Gawdzukes

Anthony is really a positive thinker dream big guy which is fine but I assume you're more like me and like to know better exactly what you're dealing with. The thing he's missing is every goaltender, or probably 90%+ that aren't named Hasek or Tretiak are partially a product of the team in front of them when measuring results. Like you mentioned above. So yes our goaltending and PK let us down at face value but it's completely unrealistic to think the team in front of them had nothing to do with it. Especially when it's spread across 3 goalies and an entire season. Don't the players play on the PK and on the ice in front of the goalie during the games? You don't need to be a stat specialist or even a hockey enthusiast to watch last years Canucks and see how brutal the team was as a whole. Numerous times the puck was given away in our own end with little pressure, how many times did Myers just gift the other team a goal. How brutal were OEL, Stillman, and Bear? It was cosmically pathetic. They definitely weren't playing for each other as Bear alluded to when he first got here. They didn't even a have a plan to work on to get better. In addition, it wasn't even limited to defence. The forwards were a mess, didn't back check as a unit, gave up on plays routinely, don't cover their marks, don't get stuck in, and don't make high percentage plays, leading to continual odd man rushes the other way. Any one that watched could see there were far more serious problems then simply bad goaltending and a poor PK plan. Once again we face a season where the prior season was a complete mess with nothing to really build on. Tocchet looked like he turned the ship a bit but there is a huge learning curve and a boatload of work to be done to get this team playing winning hockey, and we don't have half a year to figure it out. Hopefully the players and coaches are committed as they appear. We're going to need 100% buy in, 100% effort, and a little luck if we hope to do some damage.

Our team is so incredibly dumb like that. It's as if these meatheads thought we were still competing for something in January so they timed it to the day for his recovery. That's what that article was saying when it said be ruthless for once. Although this is just common sense. Wasn't he hurt in the first game? Just mind numbingly stupid, Ah, to be a Canucks fan.

Waited way too long. Could have been ready months ago.

He's probably the firth or sixth best winger if healthy. He also has some size and strong defensive awareness. He's probably an important player for us. Wouldn't surprise me at all to see him on the second line.

Yeah Miller was pretty good to end the year ... I wouldn't say he was necessarily better ... yet. However my thoughts were more so we might have better luck finding a rugged center than a winger. It's sparse on both fronts.

Arvidsson, Duclair, Bertuzzi, or Domi, might be options if Podkolzin doesn't show a big improvement. Maybe a trade for an up and coming 25/26 year old player. That line-up needs some toughness though and two way play added to Lekk, Kuz, and Petey. Frederic and Klimovich seem like reaches at this point. It would be very exciting to see Klimovich put it together though. Or maybe even target a center like Scheifle, or Reinhart, and push Miller to the wing.

pk1 ? He's brutal though and was part of the league worst pk. Wouldn't Cole Soucy be better? Soucy was excellent on Seattle’s penalty kill last season. He was on the second pairing for their shorthanded unit and was one of the top-10 (7th) defencemen when it comes to on-ice expected goals against per 60 minutes of shorthanded play. Soucy will bring some size to the backend and has the potential to be the top penalty killer for the Canucks’ defence corps. It was also Cole and Slavin who did the majority of the penalty killing for Carolina this year, which is good news for the Canucks, because the right side of the PK might be where they need Cole most in 2023/24. We also have Hughes and Hronek that can play some minutes there. I'd play him very sparingly there, pk2 30 seconds but I do agree in limited minutes his outlook is far better.

Some of it was bad goaltending but a lot of it was horrible team defence as well. They were absolutely atrocious at times, a complete sh!t show and even Hasek would have struggled. It's too easy to just let the rest of the team off the hook, blame goaltending and a bad pk, snap your fingers and voila, say it's all fixed. The team in front of the goalie still needs to own some responsibility after that season and actually fix the team defence if we want them to improve and make the playoffs. I think that's why you're getting pushback here. It's a fair position to take and I feel the players and the goalies both have lots to prove that they can be better at defending. I seriously wonder at the top 6, and bottom 6's ability to be tough on defence and be hard to play against. They even look weak on paper. After the last two years I think it's a very fair comment on @wai_lai416's part. Even with Vezina level goaltending we're not going to win many games giving away 40 shots a game and being dangerously out chanced two or three to 1.

He might as well just attend training camp with the rest of the Abby guys. I would assume he'll just as soon stay up with the Canucks and get into pre-season games to test himself if he's at all close. Which it sounds like it is. I don't think there is any benefit to that at this point in the season.

Yeah good point. Apparently he slipped right in on Abbotsford in the playoff and got good reviews from the coaches there. Maybe he's a candidate to replace Myers sooner than later as well.

I couldn't agree more. It's nice we finally have a somewhat competent group but Cole is a stop gap, and Soucy is really a #5. Our goal should absolutely be to get another top 4 longer term Dman in there asap and definitely before the start of the next season. It's nice to have Willander, D-Petey, and even Mynio coming up but they are two or more years out most likely. We do have a lot of cap coming off the books in the next few years so we should be able to target the players we need, and like you said earlier our 2024 and 2025 firsts should definitely be on the table. No more Benning moves of just acquiring random players who are decent contracts in isolation. We need to specifically find the right guys for the job. The good thing is we don't really need to find high profile point getters, just solid defensive Dmen who can move the puck.

6-8 5-6-1 1-7 2-5-1 =13-26-2 28 points against playoff teams leaving us needing about 67 points in the remaining 41 games to make the playoffs, or a 31-5-5 record. That's a tall order ... we obviously should and need to be better against the playoff teams. With regards to the coaching style I have to disagree. I am a big fan and we looked like a different team under Tocchet by the end, an actual hockey team. I do agree that getting outshot and out chanced as badly as we did is not sustainable and will not win us enough games. However I would personally put the blame on the personnel and not the coaching. We will see if 4 new faces on D can gel and change our fortunes. I think we'll be happily surprised but still challenging for a playoff spot, which will be a huge win for this group.

Yup, make sure we have plenty of booze ready if that's the case. I'm really hoping and I actually do think Silovs will be the backup. He's the far better goalie imo. Martin doesn't belong in the NHL.

Not trying to get in the middle of your debate but I do find it quite interesting. They actually only played 5 playoff teams after Demko returned playing Dallas and LA a whopping 6 times (low scoring games)! I'm not quite as good as procuring the stats like you guys but my brute force method tells me we played 10 games against playoff teams since Demko returned Feb 27th, and he played in 8. It looks like Demko went 5-3 in 8 games, winning two in OT/SO, while giving up 3,1,4,2,2,1,2,4 in reverse order of schedule (only 1 empty net goal that I noticed not included). Pretty decent but not enough to really provide concrete evidence of anything. 2.3 GAA in those games is a fairly good result though. One positive there is he definitely looked like his old self down the stretch. I really worry about his health and ability to handle anymore than 55-60 games though. Our backup situation is worrisome unless Silovs comes in guns a blazing. He's in Van and practicing today already so that's great news.

I like reality and being correct above either brimming positivity or self deflating negativity myself. Reality was we ended up 12 points out of a playoff spot whether they were 1 goal losses or 5 goal losses they were losses. Every other team could make up these silly scenarios where they make the playoffs too. We've tinkered around the edges and addressed our league worst defence, but we haven't brought in any high impact players (besides Hronek). As you say there are definitely some positive spin angles but they don't really mean anything concerning this year. Winning a bunch of no account games versus bottom feeders in garbage time doesn't really prove anything at all and has no bearing on this season. We have 6 new faces looking at full time roles and a lot of competition in Seattle, Winnipeg, St. Louis, and Calgary for the wildcards. It could be a good year, or it could be a bad year. Our last two years and the starts we've had should have everyone guessing at what kind of team we'll have this year. I really hope we get off to an average start at least and we are in a position to compete for a wildcard. I think that's a pretty realistic and even dare I say positive outlook.

Exactly. While Garland is far better than Myers imo it's like you have been saying all along. Square peg round hole. He simply just doesn't fit in and at $5 mil that's a pretty steep swiss army knife contract for a team with negative cap space. I completely agree with your size/grit on the wings comment. It's just blatantly obvious as to where that should come from when you look at the roster.

No I don't know what Petterson's thinking exactly but what I said is just common sense. Why wouldn't you respect someone like Bo when they up their game and have a career year? It just shows you're being petty and irrational on the subject. That's like criticizing Pasternak for his great season. Like it makes no sense man. But if you have to be mad at Bo go ahead if it makes you feel better, it's your perogative. I guess Petterson doesn't care about winning either, or Miller, Kuzmenko, or Hughes for that matter. Bo also helped the Isles get into the playoffs and certainly seemed to care more about wins then points. Personally I don't care about Horvat. He's no longer a Canuck but he's actually making $8.5 million and that will just cost you your sanity.

Well yeah, he's got 38 games total in the NHL so I think that recent play should definitely be taken into account. His play in the second half was absolutely brutal though (.871). Worst I've seen in a while. I think he was rated as the worst backup in the NHL. If he can provide decent play like the start of the year and his 21-22 finish (3-0-3) then great. Not a lot of evidence though. The problem I see is that Demko doesn't appear to able to play 65-70 games without getting hurt. So if he plays 57-62 that leaves about 20+ starts for the backup. Hopefully you're right and my fears are misplaced. I'll be happier then heck if he can even play .500 and win 10 games but I'm awfully worried after watching his 29 games last year. It should be expected that your backup should be able to come in play semi-decent hockey if your goalie goes down with injury. Not just completely melt down like Martin did last year. I'd be way more comfortable with an upgrade there. Maybe Silovs comes in lights out and steals the job. If it's Martin I'll be nervously hoping for the best. From the article Acquire a better backup, or recall Arturs Silovs frequently We’re not here to be cruel or callous, but Spencer Martin was the worst backup in the NHL last year, and it wasn’t even close.

Yup, I was a big proponent of trade Miller keep Horvat but I've got to admit it admit it worked out fairly well. Miller is the more talented player, albeit older. As you say the team was definitely stale and no team can afford three 8 million dollar centers. We also got a decent return for Bo as well.

Yeah smart move on his part. He'll make more money waiting for the cap to finally increase and see if the team isn't a complete joke and out of the playoff race by December again. I would do the exact same thing if I was in his position. Very smart move. I have to totally respect what Horvat accomplished last year. It's obvious he put a tonne of time into working on his release and his shooting. It's also obvious he spent a tonne of time working on tips and net front play, as well as coming into camp in incredible shape. He won 958 face-offs as well for a 57% win ratio. It seems really odd to criticize a player for hard work and a career best performance. Really really weird take actually. I sure hope Petterson doesn't come in better than last year and score 50. That would be tragic lol. What an ahole Edit: In addition I don't know if you were following along and forgot because it doesn't suit your narrative but apparently the offer made to Horvat was ridiculously low at $5.125 for 8 years. That is no where near "fair market value", as you claim. https://clutchpoints.com/bo-horvat-insulting-contract-offer-vancouver-canucks-trade

And what attitude is that? Tired of playing for a crap team.

I'd be 100% on board with that. I think he might want to stay in the East and the US though. I totally agree though. The plan should be to have Willander come in on the third line and work him in slowly. We kind of are though. We have negative cap space, and have exhausted almost all of our assets besides Willander, Lekkerimaki, and our first. Unfortunately we've been all in for years and it keeps us from icing a better team. The article is dead right about that. "Now, this is the Vancouver Canucks we’re talking about, an organization that never needs much convincing to make a push toward postseason revenue."

This article seems more like a rough sketch of a school kid's essay but it throws out a bunch of talking points. -If we plan to play Demko 60+ my biggest fear is he gets injured again. If we go with Martin all year I think we're sunk anyway. He's brutal. -Our biggest factor will be trying to build a cohesive defensive unit, especially the top 6 -Once again we have a lot of new faces, can the team gel right off the bat or will we be out by December again -Captaincy is unimportant imo -I agree the team needs to be merciless for once, too much country club going back decades -I've felt our 2024 first has been gone for awhile, hopefully it's spent wisely and not on a rental, a partner for Hughes would be wise -I think we need to upgrade our top 6 somehow for our team to get to the next level, we're far to wishy washy with Boeser, Kuzmenko, and Garland. -Hoglander or Podkolzin making strides would be a godsend -Rick Tocchet, Foote, Gonchar, and the Sedin's could be a difference maker. What a great development for our club -I would ditch Beauvillier or Garland for an upgrade if possible, not sure Beauvillier makes a difference one way or another

I agree it's unfortunate that Garland is our 2nd/3rd/4th best winger. After how horrible we've been the last 5 or 6 years I personally find it odd that anyone would be defending any of these guys not named Kuzmenko though. That's like defending Myers because he was our third best defender. Big whoop. It's more of an indictment on how poor of a roster Benning complied than how good Garland is. It just simply hasn't been working period, and it's not Petterson, or Miller who aren't doing the job. At least Beauvillier is expiring this year, Mikeyhev has size, speed, and strong PK ability. Boeser while I've not been impressed lately is a home grown talent with a year shorter contract. People are correct he gets a lot of PP points, but at the very least is a strong option there that pays some dividends. If they can rejig the lines and Garland can find year long chemistry and production in the top 6 great, but I just don't understand the need from some folks to force him into a line-up at all costs when they clearly couldn't compete with the upper half of the league. For me it's about the Canucks first and foremost, not Garland. Maybe he can be a solution here but so far he hasn't been, and he has the worst contract out of our top 4 wingers.