Podkolzin, Wolanin, or any number of the higher scoring AHL team.

Apart from Miller any retention ends within 4 years. And the cap going up should take care of that. Younger players cost less so cap savings there as well.

I wonder if or how many fans have noted that the defensive trouble with the Canucks started when Hughes made the team? Almost from day one the GA increased. Not all his fault but he does make it harder on the forwards and his D partner.

Canucks should start pressuring teams to make trades before the standings create more teams trading away player, eliminate the competition or trade while the competition is less.

The market stir for any team getting Horvat would be enhanced if the deal is made before the Allstar game IMO.

If the Islanders got just 1/2 a goal more per game they have a real chance to make the playoffs and they are a playoff team if they can get there.

Two types of teams the easy season, regular season and the second season, the playoffs. Tampa for years was a regular season team then they toughened up

 

[credulous]

This goes back to, what the hell are we missing that is so hard to get that we need to tank? We don’t have enough 2nd paring D, 2nd line wingers and centers so we should rebuild to get them?

i think i laid it out pretty clearly? the canucks don't have enough good players and don't have the means to get enough good players in a short timeline. it's really three things:

you need a large amount of really good players to contend in the nhl. it's not as simple as getting a couple elite pieces and then filling in the rest of the roster with whatever you have lying around

the cost to get good players to supplement elite pieces is much higher than you would expect. fans are salivating over possible horvat returns while ignoring that to get a player of horvat's level (i would say very good but not elite) is expensive

vancouver is basically a poverty level franchise when it comes to having the assets to make moves for good players. they have the following 'in their wallet':

2023+ first (2023 and each year beyond)
2023 second
2025+ second
2023+ third
hoglander
podkolzin
klimovich
rathbone
lekkerimaki

even if you add whatever the returns are for horvat, schenn and possibly garland/kuzmenko/whoever that's less than almost every single team in the league. there's really nothing else with significant value either in the farm or on the roster. maybe you can get a third or two if you move someone like bear or dermott or lazar but that's not really significant. there's certainly not enough to make the kind of moves colorado made in building their winning roster

given all this all i'm saying is that vancouver is in no position to 'go for it' either now or in the next few years. they shouldn't be making win now moves like buying out oel/boeser/garland, signing somewhat questionable defenders (like gavrikov or severson) to big money and term, acquiring assets that are going to be appreciably worse three years from now at the cost of assets that should be worth more than now (and by this i mean prioritizing nhl ready assets in the horvat deal instead of just getting the most valuable assets you can). they need to take a longer view

 

[theguardianII]

The problem for the Canucks is that they need to turn over like a third to half the roster, move out terrible contracts to free up cap space, replenish their prospect pipeline, sign significant UFAs to fill major roster holes, etc. and usually doing each of those things requires borrowing from one of those other areas to achieve it.

They basically don't have any significant position of strength from which they can draw to bolster the deficient areas. Like, it'd be one thing if they had a surplus of decent prospects to move or to enable them to be okay moving a number of picks, or a lot of cap space to take on bad contracts, or a logjam of young roster players at centre or D to move for excess help elsewhere. But, unfortunately, they're tight on the cap, have a lot of bad contracts, have almost no prospects of any realistic appeal, and they don't have many pieces to move in real no-brainer win deals that don't leave significant holes in their absence.

Not just roster, core. They turn over 1/3 almost every year, bottom guys

 

[SeawaterOnIce]

So FAQ just signed a new coach for 3 years.

What if this new coach comes out and claims this roster is crap and we need a rebuild?

It really puts FAQ in a very awkward position.

 

[theguardianII]

These pressers sometimes have little gems in them, all year management has stated they know how much they have to offer Bo, so would that not mean they know how much other player's contract might cost already? Information "you won't know"?

Ya quoting myself is Narcissistic.

But ding ding ding

 

[Jyrki21]

 

[gringo]

Canucks will refuse to pay Horvat and trade him, only to sign someone equally (or more!) expensive in free agency.

Our center ice depth is gonna be laughable the second Bo is traded.

 

[MS]

Colorado never had a state where they only had Mack and Makar. Hell they tanked with Mack, Rantanen and Landeskog. You don’t see them going all rebuild when that happened, they just sold some guys off and did a retool.
Nichuskin was signed as a reclamation project after scoring like 10 points in a season with Dallas and even then it took him 3 seasons to blow up with the Avs. You are trying to argue elite players are hard to argue and at the same time listed out how the Avs were able to do it via trades. So yeah it seems like you answered the question of well how hard is it to actually acquire those pieces. Do you realize that the elite pieces, Rantanen, Mack, Makar weren’t simply acquired by trades? And all the pieces you listed took time to acquire. It’s not like anybody is saying we need to be like the Avs next year!!!!! It’s like ok, we have a somewhat equivalent to Mack, Rantanen, Makar, obviously not as elite but it’s probably as close as you can get and we have the better goalie. It’s a base to build from.

So do you think Florida, Toronto should rebuild now? Is that what you are arguing? Winning is hard, let’s just tear shit down and rebuild when you can’t win enough.

Nashville doesn’t have a true 1C and their core is old as f*** now. They are in a completely different cycle. I don’t even know why you would include them in this convo. Yeah let’s compare our core who is 24 and 23 with a team where the whole core is like 30+ and starting to decline.

This goes back to, what the hell are we missing that is so hard to get that we need to tank? We don’t have enough 2nd paring D, 2nd line wingers and centers so we should rebuild to get them?

Yeah, this is the problem with these takes.

People have idealized like 3 or 4 situations that have happened over the past 30 years (Chicago, Pittsburgh, Colorado) where a tank went absolutely perfectly and now basically want to blow up anything that doesn't measure up to that standard.

Those situations are not the norm. Again, look at teams like Detroit and LA who did 'perfect' tanks of the sort that everyone here wants and at the end of that ... ended up with basically zero high-end offensive NHL talent.

Fans also in one breath are AMAZED! at how the Seattle team that they mocked mercilessly last year as being a total butcher job by their management is one of the best teams in the NHL a year later and in the next breath it's IMPOSSIBLE this team does anything but suck for the next 3 years.

Fans also claim that it's impossible to fix the D while ignoring the bluelines in places like NJ and Seattle and the level of player and how those bluelines were composed.

 

[DCantheDDad]

Well, the first piece drops with the resigning of Kuzmenko. Not a terrible piece of business, but I expect (read hoping) to see Horvat out of here sooner rather than later.

Yeah, this is the problem with these takes.

People have idealized like 3 or 4 situations that have happened over the past 30 years (Chicago, Pittsburgh, Colorado) where a tank went absolutely perfectly and now basically want to blow up anything that doesn't measure up to that standard.

Those situations are not the norm. Again, look at teams like Detroit and LA who did 'perfect' tanks of the sort that everyone here wants and at the end of that ... ended up with basically zero high-end offensive NHL talent.

Fans also in one breath are AMAZED! at how the Seattle team that they mocked mercilessly last year as being a total butcher job by their management is one of the best teams in the NHL a year later and in the next breath it's IMPOSSIBLE this team does anything but suck for the next 3 years.

Fans also claim that it's impossible to fix the D while ignoring the bluelines in places like NJ and Seattle and the level of player and how those bluelines were composed.

We have spent a decade spinning our wheels pretending that maximizing picks is not an effective strategy. Yes, it can fail, just like everything else, but I do not see a path to being an actual Stanley Cup contender by taking shortcuts and continuing to try and build with a net deficit of draft picks.

 

[credulous]

Yeah, this is the problem with these takes.

People have idealized like 3 or 4 situations that have happened over the past 30 years (Chicago, Pittsburgh, Colorado) where a tank went absolutely perfectly and now basically want to blow up anything that doesn't measure up to that standard.

Those situations are not the norm. Again, look at teams like Detroit and LA who did 'perfect' tanks of the sort that everyone here wants and at the end of that ... ended up with basically zero high-end offensive NHL talent.

Fans also in one breath are AMAZED! at how the Seattle team that they mocked mercilessly last year as being a total butcher job by their management is one of the best teams in the NHL a year later and in the next breath it's IMPOSSIBLE this team does anything but suck for the next 3 years.

Fans also claim that it's impossible to fix the D while ignoring the bluelines in places like NJ and Seattle and the level of player and how those bluelines were composed.

you're criticizing a position i don't hold. i'm not advocating 'the full tank' where everything gets traded and management tries to ice the worst roster possible. i'm simply asking that we be realistic about contention timelines. this isn't a video game where incremental progress leads to more incremental progress wihch leads to winning. there's a very real risk that trying to get better next season means we're worse in three seasons or four seasons. it's a fantasy to think this team can contend next season or even the season after. it's going to take that long just to recover from the cap damage currently inflicted on this team. it's time to make decisions with an eye to the long term not the short term. none of that means 'TRADE PETTERSSON NOW' or we must pick first overall or we're doomed. it just means let's stop cheerleading for management that think they can shortcut this process

 

[MS]

Well, the first piece drops with the resigning of Kuzmenko. Not a terrible piece of business, but I expect (read hoping) to see Horvat out of here sooner rather than later.


We have spent a decade spinning our wheels pretending that maximizing picks is not an effective strategy. Yes, it can fail, just like everything else, but I do not see a path to being an actual Stanley Cup contender by taking shortcuts and continuing to try and build with a net deficit of draft picks.

Our problems in the last few years are nothing to do with draft pick deficits and everything to do with poor cap management.

We did a tank (unintentionally). We acquired a very talented core of young players. Those young players started seeing results in 19-20.

At that point, we should have had $20 million in cap space heading into the 20-21 season and been chasing guys like Pietrangelo and Hall in additional to retaining our own UFAs.

Instead, $30 million in terrible Jim Benning signings (Eriksson, Sutter, Beagle, Roussel, Baertschi, Myers, Ferland, Holtby) meant that not only were we not able to move forward from that point, we additionally had to gut our roster of quality veteran players. Team got worse, morale tanked, and we still haven't recovered.