[Article] Is Jim Benning the best GM in the NHL at the season's halfway mark?

[Alflives]

2 minutes ago, Monteeun said:

OJ is doing fine. Give your head a shake.

Shake like this?

[Gaudette Celly]

48 minutes ago, oldnews said:

Remember that Ed Wiles article - and thread - about the Canuck rebuild lagging behind the Leafs.....?

 

Fun times.

 

 

Whole lotta crickets coming from those who made those claims.  All the articles, the comparisons, the mockery, the derision.  But oh look -- 50 games into the season and they're neck and neck, Canucks one point up.  How'd that suddenly change?  Wha' happen?  Where's the apologetics and polemics (actually, nothing but conjecture) analyzing this amazing turn of events?

Edited January 28, 2020 by Gaudette Celly

[Chickenspear]

40 minutes ago, Alflives said:

Shake like this?

Nah, more like this...

[alt kilgore]

Benning's drafting prowess has saved his bacon. And the teams, for which I am extremely grateful.  The best thing he did was to demote Ron Delorme.  Our long time scouting "guru".  Who had the dubious honour of being the least successful scouting head in the league during his reign as chief scout.

 

Article from 2014, just before JB was hired:

 

https://canucksarmy.com/2014/05/27/ron-delorme-and-the-canucks-v-the-29-other-scouting-departments/

 

Since 2000, Vancouver has had:

 

• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 50 career NHL games played.
• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 100 career NHL games played.
• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 250 career NHL games played.

The Canucks’ scouting staff has completely blown more drafts than any team in the NHL, and has more <50 GP drafts than 15 teams

combined

 

 

Vancouver is on the far right.

meanwhile,

Jim Benning's scouting record?

 

Jim Benning’s time as the head of Buffalo’s amateur scouting during the Delorme era and compare how he did with the rest of the NHL:

 

JB is on the far right.

 

 

 

Which is all to say, that JB, knows scouting, and knows who to hire, and fire in that department.

 

He has successfully done enough great drafting to totally counter his mistakes there IMO. Basically just one and a half.  Picking for position instead of BPA in Juolevi > Tkuchuk.  And a half demerit for picking Jake over Nylander or Ehlers, if only that they have been contributing earlier and better for their teams, while Jake has not shown consistency or production during that time which we will never get back. But if he does get woke, and matures before our eyes to live up to a top ten showing, I'd be happy.

 

 

 

But as far as GM of the year?

 

22 hours ago, Horvat is a Boss said:

Cap management (and Free Agency by extension) is the main thing holding him back. He's been below average at best in those two areas. 

 

¥es we have a great new young core, but it will take more than that to win a Cup.  Arguably, he did not stock the cupboards enough earlier on, and instead held onto his misguided (or owner guided?) belief in a miraculous quick fix turnaround where we could afford to trade away prospects like McCann, and picks like a second for Vey, and refuse to weaponize the cap for more prospects. To the point that at present, he had to trade away a future #1, just to get a bonifide piece in order to (maybe) make the playoffs. Which is great for this year, but when we are truly ready to contend, will Miller be the same player? How will that #1 look then? We will need an army of young good entry level contracted players in future years to even be able to hold onto players like Miller.  And the bigger the prospect army built early on, the more chance for real NHL calibre soldiers when you need them as Petey, Brock, and Hughes reach mid twenties, and their primes.  JB free agent sprees, handing out long lucrative contracts to over-hyped scrubs like Beagle. All of that is going to come to a head in the next couple of years.  And the Seattle expansion is really going to mess it all up.  We'll see.  

 

I just think in hindsight, we may have been better off to hire JB as chief scout, and hire an experienced GM instead to really tear it down and build it.

But everything is coming up roses now, this season. So I can't complain about the present. But JB's accidental rebuild, led not by his trades or free agent pick-ups, which was the original plan, but that the picks he did keep developed much better than anyone predicted, has saved his bacon. And as a fan or course, I really hope, the team's future.  Who knows, maybe he can perform another miracle and get rid of Eriksson, Beagle and/or Sutter, and hopefully Ferland gets to 100% and turns into a valuable contributor. And our cap crunch will not be as bad as predicted.

 

But IMO, the GM award should be more than how much luck, or even smarts, you had drafting.  For which I am in awe of with JB.  But on balance, JB has a mixed record. Ignoring the future cap crunch he has set up for the team, is like of out of sight, out of mind for a lot of fans.  But hey, I'm the biggest procrastinator of anyone. So whatever. The Future JB will take care of it. What me worried?

[oldnews]

1 hour ago, kilgore said:

 I am extremely grateful.  The best thing he did was to demote Ron Delorme.  Our long time scouting "guru".  Who had the dubious honour of being the least successful scouting head in the league during his reign as chief scout.

Demoting him was evidently better than firing him - that is, if you like your franchise, game-breaking young forward EP.

 

https://theprovince.com/sports/hockey/nhl/vancouver-canucks/kuzma-ron-delorme-delivered-first-hard-sell-to-get-elias-pettersson-on-canucks-draft-radar

 

Quote

“Ronnie saw him early and was a loud voice for him right from the start — even before any of us had seen him,” recalled Canucks general manager Jim Benning. “He was in my office and said ‘we’ve really got to watch this guy.’ He loved his skill and hockey sense.

“We saw Elias anywhere from 70 to 90 times in his draft year because he was a bit of a late bloomer. In Sweden, they identify top kids when they’re 12 or 13 and when he was 14 and 15, he wasn’t one of those. He came more into his own at 17 when he had a growth spurt.”

Btw - that smarmy article is 5 year 'old news'.....and a horse that's been beaten enough.

The 'best thing' Benning has done is not a demotion - it's  the positive moves - like drafting Pettersson ironically,  that have made the rething.

Edited January 29, 2020 by oldnews

[Rob_Zepp]

3 hours ago, oldnews said:

Remember that Ed Wiles article - and thread - about the Canuck rebuild lagging behind the Leafs.....?

 

Fun times.

 

 

Toronto has some nice young talent but not sure they are a "team" yet nor do I think they are constructed for playoff hockey.   I think Toronto needs to be very careful with their use of assets and the trade for Barrie was really odd when they could have parlayed Kadri into some much more in terms of they nature of player they needed (a stay at home Dman who can log 23 minutes and chip in with solid passes but no need to score etc.).   

[alt kilgore]

15 minutes ago, oldnews said:

Demoting him was evidently better than firing him - that is, if you like your franchise, game-breaking young forward EP.

 

https://theprovince.com/sports/hockey/nhl/vancouver-canucks/kuzma-ron-delorme-delivered-first-hard-sell-to-get-elias-pettersson-on-canucks-draft-radar

 

Btw - that smarmy article is 5 year 'old news'.....and a horse that's been beaten enough.

The 'best thing' Benning has done is not a demotion - it's  the positive moves - like drafting Pettersson ironically,  that have made the rething.

I figured someone would bring that up.  Good for him.  His clock was right once every 10 years.  So he gets one recommendation right, that an elite Swede youngster, that a lot of scouts were already high about, hence his position in the draft, will be a good pick,  Wow.  And that wipes out his overall record, shown above in that graph?   Sorry, but i like this team's drafting consistency more after Jim took the reigns and demoted him. The stats don't lie.

.

.

Edited January 29, 2020 by kilgore

[tas]

1 hour ago, kilgore said:

and has more <50 GP drafts than 15 teams

combined

I don't care about the rest of your post, but when we're talking about a scale of 0-4, where 11 of those 15 teams you mention have 0, that phrasing is a liiiiittle bit misleading and dramatic. a team with 1 single sub-50 game draft has more than 11 teams combined ...

[Alflives]

2 minutes ago, tas said:

I don't care about the rest of your post, but when we're talking about a scale of 0-4, where 11 of those 15 teams you mention have 0, that phrasing is a liiiiittle bit misleading and dramatic. a team with 1 single sub-50 game draft has more than 11 teams combined ...

What?  This is yet another example of what the confusion emoji is for.  Your post has old Alf totally confused. Confusing post, or dumb Alf?  Dumb Alf me thinks. 

[oldnews]

1 hour ago, kilgore said:

 Wow.  And that wipes out his overall record, shown above in that graph? 

.

You can be as dramatic as you want - there's no argument that drafting has improved under Benning, since the department has been restructured - as I said, a negative move  - a demotion - is not Benning's best - and kicking Delorme is old news.

 

What matters is where the team is today - and say what you want about Delorme but Petey is a significant part of it - so I have a hard time caring less about his ancient historical record when the question is Benning's merits.

 

You may as well come in and take shots at Gillis - which is the era you're referring to in criticizing Delorme's performance under a previous administration.

Ironically, in pointing out that the team had a paltry if non-existent prospect pool when Benning took over, you're underlining how dramatically the franchise has turned around, from top to bottom.  Of course, his rebuilding of the scouting staff isn't really to his own credit - he was lucky - he himself isn't really a good evaluator of talent nor a good evaluator of evaluators of talent - he got lucky - his best move was a demotion.

Counterpoint:  Benning's drafting didn't save his "bacon" - it was his bacon.

 

Edited January 29, 2020 by oldnews

[Alflives]

1 hour ago, kilgore said:

Benning's drafting prowess has saved his bacon. And the teams, for which I am extremely grateful.  The best thing he did was to demote Ron Delorme.  Our long time scouting "guru".  Who had the dubious honour of being the least successful scouting head in the league during his reign as chief scout.

 

Article from 2014, just before JB was hired:

 

https://canucksarmy.com/2014/05/27/ron-delorme-and-the-canucks-v-the-29-other-scouting-departments/

 

Since 2000, Vancouver has had:

 

• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 50 career NHL games played.
• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 100 career NHL games played.
• The most drafts in which their selections failed to combine for 250 career NHL games played.

The Canucks’ scouting staff has completely blown more drafts than any team in the NHL, and has more <50 GP drafts than 15 teams

combined

 

 

Vancouver is on the far right.

meanwhile,

Jim Benning's scouting record?

 

Jim Benning’s time as the head of Buffalo’s amateur scouting during the Delorme era and compare how he did with the rest of the NHL:

 

JB is on the far right.

 

 

 

Which is all to say, that JB, knows scouting, and knows who to hire, and fire in that department.

 

He has successfully done enough great drafting to totally counter his mistakes there IMO. Basically just one and a half.  Picking for position instead of BPA in Juolevi > Tkuchuk.  And a half demerit for picking Jake over Nylander or Ehlers, if only that they have been contributing earlier and better for their teams, while Jake has not shown consistency or production during that time which we will never get back. But if he does get woke, and matures before our eyes to live up to a top ten showing, I'd be happy.

 

 

 

But as far as GM of the year?

 

 

¥es we have a great new young core, but it will take more than that to win a Cup.  Arguably, he did not stock the cupboards enough earlier on, and instead held onto his misguided (or owner guided?) belief in a miraculous quick fix turnaround where we could afford to trade away prospects like McCann, and picks like a second for Vey, and refuse to weaponize the cap for more prospects. To the point that at present, he had to trade away a future #1, just to get a bonifide piece in order to (maybe) make the playoffs. Which is great for this year, but when we are truly ready to contend, will Miller be the same player? How will that #1 look then? We will need an army of young good entry level contracted players in future years to even be able to hold onto players like Miller.  And the bigger the prospect army built early on, the more chance for real NHL calibre soldiers when you need them as Petey, Brock, and Hughes reach mid twenties, and their primes.  JB free agent sprees, handing out long lucrative contracts to over-hyped scrubs like Beagle. All of that is going to come to a head in the next couple of years.  And the Seattle expansion is really going to mess it all up.  We'll see.  

 

I just think in hindsight, we may have been better off to hire JB as chief scout, and hire an experienced GM instead to really tear it down and build it.

But everything is coming up roses now, this season. So I can't complain about the present. But JB's accidental rebuild, led not by his trades or free agent pick-ups, which was the original plan, but that the picks he did keep developed much better than anyone predicted, has saved his bacon. And as a fan or course, I really hope, the team's future.  Who knows, maybe he can perform another miracle and get rid of Eriksson, Beagle and/or Sutter, and hopefully Ferland gets to 100% and turns into a valuable contributor. And our cap crunch will not be as bad as predicted.

 

But IMO, the GM award should be more than how much luck, or even smarts, you had drafting.  For which I am in awe of with JB.  But on balance, JB has a mixed record. Ignoring the future cap crunch he has set up for the team, is like of out of sight, out of mind for a lot of fans.  But hey, I'm the biggest procrastinator of anyone. So whatever. The Future JB will take care of it. What me worried?

There should be a rule against these completely complex and confusing posts.  What? 

[tas]

7 minutes ago, Alflives said:

What?  This is yet another example of what the confusion emoji is for.  Your post has old Alf totally confused. Confusing post, or dumb Alf?  Dumb Alf me thinks. 

it's just an example of a sensationalist presentation of mundane stats in order to make it appear more shocking and click-baity.

 

the internet in a nutshell. 

 

edit: "did you know that almost 100% of farmers are adding huge amounts of dihydrogen monoxide, a potentially dangerous chemical, to the food you and your family eat?!"

Edited January 29, 2020 by tas

[Alflives]

2 minutes ago, tas said:

it's just an example of a sensationalist presentation of mundane stats in order to make it appear more shocking and click-baity.

 

the internet in a nutshell. 

Posts like that one just make me want to drink.  So does breathing, of course! 

[You Mad Bro?]

On 1/27/2020 at 10:53 PM, Elias Pettersson said:

Just look at the drafting prior to 2014.  Only one player remains on the roster, BO.  Since 2014 when Benning took over we now have 6 players on the roster with 2 of those players being elite franchise game changers in Petey and Hughes.  Gaudette, Boeser, Virtanen and Demko are the other 4.  The trades for Miller and Pearson were incredible.  Stecher was a good free agent pickup and signing Beagle and Roussel for the bottom 2 lines was a good piece of business. 

 

Has Benning been perfect?  Of course not, even Scotty Bowman made mistakes.  But overall I think Benning has turned this team around into a legit playoff team.  And then you look at our prospect pool.  Podkolzin, Hoglander, Lind, Madden, Rathbone, Woo, Tryamkin, Juolevi, Brisebois, Rafferty, DiPietro.  The cupboard of prospects is so full the cabinet door can’t close.  

 

I believe Jim Benning is one of the better GM’s in the league right now.  Hopefully once playoff success comes to Vancouver he will be recognized as one of the best.  

We also had Edler and Tanev. Good post tho

[Elias Pettersson]

1 hour ago, You Mad Bro? said:

We also had Edler and Tanev. Good post tho

Tanev was never drafted.  Edler was drafted by Nonis, I was referring more to the Mike Gillis era.  But even adding Edler we only have 2 draft picks on the roster prior to Benning taking over...

[oldnews]

17 hours ago, Alflives said:

There should be a rule against these completely complex and confusing posts.  What? 

Can't you appreciate a good Horizontal Evaluative Ratings Optic chart?

 

[Ghostsof1915]

1 hour ago, oldnews said:

Can't you appreciate a good Horizontal Evaluative Ratings Optic chart?

 

Starfire is 6'4"? Is that with her massive hair or without? 

[You Mad Bro?]

7 hours ago, Elias Pettersson said:

Tanev was never drafted.  Edler was drafted by Nonis, I was referring more to the Mike Gillis era.  But even adding Edler we only have 2 draft picks on the roster prior to Benning taking over...

You’re correct I misread as Bo is the only player still here from when Benning took over. Agreed Benning’s drafting has been excellent. One blip in 2016 but other than that very pumped about it

[oldnews]

4 hours ago, Ghostsof1915 said:

Starfire is 6'4"? Is that with her massive hair or without? 

I'm not sure - I 'm not very good at analytics.

[riffraff]

14 minutes ago, oldnews said:

I'm not sure - I 'm not very good at analytics.