Extension coming for #40?

[BedBeats™2.0]

Danny did have the highest PIM, but that was because of the game misconduct he got after the end of the 4th game from Sullivan as a parting FU gift. Other than that bullcrap pointless penalty, he only got 2 minors. Not the most.

[RonMexico]

He is a stiff with a declining skill set and I could care less if he comes back or not. He is a replacement level player. Too many people have sentimental attachments to every player on this team. He wants a retirement style contract....reading between the lines, a decent payday and term. Thanks but no thanks.

[CB007]

Lappy doesn't really hurt anyone. We need guys who hit to hurt, win faceoffs, clear the puck, dump and chase the puck, crash and bang their D, and score the odd goal and fight the odd fight.

Am I asking for too much?

[bobopan]

I would want nothing to do with a contract that long.. Big no IMO. I still don't think he's brought back at all.

[zombieksa]

“He’s like my new girlfriend.”

- Max Lapierre on Chris Higgins

How could you not want those two on your team.

[Blue & Green]

The only UFAs I'd like to see back are Lappy and Alberts, hopefully in the 2-3 year range. Cut the ties with everyone else.

[Provost]

No thanks... if you are trying to re-tool and not going to touch a lot of the core players, you need to replace your role players. Lapierre doesn't bring a lot, let him go.

[DarthNinja]

Hopefuly the new coaches will let him loose.

It's not like the officials can screw us over any more than they already have. PPs were 24-10. I'd rather go down with a fight.

[thad]

No thanks... if you are trying to re-tool and not going to touch a lot of the core players, you need to replace your role players. Lapierre doesn't bring a lot, let him go.

[afan]

MG should let the world know how is Sestito better than Lapierre playing on the 4th line. The lack of speed and hands Sestito is a waste of cap space and roster spot which should be filled by young prospects or more capable veterans like Lapierre.

[doobiedoodoo]

If they bring him back for a 4th line role then yes. Anything else then no thank you.

[Bananas]

Lappy is one of most consistent physical players.

If this team wants to get tougher for the playoffs, getting rid of him would be counter productive.

[poetica]

Cheers for the deeper stat.

Even though the refs did not punish the Sharks antics, its safe to say that painting Lappy as a negative factor is not the whole story of him. Most of he team, deserved or not, were penalty magnets.

[CanucksSayEh]

Higgins deal already looks rough, just another guy who hasn't done anything the last couple playoffs. It would have to be a legit bargain. Please no more limited NTC crap.

[TheWheeler]

I couldn't agree more! Most of the calls were complete crap while SJ was allowed to get away with worse. None of our guys were particularly bad and in fact most were often penalized for doing exactly what people here were saying they needed to -- being physical. It just seemed it was deemed "boarding" every time they hit a player. Fracking refs!

[poetica]

And you don't think the way our team has been made up the last couple of years has anything to do with it?

Burrows can't buy ANY call against him because the referees hate him.

Kesler is notorious for his diving and being a yapper on the ice.

Lapierre is basicay the same as those two.

So WHY would refs give us any favors when our key players have painted a whiny, divey, cheap reputation to the officials of the league?

Sorry, if getting rid of Lapierre is one small step to the team shedding its annoying rep, I am 100% for it.

[TheWheeler]

No, actually I don't. Rather, I think it's attitudes like yours that have everything to do with it.

First and foremost, the refs' job is to call the game fairly. Not to hold personal grudges. Not to judge a player's character and decide in advance whether or not they deserve calls for or against regardless of the game that's actually played. If they are failing in that most basic tenant of their job, that failure is on them entirely. By pretending otherwise you only perpetuate the belief that's up to players to figure out what refs want and give it to them, as if they are there to please the refs as opposed to both players and refs being there because of the game. That attitude ensures that NHL does nothing to address the utter lack of integrity some refs seem to have some games, or the complete lack of consistency across the league. They are refs, not godfathers!

Second, no Canuck has ever been the worst, or even most successful diver in the league. Other players dive constantly. (Did you see SJ?! I heard they had to start issuing swimming trunks for practice.) And yet, where was the fallout? Where was the punishment? Where was the outrage from the refs, or the people like you who seem to think because some Canucks were known to dive that the entire team, the majority of whom are never guilty to begin with, is now rightfully subjected to years of undeserved calls against as punishment for past crimes? Name another team that has ever been penalized for years because of diving. If you can't, then that theory is just bullsh*t used to fertilize the little god complex some refs have gotten, believing it is their right to determine the outcome of games based on whether or not they like you. This is the NHL, not high school!

Third, no Canuck has ever been the most vocal on the ice or off the ice in being critical of the refs. For example, this year a NYI assistant coach was fine and suspended for 2 games due to his "verbal abuse of officials." Last year Tortorella was fined for his comments suggesting officials managed the outcome of a game because NBC wanted it to go to OT. Quenneville, coach of one of the NHL's most darling teams, was also fined last year for calling officiating in one of their games a "disgrace." He was previously fined in 2009 for saying that he'd seen "the worst call in the history of sports" and that the refs "ruined the whole game." So, to review: Chicago's coach has been fined twice in the last 4 years for publicly calling out the refs. By contract, Gillis was fined once in April 2011. No other staff member has been fined since, and yet we're called the league's whiners?!

Do you watch any non-Canucks games? If so, do you not pay attention? Hardly a game goes by where you don't see a player yelling at a ref or a coach looking like he's about to blow a gasket. The truth is the Canucks have had to be very conscious of hurting the poor little refs' feelings, so this last year they were far less likely than other players to argue even when the call was bad. And where did it get them? Oh right, still one of, if not the most disproportionately penalized playoff teams of all time. Why? Because of "but it's their fault" attitudes like yours that ignore reality, allow refs' to replace the rules with their own feelings whenever they choose, and hold the Canucks to a unique standard.

Fourth, I really don't give a crap if 2 or 3, or 5, of our players really were the biggest whiners, divers and all around loudmouths. So the frack what? This is freaking hockey. People hit each other, cuss each other out, and generally behave far less gentile than a Victorian gentleman at tea. If refs really get their nickers in a bunch over a coach yelling "That's an elbow!" in defense of one of his players getting hit in the head without a call, then they're in the wrong line of business. (And the fact that AV had to yell that because Tanev was yet again getting hit with rarely a call just proves that even players who have never been known to dive, lip off or do anything else wrong are getting a completely undeserved raw deal from the refs.)

Of course players need to be respectful of refs, who actually have a really difficult job and more often than not get calls correct. (How many times have we thought it was a bad call only to see the replay and realize the ref was right?) But, refs also have to have respect for the players and the game itself. The rules are the rules only if they apply to everyone. If they only apply to non-superstars or only players the refs don't like, they're not rules. They're punishments. And then NHL hockey isn't a sport, it's a popularity contest.

This is their job. They choose it and are free to leave it at any time. If they were expecting peace and quite might I suggest a career as a tennis official. I hear those people are always respectful of the refs.

[poetica]

Right, because my attitude, sitting here at home, can somehow affect the way the referees ref or the players play. What a stupid thing to say...

I don't really care if a player yells or acts inappropriately. I care if they do it consistently enough to become watched more closely by officials. If you don't think players develop bad reputations with officials (in ANY sport) you are a fool. It happens. Deal with it. Referees aren't machines, they are just as human as the players themselves.

I also don't really care if San Jose dove and got away with it. The fact is, for some reason Vancouver was vastly over-penalized. Maybe it's a conspiracy, maybe it's coincidence, maybe it's the fact we have 3 prominent players who have a history of acting like goof balls. I'll go with the latter, and I hope Gillis starts culling this image the team has gotten from the last 3 years.

[a Fool]

No, actually I don't. Rather, I think it's attitudes like yours that have everything to do with it.

First and foremost, the refs' job is to call the game fairly. Not to hold personal grudges. Not to judge a player's character and decide in advance whether or not they deserve calls for or against regardless of the game that's actually played. If they are failing in that most basic tenant of their job, that failure is on them entirely. By pretending otherwise you only perpetuate the belief that's up to players to figure out what refs want and give it to them, as if they are there to please the refs as opposed to both players and refs being there because of the game. That attitude ensures that NHL does nothing to address the utter lack of integrity some refs seem to have some games, or the complete lack of consistency across the league. They are refs, not godfathers!

Second, no Canuck has ever been the worst, or even most successful diver in the league. Other players dive constantly. (Did you see SJ?! I heard they had to start issuing swimming trunks for practice.) And yet, where was the fallout? Where was the punishment? Where was the outrage from the refs, or the people like you who seem to think because some Canucks were known to dive that the entire team, the majority of whom are never guilty to begin with, is now rightfully subjected to years of undeserved calls against as punishment for past crimes? Name another team that has ever been penalized for years because of diving. If you can't, then that theory is just bullsh*t used to fertilize the little god complex some refs have gotten, believing it is their right to determine the outcome of games based on whether or not they like you. This is the NHL, not high school!

Third, no Canuck has ever been the most vocal on the ice or off the ice in being critical of the refs. For example, this year a NYI assistant coach was fine and suspended for 2 games due to his "verbal abuse of officials." Last year Tortorella was fined for his comments suggesting officials managed the outcome of a game because NBC wanted it to go to OT. Quenneville, coach of one of the NHL's most darling teams, was also fined last year for calling officiating in one of their games a "disgrace." He was previously fined in 2009 for saying that he'd seen "the worst call in the history of sports" and that the refs "ruined the whole game." So, to review: Chicago's coach has been fined twice in the last 4 years for publicly calling out the refs. By contract, Gillis was fined once in April 2011. No other staff member has been fined since, and yet we're called the league's whiners?!

Do you watch any non-Canucks games? If so, do you not pay attention? Hardly a game goes by where you don't see a player yelling at a ref or a coach looking like he's about to blow a gasket. The truth is the Canucks have had to be very conscious of hurting the poor little refs' feelings, so this last year they were far less likely than other players to argue even when the call was bad. And where did it get them? Oh right, still one of, if not the most disproportionately penalized playoff teams of all time. Why? Because of "but it's their fault" attitudes like yours that ignore reality, allow refs' to replace the rules with their own feelings whenever they choose, and hold the Canucks to a unique standard.

Fourth, I really don't give a crap if 2 or 3, or 5, of our players really were the biggest whiners, divers and all around loudmouths. So the frack what? This is freaking hockey. People hit each other, cuss each other out, and generally behave far less gentile than a Victorian gentleman at tea. If refs really get their nickers in a bunch over a coach yelling "That's an elbow!" in defense of one of his players getting hit in the head without a call, then they're in the wrong line of business. (And the fact that AV had to yell that because Tanev was yet again getting hit with rarely a call just proves that even players who have never been known to dive, lip off or do anything else wrong are getting a completely undeserved raw deal from the refs.)

Of course players need to be respectful of refs, who actually have a really difficult job and more often than not get calls correct. (How many times have we thought it was a bad call only to see the replay and realize the ref was right?) But, refs also have to have respect for the players and the game itself. The rules are the rules only if they apply to everyone. If they only apply to non-superstars or only players the refs don't like, they're not rules. They're punishments. And then NHL hockey isn't a sport, it's a popularity contest.

This is their job. They choose it and are free to leave it at any time. If they were expecting peace and quite might I suggest a career as a tennis official. I hear those people are always respectful of the refs.

[BedBeats™2.0]

And you don't think the way our team has been made up the last couple of years has anything to do with it?

Burrows can't buy ANY call against him because the referees hate him.

Kesler is notorious for his diving and being a yapper on the ice.

Lapierre is basicay the same as those two.

So WHY would refs give us any favors when our key players have painted a whiny, divey, cheap reputation to the officials of the league?

Sorry, if getting rid of Lapierre is one small step to the team shedding its annoying rep, I am 100% for it.