FIRE Jim Benning & Travis Green Thread

[D-Money]

4 minutes ago, Ghostsof1915 said:

Did he?

Luongo, The Twins, and basically the core of the team was there before Gillis got here. 

And Gillis clearly couldn't draft very well. If only we didn't lose Bourdon.  

Most of the core didn't look nearly as good as when he took over. He put them in a position to take their games to new levels. Something Benning has been extremely inept at.

 

Gillis acquired 2 very good defensemen for almost nothing (Hamhuis & Ehrhoff), and acquired numerous key depth pieces up front (Samuelsson, Malhotra, Torres, Higgins, Lapierre). And he juggled it all under the cap. Had the team just managed to stay even remotely healthy (even just the freak eye injury to Malhotra would have made a world of difference), we probably would have finally won a cup.

 

Benning has lots of good young players too. And Buffalo has had a ton of them. Building them into a winning team is a special skill. Acknowledging that should be common sense.

[D-Money]

11 minutes ago, Ghostsof1915 said:

I'm surprised Gillis hasn't gone back to being an Agent. Was that too boring for him? 

He works for the NHLPA now. He's second only to Donald Fehr, and probably will end up being the Executive Director one day.

 

Then he can finally fulfill his dream of sticking it to EVERY owner and GM out there. 

[King Heffy]

8 minutes ago, D-Money said:

Luongo was still in his prime, and was a valuable starting goaltender for years. He ended up getting us Markstrom, who could have provided a lot of value to the franchise. The stupid person was the one who didn't trade one of Markstrom or Demko for picks/prospects (like Gillis did with Schneider), instead of just letting one of them walk.

 

What bad trades are you referring to? Ehrhoff for almost nothing? Max Lapierre for a 3rd? Chris Higgins for friggin Evan Oberg? I mean, the Ballard trade didn't work out, but it looked like a landslide when Grabner was on waivers.

Roy, Ballard, Booth for starters.  I would have much preferred getting Luongo's salary completely off the books than a couple of good years from Markstrom.  Bottom line is not everyone thinks Gillis did a good, or even acceptable job.  Personally, I wouldn't let that idiot run a Taco Bell.

[ruilin96]

24 minutes ago, D-Money said:

Luongo was still in his prime, and was a valuable starting goaltender for years. He ended up getting us Markstrom, who could have provided a lot of value to the franchise. The stupid person was the one who didn't trade one of Markstrom or Demko for picks/prospects (like Gillis did with Schneider), instead of just letting one of them walk.

 

What bad trades are you referring to? Ehrhoff for almost nothing? Max Lapierre for a 3rd? Chris Higgins for friggin Evan Oberg? I mean, the Ballard trade didn't work out, but it looked like a landslide when Grabner was on waivers.

I criticize Benning for a lot of things, but Markstrom/Demko decision isn't one of them. Do I love Marky? Yes. In a perfect world do I wish to still have him on the Canucks? Absolutely! Do I hate that Marky is in Calgary? Of course! However, Markstrom's contract expired at perhaps the worst possible time. If he has just 1 more or 1 fewer year on his contract, this would've been a much better situation to be in.

 

Scenario 1: Let's say Markstrom's contract ends at 2018-19, the season where he seem to have figured things out and become a consistent number 1 goalie, the number and sample size is still too small and we could've inked him to a 2-4 year extension at around $4.5 million (at the time it was before his excellent 2019-20 campaign). 2019-20 comes around, Marky becomes absolutely elite, and now we would have the opportunity to trade a bonafide Vezina level goalie at $4.5 million per, there would've been a bidding war for him.

 

Scenario 2: Let's say Markstrom's contract ends at 2020-2021, we would've still be able to get good value back for him if we trade him in the 2020 off season as a team like Colorado would've been willing to give up a significant amount to pick up a Vezina candidate for 1 season at $3.67 AAV (Marky's cap hit with us).

 

Unfortunately for us, his contract ended exactly after 2019-20. We are face with the dilemma that if we sign him (he really just wants a NMC), we will guarantee to lose Demko to Seattle in the expansion draft. You don't want to lose a young up an coming goalie to a divisional rival for a goalie who is going to be 30+. Keeping Demko over Markstrom is the right move.

 

Our alternative option is to trade Demko or Markstrom at the 2020 trade deadline and go with the remaining goalie term. Demko's trade value wouldn't be very high at the time and we won't get a fair return for trading him. We can't trade Markstrom when a team is clearly going all in to make the playoffs.

It is unfortunate timeline with the Seattle Expansion which complicate things. If expansion draft isn't a concern, I could see the team being able to retain both Markstrom/Demko for a longer period of time or able to get more value out of this situation.

Edited December 3, 2021 by ruilin96

[D-Money]

12 minutes ago, King Heffy said:

Roy, Ballard, Booth for starters.  I would have much preferred getting Luongo's salary completely off the books than a couple of good years from Markstrom.  Bottom line is not everyone thinks Gillis did a good, or even acceptable job.  Personally, I wouldn't let that idiot run a Taco Bell.

Roy was a playoff rental, happens all the time. Ballard looked good at the time. Booth cost very little, and was looking good until that injury.

 

Regardless, Gillis built a winning team, something Benning has sucked balls at. I think he did a fine job, 2nd best GM we've ever had IMO. But then again, after the past 7+ years, with someone who is widely regarded as one of the worst GMs of the salary cap era running things...maybe I'm glossing over some of the lows.

[D-Money]

4 minutes ago, ruilin96 said:

I criticize Benning for a lot of things, but Markstrom/Demko decision isn't one of them. Do I love Marky? Yes. In a perfect world do I wish to still have him on the Canucks? Absolutely! Do I hate that Marky is in Calgary? Of course! However, Markstrom's contract expired at perhaps the worst possible time. If he has just 1 more or 1 fewer year on his contract, this would've been a much better situation to be in.

 

Scenario 1: Let's say Markstrom's contract ends at 2018-19, the season where he seem to have figured things out and become a consistent number 1 goalie, the number and sample size is still too small and we could've inked him to a 2-4 year extension at around $4.5 million (at the time it was before his excellent 2019-20 campaign). 2019-20 comes around, Marky becomes absolutely elite, and now we would have the opportunity to trade a bonafide Vezina level goalie at $4.5 million per, there would've been a bidding war for him.

 

Scenario 2: Let's say Markstrom's contract ends at 2020-2021, we would've still be able to get good value back for him if we trade him in the 2020 off season as a team like Colorado would've been willing to give up a significant amount to pick up a Vezina candidate for 1 season at $3.67 AAV (Marky's cap hit with us).

 

Unfortunately for us, his contract ended exactly after 2019-20. We are face with the dilemma that if we sign him (he really just wants a NMC), we will guarantee to lose Demko to Seattle in the expansion draft. You don't want to lose a young up an coming goalie to a divisional rival for a goalie who is going to be 30+. Keeping Demko over Markstrom is the right move.

 

Our alternative option is to trade Demko or Markstrom at the 2020 trade deadline and go with the remaining goalie term. Demko's trade value wouldn't be very high at the time and we won't get a fair return for trading him. We can't trade Markstrom when a team is clearly going all in to make the playoffs.

It is unfortunate timeline with the Seattle Expansion which complicate things. If expansion draft isn't a concern, I could see the team being able to retain both Markstrom/Demko for a longer period of time or able to get more value out of this situation.

Stop with the excuses. Everyone knew the expansion draft was coming, and one of them was going to be lost for nothing. But Benning sat on his hands, and "ran out of time". Just like he did with Toffoli. And just like he did with most of his pending UFAs with value in years past (Hamhuis, Miller, Vrbata, etc.). 

[ruilin96]

17 minutes ago, D-Money said:

Stop with the excuses. Everyone knew the expansion draft was coming, and one of them was going to be lost for nothing. But Benning sat on his hands, and "ran out of time". Just like he did with Toffoli. And just like he did with most of his pending UFAs with value in years past (Hamhuis, Miller, Vrbata, etc.). 

I am not giving Benning a freepass, in fact I want him fired. However, when Benning signed that contract extension with Markstrom, it was back in the summer of 2016. At the time we were aware of expansions (mainly the Vegas one), but we don't have a definite timeline of the Seattle expansion. I just don't think the Demko/Markstrom situation is on him.

 

Hamhuis and Vrbata had no trade clauses that both of them wouldn't waive. Hamhuis didn't want to relocate mid-seaon, while Vrbata was just striaght up pissed with the team and decided to give them a list of bottom feeders that wouldn't trade for him. The time to move Hamhuis and Vrbata was at the 2015 draft. This would give both players plenty of time to plan their relocation, and kick start the rebuild with more draft picks in the 2015 draft.

 

I heard a story leaked by Lauren Gillman that at the 2015 draft, San Jose was willing to trade the 9th OA pick (Timo Meier pick) for Ryan Miller and the team declined the trade because they didn't want to trade a goalie to their divisional rival. That to me is a major screw up as at the time the team still sees themselves as a playoff team and won't signal a rebuild. Gillman also said the Canucks had Barzal ranked a lot higher than where he eventually got drafted, so you have to think at #9, there is a good chance the Canucks would draft Barzal. Montreal was rumour to have interest in Vrbata as they were searching for offense, so if Vrbata got us their first round pick (late 20s range) and Hamhuis gets us an early 2nd, we would have a shot at drafting Carlo, Aho etc. In a perfect world if we walk away from the 2015 draft with Barzal, Boeser, Aho and Carlo and drafted McAvoy/Sergachev in the 2016 draft instead of Juolevi, we would've been a solid up and coming playoff team at this point. If the team made those rebuilding moves right there and then, we would've been out of the rebuild a lot sooner.

 

There are so many things I blame Benning for, but there are times you can't blame things on him. The Toffoli situation is  another one that I think he botched completely. Same with not signing Tanev, who we basically haven't been able to replace since his departure. However, the Markstrom/Demko situation isn't on him. He kept the younger elite goalie on a better contract and he made the right choice to keep Demko. Do I wish we got assets for Markstrom? Yes, but as previously mentioned, it is just a bad timing on Markstron's contract expiration.

 

Edited December 3, 2021 by ruilin96

[D-Money]

2 minutes ago, ruilin96 said:

Do I wish we got assets for Markstrom? Yes, but as previously mentioned, it is just a bad timing on Markstron's contract expiration.

 

Possibly. But it's yet another situation that Benning mismanaged. His excuse may be better for it, but still...just adding it to the pile.

 

[kanucks25]

1 hour ago, King Heffy said:

There's the third option that neither GM did a good job.  There is a reason no one has hired Gillis since then.  Benning, for all his faults, has still left the franchise in a better position than the unqualified moron he replaced.

You understand that a team going for the Cup is going to look different (and have less in the cupboards) than a team that's constantly bottom-feeding, right?

 

I mean, I'm sure you do, but you're obviously being purposefully disingenuous.

[kanucks25]

9 minutes ago, ruilin96 said:

Hamhuis and Vrbata had no trade clauses that both of them wouldn't waive. Hamhuis didn't want to relocate mid-seaon, while Vrbata was just striaght up pissed with the team and decided to give them a list of bottom feeders that wouldn't trade for him. The time to move Hamhuis and Vrbata was at the 2015 draft. This would give both players plenty of time to plan their relocation, and kick start the rebuild with more draft picks in the 2015 draft.

Hamhuis admitted himself he waived and to more than 1 team. Word is those two teams were Dallas and Chicago.

 

Rumor at the time was that Dallas wasn't offering enough. Chicago was presumably offering the Teravainen + Bickell cap-dump package that eventually went to Carolina, but Benning didn't want to take on a cap-dump because he needed that cap space to sign Loui in the upcoming off-season.

 

So instead of Teravainen we got Loui.

 

Edited December 3, 2021 by kanucks25

[spook007]

46 minutes ago, D-Money said:

Most of the core didn't look nearly as good as when he took over. He put them in a position to take their games to new levels. Something Benning has been extremely inept at.

 

Gillis acquired 2 very good defensemen for almost nothing (Hamhuis & Ehrhoff), and acquired numerous key depth pieces up front (Samuelsson, Malhotra, Torres, Higgins, Lapierre). And he juggled it all under the cap. Had the team just managed to stay even remotely healthy (even just the freak eye injury to Malhotra would have made a world of difference), we probably would have finally won a cup.

 

Benning has lots of good young players too. And Buffalo has had a ton of them. Building them into a winning team is a special skill. Acknowledging that should be common sense.

All of his ideas and juggling cost us the recapture penalty... part of the pain at the moment.

 

Have to disagree with the Demko v Markstrom, and trading one of them for something good. Leading up too the playoffs I don't think much could be had for Demko, and few were certain he would be as good as he turned out to be. I wanted to keep Marky, but glad we didn't, even if we didn't get anything for him. In hindsight, had they had a crystal ball, they could have traded Marky for something good, but most things are a lot clearer with hindsight.

[kanucks25]

9 minutes ago, spook007 said:

All of his ideas and juggling cost us the recapture penalty... part of the pain at the moment.

Blaming Gillis for the recapture is a complete joke.

[NewbieCanuckFan]

1 hour ago, King Heffy said:

Roy, Ballard, Booth for starters.  I would have much preferred getting Luongo's salary completely off the books than a couple of good years from Markstrom.  Bottom line is not everyone thinks Gillis did a good, or even acceptable job.  Personally, I wouldn't let that idiot run a Taco Bell.

**** Gillis.  Don't want him back & it sure looks like no other NHL team wants him as a GM either.

 

But the thing is, that has really nothing to do with the situation now. It's just deflecting from the poorly constructed team Jim Benning has assembled. 7+ years is long enough.

[spook007]

18 minutes ago, kanucks25 said:

Blaming Gillis for the recapture is a complete joke.

Hmmm... not so sure. Believe they were told they were circumventing the rules?

I used to think so too, but later was told the club had been warned... sooo...

[kanucks25]

13 minutes ago, spook007 said:

Hmmm... not so sure. Believe they were told they were circumventing the rules?

I used to think so too, but later was told the club had been warned... sooo...

At the time the contract was signed, it was legal.

 

We were retroactively punished as the recapture penalty was only added to the CBA afterwards. So far we're the only team that has been stung by it.

 

Even the draft pick that New Jersey had taken away for the Kovalchuk contract was later returned to them.

 

Your gripe is with the league, not Gillis.

Edited December 3, 2021 by kanucks25

[BPA]

Was listening on the radio that Canucks are taking their time (due diligence) to hire a new GM.  Thus JB is a lame duck GM and cannot make trades, waiver wire pick ups, fire coaches, etc.

 

[Fred65]

5 hours ago, IBatch said:

A few things on that thinking.   Yes the prospect pool is pretty vacant compared to what it was a few years ago - that's because those guys are now on the team, or Miller, OEL/Garland.    Even with that said, with MG our pool was almost or dead last for many consecutive years.   Now our pool is bottom third (low 20ish - more on that next time i get the pre-draft data) and that's with Podz in the lineup.    

 

Our best players when MG left we're 28-33....now our best players are 22-27...that's a big difference.   All of MG core had clauses - all the best players even Hansen.   We also had 9 consecutive years going back to Nonis with nothing to talk about until Horvat ... yes Co-ho and Hutton - big deal.  

 

A massive tweener gap, why guys like Vey and Bear came in right away, and later Dahlen and Goldobin.   

 

Now Miller is our elder statesmen as far as our core goes and not ONE of our core has a clause on him.   It's nothing at all like it was when MG was fired.  And rightly so (for getting fired).   A monkey could have come in and run that franchise at that point.   The core was already in place.   And Nonis gave us Luongo the last piece, plus Edler, Hansen and Schneider.    MG did an amazing job from top to bottom making the franchise as professional as it could possibly be, sleep doctors, oxygen chambers etc.   And only actually traded one first - part of the Ballard trade so it's not like he didn't have most of his picks because he actually did.    JB picks are all in our lineup right now - the ones that matter anyways.     And we have a ton of assets that could be moved to re-set the rebuild.   By the time EP is 27....that's four years to make it work.    So wouldn't try and make comparisons, they really aren't the same at all.   MG managed our best regular season team for 6 years.   The next GM that comes in has 2-4  years BEFORE it even gets to where MG was when he first started as far as the cores age goes. 

 

Naslund and the Sedins ... when did they break out again?  (26/27-30)  I know folks are impatient and I get that.   And i'm all for change too - starting with a President and going from there.   But like Hamonic agent says - who else is out there or available?   They have to want to come here, and making change just to make change is ok IF and only IF we do it smart.      

 

The next GM or even the current one, has way more assets available to him then JB did when he started, to finish this job up.    It won't be theger term as  "same" until EP is 33.   That's a decade from now. 

I grasp what you're pointing out but, the Gillis succes was better than  the JB success. Both had the opportunity to put their mark on the club in which ever way THEY chose. Gillis looked at his roster and decided to put his foot to the gas peddle, JB initially told us " I like this group, this can be a quick transition"  Gillis plan resulted in apprently never to be repeated success while JB after 8 years is still looking for that elusive standing in the league, and that's on him! I doubt any GM will repeat Gillis long line of success. BUT FA quickly, repeat quickly, pulled the plug on him, no one does that in business while you have such a prolific successful history to your term in office, and yet FA did, he fired the successful guy and gave a long, long, long leash to the guy that has failed at almost every turn in his.

 

I can only assume that FA and MG had presonnell difference, there's no other explanation.

 

Fire success and reward failure

Edited December 3, 2021 by Fred65

[IBatch]

6 minutes ago, Fred65 said:

I grasp what you're pointing out but, the Gillis succes was better than  the JB success. Both had the opportunity to put their mark on the club in which ever way THEY chose. Gillis looked at his roster and decided to put his foot to the gas peddle, JB initially told us " I like this group, this can be a quick transition"  Gillis plan resulted in apprently never to be repeated success while JB after 8 years is still looking for that elusive standing in the league, and that's on him! I doubt any GM ill repeat Gillis long line of success. BUT FA quickly, repeat quickly pulled the plug on him, no one does that in business while you have such a prolific successful history to your term in office, and yet FA did, he fired the successful guy and gave a long, long, long leash to the guy that has failed at almost every turn in his. I can only assume that FA and MG had presonnell difference, there's no other explanation.

 

Fire success and reward failure

Nah your not really doing that and that's ok.   You tried   to say that when JB leaves (if that's soon) that what he is leaving is similar to what MG left us, aside from our pool which i still disagree with, because the latest has us in the high teens low 20's, and with MG as a top team which i also understand, we had very little for a very long time coming up.   Aside from Co-ho and what Nonis left us nothing until the very end with Horvat (thanks to Nonis again).    But good job on trying at least to compare the two.   Might as well compare Quin or Burke next.  

Edited December 3, 2021 by IBatch

[PistolPete13]

2 hours ago, D-Money said:

Most of the core didn't look nearly as good as when he took over. He put them in a position to take their games to new levels. Something Benning has been extremely inept at.

 

Gillis acquired 2 very good defensemen for almost nothing (Hamhuis & Ehrhoff), and acquired numerous key depth pieces up front (Samuelsson, Malhotra, Torres, Higgins, Lapierre). And he juggled it all under the cap. Had the team just managed to stay even remotely healthy (even just the freak eye injury to Malhotra would have made a world of difference), we probably would have finally won a cup.

 

Benning has lots of good young players too. And Buffalo has had a ton of them. Building them into a winning team is a special skill. Acknowledging that should be common sense.

This hasn’t been mentioned enough. Gillis brought a lot of good things to the table. If he came back as Team president, I would support the move.

 

[King Heffy]

1 hour ago, kanucks25 said:

You understand that a team going for the Cup is going to look different (and have less in the cupboards) than a team that's constantly bottom-feeding, right?

 

I mean, I'm sure you do, but you're obviously being purposefully disingenuous.

And when the team was clearly not a contender, Gillis still chose to handicap the franchise by trading Luongo instead of buying him out like anyone with a functioning brain would have done.  He kept a lot of draft picks, he simply lacked the intelligence to be able to identify players who could play in the NHL.

  

1 hour ago, kanucks25 said:

Blaming Gillis for the recapture is a complete joke.

Who else should be blamed despite the idiot who made the trade exposing us to the recapture?  Other options were available.

Edited December 3, 2021 by King Heffy