Maniwaki Canuck

This ground has been covered extensively on other threads: there is enough money to keep our top forwards if that's what we want to do. Let's not speculate about what Miller wants: that's not something that's going to be resolved here. Yes, our better RD will have their contracts expire in the coming years. But in a cap world, you can't stockpile top 4 D just because some will be leaving. Myers, Hamonic, Poolman, Schenn, Burroughs and Woo is excellent depth on the right side: the first 4 of those can and have played top 4 minutes. Upgrading on one of those guys when they move on would be great if it can be done without paying a huge premium but it isn't a reason to trade Miller. OP's whole point is that our D has been performing better than our offense. This needs to sink into the thinking around here.

Why don't we just re-allocate the nearly 10M that Myers, Hamonic and Schenn make to other RD once they're gone? It makes no sense to trade Miller to get a replacement RD now when we're already awash in them. If he won't re-sign of course we should deal him, but for the best return, not necessarily an RD. And if he wants to stay at manageable price/term, we'd be nuts to trade him.

Thank you. This realization should call into question the received wisdom and most of the trade proposals on this board. Hopefully Rutherford sees the reality of this team's performance as opposed to the established narrative.

If Petey continues as he has been this year, I'd reluctantly consider it in the summer. But it would be super-risky and invite the "whoever gets the best player wins the trade" adage. If you swapped Brock into that package, I think it would be more likely to go from our end. Just a question: how much better is Marino than Poolman? Some, undoubtedly, but is the difference enough to justify handing over one of our top forwards? That's the question I'd want to answer before doing that deal. Mayfield seems like a clearer complement to our puck-moving D who would give us something we lack, so I'm more inclined to sacrifice some value at forward for someone like him.

Just coming off LTIR: what was that about?

Okay, yeah, got it: his old expensive deal is over.

cap?

One question I have is how many pucking-moving/puck-carrying D do we really need? With Hughes, OEL, Meyers and Rathbone available, it doesn't seem like a weak spot. Upgrading the more defensive guys that can play with them would make sense but I think Hamonic, Poolman, Schenn and Burroughs have actually been pretty good at that. With that said, Schenn does get walked a bit more than you'd like when playing with Hughes. He's smart and covers up his lack of footspeed well with good posiitoning, but it's not ideal. What would be nice is a big, somewhat mobile punishing crease-clearer and cycle-breaker, maybe like Hamonic in his prime. If we have to move a good forward, I'd look at maybe including Poolman and going after a package like Mayfield and Pageau from NYI.

I'd hate to move on from Brock, Miller or Petey, but those seem like the guys that could go in any attempt to re-balance our lineup. Those would be difficult deals to do at the deadline, though, and not just because of their salaries. A bigger sticking point is what we'd be asking for in return, which would have to include good NHL players, not just picks and prospects, and therefore affect the composition of the team acquiring them. Most contenders aren't looking to re-tool on the fly themselves, just add rental type players. So if anything happens, I'm thinking it will be around the draft at the earliest, but more likely free agency, when hockey deals are most doable. This timeline would also allow the new management to properly assess our players, which is the most important thing.

4th line was our only good one last game. Lammikko may not have the greatest set of tools, but he brings it every night. As long as they're forechecking and keeping the opposition hemmed in their own zone, they're more than doing their job.

Nylander is a good comparison: hopefully it comes around like that for Pettersson. There are a lot of variables here: pressure, injury, training. It's not easy watching him play like this but even MacKinnon had a regression before re-establishing himself. It happens.

Thought the 4th line was good tonight, maybe our best. By the 3rd, I was having flashbacks of the Green line blender. But fair enough, the top 3 lines didn't have much going. Eventually there was going to be a game like this. Props to Halak for pulling a point out of it.

Bloody terrible that. I drive by there a lot when I come into town. Hate to say it but there may not be that big a dent where he hit her, which is how I'd expect to identify that vehicle. Looked like snow was covering the plates.

Makes some sense that training issues could be involved. It usually takes players a few years to figure out what they need to do to play their game at the NHL level. Squats and power skating wouldn't be out of place for Pettersson.

I think so: Pearson Miller Chiasson Dickinson Horvat Hoglander Garland Pettersson Podkolzin Highmore Lamakko Motte

Gotta take these chumps tonight. Cant let them think we aren't hunting them down. A win tonight and we leapfrog a couple of teams in the standings. Not to mention a record for Bruce.

I remain a bit worried. His confidence still isn't there and it seems to go straight to his hands. Even in his current state he's a useful player but not the one we're used to or that is worth his contract. Some say that the league has figured him out, and that might be true in some ways. But you can't figure out someone with an elite shot, elite vision and elite passing ability. So I think it's in his head. Putting him on the pk and getting him to just react and stop thinking is probably the way out.

Don't know what triggered that moral avalanche, but for the record: I actually think that what Giroux did was pretty funny, way funnier than the stupid stuff I did when I was young and drunk. I also think its more honourable to do something like that to a person who can push back (like a cop) than someone who can't (like most women and children). So I've got no problem with the guy and think he's badass. But I also think it's funny

That trip is the moment of truth, for sure. If we can do .500 then I'm calling playoffs. Anything more and it would be tempting to buy at the deadline, but it would have to be on the cheap.

J.T. f'n Miller. Best player we've had in years but let's ship him out. Stay in the moment, people, and be careful what you wish for!

Miller is 100% a core player. Trade him and you'll only be looking for someone like him, and they don't grow on trees. So if he'll re-sign at 8M or less, get it done. if he won't, yes, we can't let him walk for nothing so trade him. The question would be when? While he probably has maximum value going into this year's trade deadline, we might still be in the running for the playoffs then or management might still be evaluating, which would prevent us from moving him. Plus, it's hard (but not impossible) for a contender to take on his contract and surrender the players we'd want at that time of year. We'd need a top young player and a couple of top prospects coming back and could retain salary for the remainder of this year to make it work out cap-wise. I'm not sure how many contenders have those pieces, let alone a willingness to give them up. A deal would be easier to do before the draft when teams are overhauling their rosters and more of them might be in the mix. That's when I'd expect to see any deal. But I really hope we don't: this guy is the heartbeat of our team.

As a Canuck fan, you haven't lived til you've gone to a Canucks game in Calgary and given as good as you've got from their inbred fans. Did it a lot in the early 90s with the Bure/Linden team and it was a blast. There's always lots of us, and we find each other! It's as good an invasion experience as Blue Jays fans going to Seattle.

Can't hate everyone or even every team but I'll only ever cheer for the Canucks. After that, it's just a question of liking some players (Ovi, Mackinnon, etc.) and which teams aren't at the top of the hate list (Boston, Chicago, Vegas, Calgary, Edmonton, Toronto). But to be honest, watching other teams play doesn't do a lot for me and I seldom hang in for a whole game. Fans need emotional skin in the game to be fans.

I agree that there were positives under Benning. People point to his drafting and there were definitely some home runs there, as well as some strikeouts. For me, the trades for Miller, OEL and Garland were some of the best moves, although to my shame, I wasn't on board with the Miller deal initially. Above all, I actually like the lineup we have right now, and have defended it on other threads here where people want to ship out core players to re-load. It took a long time, probably too long, but he did put together a team I can believe in. The big negatives of the Benning regime included the incredible shrinking front office, reduced to an echo chamber after multiple purges of dissenting opinions, the abysmal communication and the unwillingness to move on from Green. There were some bad misjudgments of who mattered in the room (e.g. Tanev) but every GM makes some bad personnel decisions if they hang around long enough. In the end, ownership was right to pull the plug. Probably it should have happened half a year sooner but then we might not have OEL and Garland. What matters is that we have a strong lineup, the right coach for it, and some of the best management in the league. Things are looking up here.

I'm thinking no/yes, but to be honest I'm not sure how Soderstrom's progressing. He'd have to be tracking well above his draft slot for this to tempt me. Keller and Carolina's 1st (via Montreal, if that's the pick you mean) aren't that exciting. But if it's Montreal's own pick, that might be a different matter! Would also depend on how Petterson fares during the rest of the season too. A move like this would probably happen in advance of the draft no?