[Report] Torts wanted to buy out Alex Burrows

[riffraff]

"Erhoff is our savior"

We have that player already. His name is Garrison, who outproduced Erhoff last season.

Once again, the problem isn't the point and the defense. The problem is the Sedins. I know this is hard to see cognitively, but you're taking something that's wearing out and already starting to fail and spending big bucks on tinkering around to keep it from failing and chugging along.

The Sedins are the problem with the powerplay. Take them off the powerplay and see whether or not it improves.

Garrison trumps Erhoff?!?!?! Holy blazing glass pipes Rob Ford!

[poetica]

Holy crap. If that's true, I want him re-hired so we can fire his arse again!

[HockeyHound93]

Agreed, they fixed the mistake. The problem is you can't take back the damage he did.

Whole team underperformed, will that have longer term issues on their psyche/confidence?

It cost them Luongo, Weise and possibly Kesler

Essentially a yr wasted with an aging core

Cost Gillis, 3 yrs remvoed from GM of the yr, his job when it' rumored he didn't want Torts in the first place

To name a few....

I hope the owners learned a very valuable lesson here. By imposing their will the last few yrs, this team has gone from SCF to 6th over all pick. I truly hope the new management group that's brought in actually has control over their job - but I have my doubts

I pretty much completely agree with this post, other than the costed them Luongo part. Luongo had wanted to leave the Canucks way before Torts even got here. Gillis just wasn't able to offload him. You could be right in the sense that Torts was the final straw for Luongo though with that whole Heritage Classic fiasco.

[Jack Fig]

If the things Mason says are fundamentally true, then it just confirms Torts was never the man for the job here...something many suspected right at his hiring. Too stubborn, too day-to-day, no ability to see past the end of his nose. The minute I saw he played Kesler 26 minutes in a pre-season game, I thought this guy didn't get the plot. Players on a west coast team complaining they didn't practice enough? The reddest of red flags right there. Not talking to Travis Green even once? Unfathomable. Dumping Burrows is basically the sanest of these peculiarities. There can hardly be any Canucks fans left who don't understand that he had to go.

[Dragonfruits]

who cares he is gone move on get over it already

[ShakyWalton]

If the things Mason says are fundamentally true, then it just confirms Torts was never the man for the job here...something many suspected right at his hiring. Too stubborn, too day-to-day, no ability to see past the end of his nose. The minute I saw he played Kesler 26 minutes in a pre-season game, I thought this guy didn't get the plot. Players on a west coast team complaining they didn't practice enough? The reddest of red flags right there. Not talking to Travis Green even once? Unfathomable. Dumping Burrows is basically the sanest of these peculiarities. There can hardly be any Canucks fans left who don't understand that he had to go.

It was a red flag for me before the season even started and Torts didnt even go to Penticton for the Young Stars Tourney????

Could never figure that out for a new coach in a new division..

[Jack Fig]

It was a red flag for me before the season even started and Torts didnt even go to Penticton for the Young Stars Tourney????

Could never figure that out for a new coach in a new division..

Agreed. He just never seemed to really buy-in all the way.

[Absent Canuck]

This whole "the core is too old" argument is a complete cop out.

The average age of New York's top 3 paid forwards is 33.

The average age of Montreal's top 3 paid forwards is 33.

The average of Vancouver's top 3 paid forwards is 31.

The biggest difference is that New York and Montreal have been able to integrate youth into the lineup, they have a goaltender that is playing amazing, and coaches that know how to coach.

These things are just as possible for the Canucks. They don't need the Sedins to be 100 point players and carry the team to have success. The GM needs to fix the problems that Gillis has failed to address, and if that's done, the rebuild won't take as long as some of these doom and gloom fans are predicting.

Nash is 30 years old. Richards is 34 and Martin St Louis is 38 years old. = 18th in offense

Vanek is 30. Plekanec will be 32 and Gionta is 34 Briere is 37 years old. = 21st overall offensively

Kesler 30 Twins 34 = 28th in the league offensively

Not too sure we want to make this argument.

Kane will be 26 , Toews is 27 , Sharp 31 = best offense in the league

Getzlaf , Perry both will be 29 eventually , Cogliano will be 27 = 2nd overall

Bergeron will be 29 in the summer, Lucic 27, Krejci 28 = 3rd most goals

Not even going to look at the Penguins or Avalanche.

[DeNiro]

Nash is 30 years old. Richards is 34 and Martin St Louis is 38 years old. = 18th in offense

Vanek is 30. Plekanec will be 32 and Gionta is 34 Briere is 37 years old. = 21st overall offensively

Kesler 30 Twins 34 = 28th in the league offensively

Not too sure we want to make this argument.

Kane will be 26 , Toews is 27 , Sharp 31 = best offense in the league

Getzlaf , Perry both will be 29 eventually , Cogliano will be 27 = 2nd overall

Bergeron will be 29 in the summer, Lucic 27, Krejci 28 = 3rd most goals

Not even going to look at the Penguins or Avalanche.

Who cares? They're both in the conference finals.

Regular season stats are irrelevant once you reach the playoffs.

[Junkyard Dog]

Nash is 30 years old. Richards is 34 and Martin St Louis is 38 years old. = 18th in offense

Vanek is 30. Plekanec will be 32 and Gionta is 34 Briere is 37 years old. = 21st overall offensively

Kesler 30 Twins 34 = 28th in the league offensively

Not too sure we want to make this argument.

Kane will be 26 , Toews is 27 , Sharp 31 = best offense in the league

Getzlaf , Perry both will be 29 eventually , Cogliano will be 27 = 2nd overall

Bergeron will be 29 in the summer, Lucic 27, Krejci 28 = 3rd most goals

Not even going to look at the Penguins or Avalanche.

Your argument is somewhat flawed.

I don't see how regular season statistics effect the playoffs for teams who have made it. MTL and NYR are both in the ECF.

[Tearloch7]

Gary is the former Sports Editor of the Vancouver Sun before he moved to the Globe & Mail. He is a phenomenal writer, and built the Vancouver Sun sports section into something people wanted to read. Once He left the Sun, the Sun sports crashed and burned big time. In fact if you took every single current sports analyst in Vancouver and put them together, they still wouldn't measure up to his credibility.

That is reassuring but something smells a bit .. like where did the info come from?? .. is it a hatchet job for a purpose?

[Honky Cat]

It staggers the mind...It's no wonder the players had their worst season..From GM ,to coach,to players,it was a dysfunctional group...

[DeltaSwede]

To ever bring up the idea of Alex Burrows being bought out makes me very angry.

Absolutley ridiculous to think that such a thing could happen. The guy literally worked his tail off and had one bad season and now we should get rid of him. I wish we had a team of Keslers and Burrows.

[johngould21]

It was a red flag for me before the season even started and Torts didnt even go to Penticton for the Young Stars Tourney????

Could never figure that out for a new coach in a new division..

Hell, he never went anywhere in Vancouver other than Rogers Arena either. That was after his in depth interview with Sekeres, I'm going to say near the end of October. Mind you, I've been downtown twice in the last calendar year, so maybe he was onto something there.

[Bo Horvat]

Keep Burrows and get rid of Torts? Fair deal imo.

[viking mama]

Torts didn't really seem to ever get what this team was about. Coming in he had no idea about who anyone was. The "I'm excited about this Edler guy" comment said it all. How do you not know who an All Star defenseman is? Was he not watching the 2011 Stanley cup playoffs? I want a coach who will at least tune in to watch every playoff game, especially after his team has been eliminated. Torts clearly isn't a fan of the game on the whole. Hopefully our next coach has seen what our guys can do and has a few ideas on how to make them even better.

John Stevens seems to be everything to his play-off savy team in LA...that John Tortorella apparently was NOT, while here in VanCity.

Stevens is reported to be: very studious, hard-working, cerebral, a video-guru, a technician of the game, a good & honest communicator, a solid evaluator of talent, familiar with the power-house teams of the Pacific Division, capable of re-juvenating careers, is a teacher, a calming influence, respected, eats-up statistics, is honorable & capable of leading, directing or listening to ALL of the professionals surrounding him...& more.

Not sayin' that everything on that list was missing from John Tortorella's performance review following just 1 season in VanCity (Point Roberts, actually)...but from what we've gleaned from Gary Mason's revelations....a lot MORE was absent than one would have thought!

Just think how differently things may have turned-out...had Gillis stayed on his original course, stuck to his guns, & hired John Stevens?

C'est la vie!

It's not very satisfying saying, I told ya so, in this instance,...BUT - I told ya so.

[Benchsplinters]

Say it isn't so??!

After all that love and support I threw behind Torts?

Just as I argued that Torts may not have been given enough time in a fair shake deal, this would suggest he was prematurely assessing his players and not allowing Burr to work through the injury plagued issues he was bouncing back from.

His timing, puck luck, confidence - everything went South but only a fool would get rid of a guy who'll sacrifice himself every game even if it's in the background that is the front of the net.

Well then, glad Torts is gone. Burr better be sticking around....

I think a lot of us felt the same about Tortorella. At first I thought he was going to be a good coach however, when the whole team went south, it was obvious that there was only one common denominator that was instrumental in all the team troubles and that was the coach. How can so many good players play so badly all at one time?

I am glad he is gone as well

[Nino]

This is intresting... Why would he want to buy him out and not be suggesting that he should be traded? Why would you buy out a player that could be traded? Did they try and trade him and there was no market for him, wouldn't think so.

[alt kilgore]

He also has a track record of 4 straight 25+ goal seasons, and has scored more goals in his previous 5 seasons than anyone on the team outside Daniel.

It's not like he didn't have a reason for his poor season. He never recovered from his foot injury. It happens.

Booth on the other hand has shown nothing to think that he's gonna earn his 4 million dollars next season. He'll get the buyout.

Exactly.

If Mason's story is true then I've just done a 180 on my opinion of Torts. I was one that thought Tortorella should be given another half season at least to see what he could do with a (hopefully) healthy season with players like....uh....Burrows.

It almost seems like Torts who doesn't watch much film even of his own team, as a New York coach of an Eastern team especially, he probably never watched any Canucks games. And probably formed his opinion of Alex before he got here from the Eastern media's ongoing skewing of Burrows. He had no idea of how valuable Burrows has been to this team. Among other things he scored two, count em two, game 7 series clinching goals ...against St. Louis in 2009 and Chicago in 2011. Yes Burrows made a couple of mistakes in his career, one biting (on a gloved finger shoved into his mouth - seriously who wouldn't?), and pulling Keith's hair in a fight. How many other cheap shots has he been guilty of especially since he was promoted to the top line? Marchand did more rat plays in one freakin game than Alex did all year.

What should be asked is how did Torts get through the interview process? But then again he now seems like a guy who is more like a smooth talking used car salesman. He said one thing but did another. The first warning shots for me, was his insistence on increasing the twins ice time, as well as playing Kesler to death and basically sitting the fourth line because...he was only concerned with winning the next game. And that the season would magically take care of itself. That he could drastically alter AVs ice time system and at the same time demand more shot blocking.

And its ironic that the injury that started Alex's dismal year was a shot block. Not that he wouldn't block shots anyways and could have been injured regardless but its still odd that the consummate team player that eagerly adopted his coaches edicts is the player that the coach wants out?

[TheXFactor]

I'm tempted to bookmark this thread in case Burrows plays just as badly for the next 1 or 2 seasons. Granted at the moment buying him out would be a bad move but i'm up for trading/ buying out Burrows if it somehow makes the team better.

And as much as I hate to say this... REALLY hate to say this... but IMO Marchand > Burrows. Better rat, better at getting under people's skin (players and fans alike), and better overall forward. Love to have him on this team.