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Canucks are #1 favorite to win the cup??? I know it's early but seeing Boston at #3 makes me dream about the current Canucks avenging 2011 Canucks. Would love to see Marchand cry at the hands of EP, Hughes, Bo, Brock and company.

I was actually curious where Kunlun Redstars is based in, thinking it's a located in a city called Kunlun. But I guess the team is in Beijing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HC_Kunlun_Red_Star)? Kunlun turns out to be a mountain range. Interesting.

Indeed, he seems like the right man to clear the mess. He just cleared the biggest mess of the previous regime, once an effective PWF but now too slow to be effective, Milan Lucic for a guy that can still keep up with the play in James Neal. If they can continue to build better forward depth around McDavid and Draisaitl, they have chance to be competitive for many years to come.

He was an effective power forward but that style of play must have taken a lot of toll on his body. My guess is that he will be "retiring" (I mean go on the LTIR) as soon as next season.

I get what you are saying and I agree that Baer should be the first call up. But to say that the Comets are a distant thought is a bit shortsighted. The players on that team needs to be developed properly so that they can help the team over the next few seasons. Imagine if an injury occurs to a scoring forward in the playoffs race or heck, in the playoffs and our first call up is fully developed Kole Lind or bottom 6 injury occurs and fully developed Jonah Gadjovich is the first call up. Same thing goes for defence.

1. No. 2. 2nd. 3. Edler. Sadly, no one is better than him other than Hughes. Maybe one day when Olli makes the team, he will replace Edler on the 2nd PP.

With the recent strong showings, it's more clear and clear that our window to win the cup will open up very soon, maybe it will start as soon as this year. If we can somehow lock up Petey at 9mil per year, that would leave enough cap room to keep the team competitive for many years to come (assuming Hughes comes in at a lower cap hit than Petey). I think our window will be wide open when Eriksson + Luongo's 9M cap comes off the book, at which point we will be able to afford our version of Marian Hossa to complete the lineup... unfortunately, that will be in 3 seasons (including this one). It's hard to imagine winning the cup when 11% of the team's cap is basically dead (9mil of 81 mil = 11.11% of the cap for Eriksson and Luongo). We could even go after Taylor Hall if it weren't for Eriksson and Luongo's cap hit, and open the window to win the cup as soon as next season.

It might not even be a hockey agent but a real estate agent of whoever wrote that tweet.

Switching up EP and Boeser seems to open up the seams for cross ice pass between EP and Boeser. Although it takes away the one timer, both guys have a great wrist/snap shot so that was a good decision. It gives the PP a different look to throw the opponents off a bit. But at the end of the day, without Hughes, they wouldn't be able to even set up the PP formations. The zone entry is way easier with Hughes compared to Edler. With Edler, as good a player he is, makes you cringe on zone entry during PP. We all know the drop pass is coming with 100% certainty. With Hughes, he can do it himself or he can drop it off, not easy to read. Love this Hughes kid. Never had a defenceman like this in the history of the franchise.

Goal of the decade? There is this sick goal that took place at the beginning of the decade and Tkachuck's goal ain't dethroning that one. There is a perfect tip pass from this guy wearing 33 followed by perfect receiving of the puck all while defender is tagging the forward wearing 22, deke leading to missed poke check, and then there's between the leg shot. Tkahuck's goal is like, I got no time left, I'm just gonna shoot it anyway I can. Oh look, it went in!

I agree with you. It will be nearly impossible to trade Tanev if we are firmly in the playoff race. I think almost any team in Pacific division is beatable, of course, we haven't played against the Golden Knights yet. We could be the surprise team like Hurricanes last season or much like the Hawks in 2009.

MDZ is their #1 pairing? Guddy is #2 pairing? Their defence reminds me of Canucks in 2017. I think this will be a harder game compared to LA. Although Anaheim's D is poor, they have some good players up front and goaltending is still solid. It makes me realize how good of a manager Doug Wilson is (Sharks). That team has never really had to rebuild in like 20 years. Just a bit of retooling as players got older but replaced by the next core fairly well.

My assumption was that Tanev will be traded to recoup a 1st rounder in 2020. But with him being such a perfect partner to Hughes, I think we should re-sign Tanev, maybe on a 2 or 3 year contract. I think JB's plan may have been to trade Tanev before the TDL, sign Barrie in the off season to fill the vacancy in the top 4. But if the team is in the playoffs race, it's going to be nearly impossible to trade Tanev. Besides, now we know how good Quinn is, we might not need Barrie, who will undoubtedly cost at least 7 million dollars.

Aren't like 4th in GA? According to NHL (http://www.nhl.com/stats/team?reportType=season&seasonFrom=20192020&seasonTo=20192020&gameType=2&filter=gamesPlayed,gte,1&sort=goalsAgainst), we have allowed 29 goals in 12 games = 2.41 GAA. If we are winning 7-5 or 8-5 then this thread is justified but, we are winning games with scores like 5-3 7-2 5-5 (SO loss) 5-2 3-2 0-1 3-3 (SO win) 5-1 2-2 (SO win) 8-2. We have given up more than 2 goals only three times in the last 10 games. Basically, we should be winning games 5-0 like we were during the peak of Sedin era for us to be legit? Actually, I hope we never get comfortable and continue to win games like we do now. 5-2, 5-3 is perfectly good enough of a win for me.

Yep and top 2 among centers, only behind McDavid.

Weird, I thought the 2011 team was honest too. You watched too much TSN and now you are believing in their narratives. Sedins, Luongo, Bieksa, Hamhuis, Edler, these guys didn't do anything that you mentioned above. The only guy that ever did something weird was probably Burrows, who had that biting incident and hair pulling. But this was in response to Bergeron putting a finger in his mouth and Keith poking his eyes. Selling calls was the norm back then to be honest, everybody did it and yet, it sounds like the Canucks are the only team that had guys trying to sell calls. And cheap shots? F*ck no. We took a lot of cheap shots. Kesler was stomped by Pronger. Cross check to lower back of the Sedins. Marchand low bridging Salo. F*ck man, can't believe one of our own fans is believing in that crap that the media is spewing out to get the rest of country against us. Mark my words, if we make the finals, they will make something else up to make us into a villain. I will never forget that the rest of Canada wanted Boston to win the cup than the Canucks.

Well, Doughty had a big hand in helping us achieve the biggest goal differential (now tied for 2nd, Boston is +16). Thanks Drew.

You can be a casual fan of both teams but not a true fan of both. I can't even be a fan of two teams in different leagues, let alone in the same league. The last time was Grizzlies and Canucks. At the end of the day, I guess the only way for me to justify being a fan of two or more teams across different leagues is if they are based in Vancouver. Since the Grizzlies left, I haven't really been a fan of any other team. I just don't understand how you get attached to any team that you have no association with.

Toronto's star players probably feel that they deserve a big piece of the pie (profit) as Toronto does generate a lot more profit/revenue compared to most other NHL cities. For example, let's say an all-star caliber player on any team contributes about 2% to the total revenue generated. If Toronto generates say 1 billion dollars of revenue then, this star player deserves 20 million dollars. But of course, with the cap and parity and all, he won't be able to take 20 million so he settles for maximum that he can get (the upper ceiling is set at 12.5 by McDavid). On the other hand, Vancouver may generate say half of what Toronto generates, so 500 million dollars. A star player of the same caliber should get 10 million dollars (2% of 500 million dollars). So that's kind of in line with what one would consider a discount. And of course, there are players like McDavid who is on a level on his own and probably contributes more than 2% to the total revenue so in his case, he set his own salary, which in my opinion, was a discount for what he brings to that team. Anyhow, that's probably not the only reason why but probably one of the reasons why Toronto players don't want to take a pay cut. in their opinion, they are already taking a pay cut in terms of proportion.

I saw him hit a few times.

Curse of Luongo. Luongo wanted to do Canucks a favor and go on LTIR. Panthers didn't give a $hit since they don't get much cap saving from it anyways. Karma coming back to bite them in the a$$.

Yes x 1 million. Can't believe this is even a question. Petey for Gretzky in his prime??? As much as I love Petey, I'd even trade Petey for McDavid let alone Gretzky. Take your homer glasses off, and you will see that Petey is still very raw and we don't know if he's peak is going to be anywhere near say McDavid, not to mention Gretzky. The scary thing is that McDavid is already playing at or near his peak, which could last at least 10 more years. And what is even more scary is that Edmonton sucks even with McDavid. You put replace Petey with McDavid on Canucks and we are going to SCF this season.

Where's Ferland? If Goldy and Petey are playing together, I think they need Miller (or Ferland) on their line. A player with puck retrieval abilities, size, and play making. Miller-Petey-Goldy Baer-Bo-Pearson Ferland-Sutter-Boeser Schaller-Beagle-Virtanen Motte The thing with Goldy is that he can make plays but aside from that, he doesn't bring much. Miller can make plays as well as Goldy. And having Boeser on the third line doesn't make much sense. I say no to Goldy until he shows that he can do other stuff better as well. Miller-Petey-Boeser Baer-Bo-Pearson Ferland-Sutter-Virtanen Schaller-Beagle-Motte

If Baer can prove that he can stay healthy, I'm sure he will get another chance with the team. It will be like a trade deadline acquisition. I think he will slot in nicely alongside Horvat and Pearson. Goldy, I'm not so sure. It's not a surprise that he is ripping up the AHL; he has graduated from the AHL couple years ago. Yes, he can make plays but he needs to bring other elements besides playmaking to be useful in the NHL. By March our line up could look like: Miller-EP-Boeser Baer-Horvat-Pearson Ferland-Sutter-Leivo Roussel-Beagle-Virtanen Schaller Motte Eriksson That's actually pretty decent depth up front.

Just imagine when EP does fill out and plays around 200-210 pounds. Given EP's competitiveness and skill level, I see a second coming of Peter Forsberg but hopefully less injury prone.