Building a team capable of winning the SC

[Gaudette Celly]

Still these examples are rare and should not and cannot be held as some sort of template. They got lucky.

[oldnews]

still first round picks buddy

your point is lost in the wash at this point.

every team gets one. every year. you don't need to tank for 19th and 28th picks.

28th overall comes as a result of being the 3rd best team in the NHL.

Ironically, Perry was picked just after the Ducks went to the Stanley Cup Final.

[Clonedanielsedin]

How is my point at a wash? Anyone can read back at what i said and see that its not, i wont bother.

I am saying I HOPE the Canucks tank, i know that they never intentionally would.

[Gaudette Celly]

"Just got lucky"

Fine, then Chicago "just got lucky" with Toews and Kane and Pittsburgh with Crosby and Malkin. And teams like Edmonton and Florida that have had many picks in the top-10 are simply "unlucky"?

Capitulation.

[oldnews]

How is my point at a wash? Anyone can read back at what i said and see that its not, i wont bother.

I am saying I HOPE the Canucks tank, i know that they never intentionally would.

Your point is a wash when you name Perry as an example of a core player in a discussion which is a debate about whether tanking is necessary or not - I won't repeat how it undermines the case for tanking.

And LA's "tank" was one Doughty pick. The rest of their core - not top 10 picks and a number of them acquisitions not built through tanking in the draft.

So really, among Boston, LA, NYRangers, and Detroit (at least one of those teams has been in the SCF 6 of the last 7 years) a team like Chicago, with two of their own high 'tank' picks on their roster, is in the minority.

Last year was Vancouver's "tank".

They got Virtanen. 6th overall. Done. Up and away.

[spook007]

After reading through the last 5 pages, is it fair to think there is no guarantees, as to how you build a winning team.

Yes picking in top 3 helps, yes good management is needed, but most important is luck...and plenty of it.

However, if nucks started tanking, it would be interesting to see how many of these posters would be around in 5 years... Just like the people selling tickets at Rodgers Area will be wondering...

[SealTheDeal]

If the question is how does any hypothetical team build a cup-winning team, then the answer is any number of ways. They accumulate talent by draft, by trade, by FA, find a good mix of players, and usually benefit from excellent playoff goal-tending. I absolutely concede that many, but not all, cup winning teams have at least one or two players drafted in the top 5.

If the question is how the Canucks can build a cup-winning team, the parameters are more restricted. I think the following assumptions are reasonable:

1) Current management will not bear a perennial loser. While there are risks associated with both rebuilding on the fly, retooling, and blowing things up to accumulate high or numerous picks, not every path risks potential destruction of the fan base and the financial security of the franchise. Impoverishing your franchise such that you can no longer spend to the cap is a great way of decreasing your odds of ever winning a cup. This assumption alone would seem to eliminate any pursuit of a "tank" or "intentionally not competitive" model.

2) The Sedins will probably not be moved in the next two years, if ever. It is hard to imagine them choosing to waive their NMCs to go to any team that is a non-contender, and I cant think of any of those that could take on the cap hit without hugely unbalancing their roster moving forward. The exceptions might by Nashville, Winnipeg or the Islanders. But would either offer anything approaching reasonable value for them? They have their own star players that will need to be paid, and they need to accumulate their own young guys for future years. Sedins for Dal Colle and 2015 and 2016 first rounders? The stars really have to align if you want to move these guys.

3) As long as the Sedins are here and you have any young talent whatsoever, you are not going to be a league basement dweller. There are too many other bad teams that actually have no plausible path to success at all except to be terrible and lucky at the draft. Arizona comes to mind. Even if the Canucks traded away Hamhuis, Bieksa, Vrbata and Miller all at this years draft, and replaced them only by promoting Baertschi, Clendening, Corrado, and Markstrom, it is hard to imagine us drafting even top 3 in 2016. Buffalo will still probably be worse. Toronto will be worse. New Jersey and Carolina could still easily be worse.

Given those assumptions, I think the route to cup contention in Vancouver is the following.

1) Make use of the remaining Sedin years to be as competitive as possible.

2) Sign free agents on short term contracts with an eye to maximizing future trade value. Vrbata is an excellent example of this, if he is flipped at the deadline for a high pick or quality prospect. The number of FAs you sign depends on how many core prospects you want to try to develop in the NHL or secondary prospects that you are trying to build value in for trade.

3) Use your competitiveness in any given year to maximize value of your assets, in order to convert them into future core players if possible. I would argue Edler may be a good example of a player that you probably can trade for high value right now, but whose value may have not been so great in recent years. If you think he can up his trade value on our team next year, fine, wait. If you think he is a core piece of a future contender then you are saying the Canucks window is going to reopen maybe 2 or 3 years from now. I doubt it. He's 29 and on a very reasonable contract. That is a player you could maybe move to a young team entering their window for big return in picks and prospects. You could conceivably get a Dal Colle or a Draisaitl as part of a package back. Lack may also be a good example of a good player to trade; his value probably won't go up over the course of the year. Guys like Hansen and Bonino who are utility players that make you competitive and mesh well with younger players but will not get elite pieces in return you hold onto until their FA year unless someone offers unexpected value.

Strategy for the draft: Try to trade Edler for max value. Try to trade Miller if someone like San Jose or Edmonton can give you value. If not, trade Lack for max value. I think on Lack and Edler I would be selling high. I think with Miller I would be flipping a FA for some value. Accumulate picks for 2016, a deep draft year by all reports. Qualify your RFAs - Corrado, Clendening, Markstrom, Grenier, Stanton, Weber etc. Possibly extend RFAs that you think will give you value.

Strategy for free agency: Target one or two FAs. If you can get any top four D or top 6 forward on a 2-3 year contract, don't worry about overpaying. Cap space isn't a huge issue - we aren't expecting to contend so we don't need to squeeze in every last veteran contract we can. Try to Vrbatify them into potential solid trade return at future deadlines. Extend Hamhuis or Bieksa if they give deep discount on their contracts and accept minimal NTCs or no NTCs.

Strategy for the season: Win as much as you can.

If you approach the deadline with little expectation of making the playoffs, trade Vrbata. Trade Bieksa, Hamhuis, Lack unless they agree to very good value contracts. Hamhuis and Bieksa will be more likely to waive at the deadline if they are going to contenders and know that it is unlikely that they will be re-signed in Vancouver. They know that they will be moving anyway. Accumulate 2016 picks.

If you approach the deadline likely to make the playoffs - no harm done. Certainly don't be buying rentals. If their is a hockey trade to be made that moves a helpful, younger player in that makes sense, like Baertschi for a second rounder, sure. You can't really know if any of your young guys are good in the playoffs until you actually see them in the playoffs. And since you are trying to build a core of young players that will win you a cup, seeing them in the playoffs at some point is a necessary part of that. Again, look at extending pending FAs only if they provide great value.

2016 draft strategy: use accumulated picks, moving up if possible. Trade away high value pieces (possibly Bonino at that point). Try to draft at least 2 players that can be reasonably expected to be part of a new core.

2016 free agency: there is a long list of high end FAs available that year so far. You may be able to pick up one or two solid pieces during that time, particularly if you made the playoffs the previous year.

That's my master plan. Tear it apart all you like.

[VANcanucks92]

The Oilers didnt tank they were just legit bad, as for Buffalo look what happens when they tank, karma comes in and no McDavid. Eichel is still good but they wanted McDavid and didnt get him. Teams that tank get zero respect and everyone thought Buffalo got what they deserved.

[bluesman60]

Thank god he seems to have a brain unlike most of the posters here who think tanking is the formula to winning ever since Oilers lucked out in the lottery. So many shortsighted people that would probably jump off the bandwagon and root for another team if this team ever became like Edmonton.

Your a total freaking idiot. There is a fine line between rebuilding and tanking....it happens, get over it instead of giving yourself a congratulations pat on the back because you think you know more than the rest.

[lmm]

Chicago never truly tanked, they just stunk for a while, same for LA.

Boston, Detroit, Carolina, Tampa, Jersey and Colorado (well the Nord's were brutal, and I'm pretty sure they never "tanked") all won cups without being tank ass losers to get there.

Sure, use Crapsburg as an example of tanking, however, they tanked by default for Crosby in a lockout year, if they tanked it was for Malkin.. 2nd overall. OV went first, how'd that tank work for Washington? (If memory serves, I could be wrong and I'll check if I care enough)

CALGARY? ARE YOU KIDDING ME!? We have just as much of a shot at the cup in the next decade as Cowtown, please, Calgary... That argument sucks. Same with your Edmonton has a better shot crap. Ed's got no defence, no goaltentending, no grit, nothing but picks.

Tanking is for losers.

I love how peops on this site paraphrase the OPs argument then howl about tanking.\

The OP never said tank , you did.

Chicago never tanked they just sucked for a while? What!

Toews was a 3rd overall and Kane was 1st. Please explain how that is different from tanking?

Doughty was 2nd overall. Stamkos?

Detroit built their team before the cap era and won 1 cup with the remnants of that club.

You are playing semantics if you are saying "Sucking for a while" is any different than "Tanking"

[canucklehead44]

Teams don't make the playoffs then say "hey lets suck next year so we can get high draft picks". GMs go into each season trying to win. Approaching trade deadline, if a team is more or less mathematically eliminated i they will sell off old players for younger ones and draft picks.

After a late season "tank", especially with low budget teams, a GM may accept that he can't acquire the assets to become competitive. Henceforth, just works with what he has. In this scenario, if the team was over achieving and was realistically going to make the playoffs rarely would you see another sell off of older players.

If the Canucks are sitting 11th or 12th in the west at the deadline, I would expect to see Vrbata traded for a decent return. You might also see Hamhuis and/or Bieksa dealt. If all three players are gone, the return would be solid and we would start to lose even more games, enter the bottom 5 and hopefully win the lottery and parlay those picks into either young players, solid draft picks, or trade multiple picks to acquire another first round pick.

[BI3KSA-]

Sure the owners would have to bite the bullet for a couple of seasons but I seriously doubt that the building would be empty in the Vancouver hockey crazed city.

If you draft just one player with the talent of Pavel Bure, you would be hard pressed to find game day tickets.

Or put another way, if we didn't make the playoffs this year and were fortunate enough to be drafting McDavid, do you really think the fans would stay away? One thing for sure, another couple of 1st round exits and the fans just might become disinterested.

Playing just to make the playoffs is not a winning environment, it is just treading water to get the gate.

If Edmonton gets the players to fill out their talented team and Calgary continues to shine you might be hard pressed to even make the playoffs especially when you can almost guarantee that LA will be back next year. If you wait too long, your vets will walk as UFAs or retire and then you are back on 1st base looking to steal.

We had missing seats in the playoffs after missing the playoffs ONCE and then following it up with a 101 point season and subsequent playoffs. Attendance would go down massively if we tanked.

Yeah lets go right ahead and draft player with the talent of Pavel Bure, even though since Bure there hasn't been, for the most part, anyone available to draft for any team that had his level of talent.

[BI3KSA-]

I love how peops on this site paraphrase the OPs argument then howl about tanking.\

The OP never said tank , you did.

Chicago never tanked they just sucked for a while? What!

Toews was a 3rd overall and Kane was 1st. Please explain how that is different from tanking?

Doughty was 2nd overall. Stamkos?

Detroit built their team before the cap era and won 1 cup with the remnants of that club.

You are playing semantics if you are saying "Sucking for a while" is any different than "Tanking"

It isn't semantics just because you dont grasp the difference. There is a difference between being terrible cause your team is terrible compared to pulling a Buffalo and trading all your half way decent players so you guaranteed suck worse than half the AHL teams.

Just like there was a difference the year before this past one where we were awful and drafted 6th vs selling off all our players for picks so we can intentionally be completely awful.

[JamesB]

After reading through the last 5 pages, is it fair to think there is no guarantees, as to how you build a winning team.

Yes picking in top 3 helps, yes good management is needed, but most important is luck...and plenty of it.

However, if nucks started tanking, it would be interesting to see how many of these posters would be around in 5 years... Just like the people selling tickets at Rodgers Area will be wondering...

It is clearly true that there are no guarantees. The best thing we can do is look at what is likely or unlikely. But luck (good or bad) can always mess things up.

We understand that the Canucks are not going to "tank" in the sense of losing intentionally by completely gutting the team (like Buffalo) to assemble as many drafts as possible AND finish low enough to get a top 2 or 3 pick for a couple of year.

But is it very hard to build a Cup contender without some very high draft picks (say top 3 or 4). It happens, but the smart money won't be betting that direction.

Yes, future stars are sometimes drafted fairly low in the first round, like Getzlaf and Perry, but not often and they come from the top 3 much more often.

If the Canucks succeed in making the playoffs for next year or two I think they are very unlikely to become Cup contenders. It could happen but the odds are strongly against it.

If they miss the playoffs next year (as I think is likely) and they are able to make some trades at the deadline for picks. I think they are much more likely to become Cup contenders.

I agree that Benning's record suggests that he has a good idea for talent. That does not mean he is good at negotiating contracts. I am willing to believe that he has correctly judged that Sbisa is a useful guy to have around. It is the 3.6 million part that is crazy. If Sbisa went to arbitration there is no way he would have got 3.6 million.

As a fan I am not sure what is best -- having a team that is consistently pretty good and gives us some hope that with great luck we might make a Cup run or having a team that sucks for a couple of years and become likely to develop into a more serious Cup contender.

[BanTSN]

The Oilers didnt tank they were just legit bad, as for Buffalo look what happens when they tank, karma comes in and no McDavid. Eichel is still good but they wanted McDavid and didnt get him. Teams that tank get zero respect and everyone thought Buffalo got what they deserved.

Eichel may turn out to be the better player imho.

[PuckRock33]

The Canucks do not draft well enough. In the last seven draft classes only seven players have played even 1 NHL game. This is less than half of the average of the rest of the teams in the league (15). This would also suggest that the Canucks aren't developing their draft picks. Winners build at the draft. The last seven champs average 14 players they drafted on their roster. Boston had the least with ten.

In the current NHL you can't win a cup without having a great number 1 defenseman. In the last twenty years only Carolina won the cup without a standout blue chip defenseman. I would argue that the Canucks don't have a number 1 dman (and maybe not even a number 2). BTW Duncan Keith was a 2nd round pick as was Shea Weber.

I do believe that Jim Benning could address the drafting shortcomings, the last draft class looks promising. It is going to take a couple of awful seasons to get enough of the right picks to turn this club around though.

[spook007]

It is clearly true that there are no guarantees. The best thing we can do is look at what is likely or unlikely. But luck (good or bad) can always mess things up.

We understand that the Canucks are not going to "tank" in the sense of losing intentionally by completely gutting the team (like Buffalo) to assemble as many drafts as possible AND finish low enough to get a top 2 or 3 pick for a couple of year.

But is it very hard to build a Cup contender without some very high draft picks (say top 3 or 4). It happens, but the smart money won't be betting that direction.

Yes, future stars are sometimes drafted fairly low in the first round, like Getzlaf and Perry, but not often and they come from the top 3 much more often.

If the Canucks succeed in making the playoffs for next year or two I think they are very unlikely to become Cup contenders. It could happen but the odds are strongly against it.

If they miss the playoffs next year (as I think is likely) and they are able to make some trades at the deadline for picks. I think they are much more likely to become Cup contenders.

I agree that Benning's record suggests that he has a good idea for talent. That does not mean he is good at negotiating contracts. I am willing to believe that he has correctly judged that Sbisa is a useful guy to have around. It is the 3.6 million part that is crazy. If Sbisa went to arbitration there is no way he would have got 3.6 million.

As a fan I am not sure what is best -- having a team that is consistently pretty good and gives us some hope that with great luck we might make a Cup run or having a team that sucks for a couple of years and become likely to develop into a more serious Cup contender.

Cheers James. I know it is almost the which came first question... the hen or the egg...

If we answer the question straight (how to build a team capable of winning the SC) then picking from top 3-4, will most likely give us the biggest chance to build a cup winning team.

But as it is a business and I don't think management is willing to loose gate money for a potential later cup winning team... time and the deals over the summer will tell what management have in mind.

PS. Regarding negotiations... that 3,6mill deal for Sbisa...hmmm.... a strange decision. Hopefully he will live up to it, cause otherwise it could be the first nail in JB coffin...

[luckylager]

It isn't semantics just because you dont grasp the difference. There is a difference between being terrible cause your team is terrible compared to pulling a Buffalo and trading all your half way decent players so you guaranteed suck worse than half the AHL teams.

Just like there was a difference the year before this past one where we were awful and drafted 6th vs selling off all our players for picks so we can intentionally be completely awful.

Exactly. Thanks Kesh, I've been away camping, enjoying the sun for the last bunch of days.

Losing sucks. Playing to lose is unforgivable. Tanking is for losers. End of story.

[Ghostsof1915]

Eichel may turn out to be the better player imho.

As weird as it sounds, Eichel is actually the type of player Edmonton needs. Not only does he have skill, he has size.

[NHTyrany]

What an interesting and passionate post. Let's face it, some of Benning's decisions demonstrate a more conservative approach to rebuilding which troubles some of us who would rather be more aggressive with asset management. Us fans however don't need to care so much about taking the risks. One prime example: why bring in Miller instead of taking a chance with Lack and using that money to bring in a top PMD man for the next 3 years or so. The answer is obviously that Management went with a more secure move for the short term--fickle fans and all. I on the other hand wanted to see young Nucks goalies make the play-offs to gauge their play-off play. It's tough for Management to gamble with such a key position that can make or break your year's bottom line. I don't care about one year's bottom line and would take more risks to accelerate the rebuild is such a way that the Sedins could still be on the team for the next big SC drive in two years.

Let's hope we will have Sedinery draped with intimidating and youthful size, grit, and speed for the next two play-offs.