Jump to content
The Official Site of the Vancouver Canucks
Canucks Community

Benning ~ Not all bad (Discussion)

Rate this topic


J.I.A.H.N

Recommended Posts

14 minutes ago, Dazzle said:

Welp, I'm not surprised with the takes you've had bashing Benning, and sparing Green of the same treatment.

 

At the same time, claiming that his team has bad defence is not wrong, but also a point of repetition. Before Benning, there was no succession plan for Tanev/Edler. Draft/development is still ultimately costing the Canucks, with or without Benning. That goes back to the Gillis time period.

 

I'm sorry, but using the excuse "But it's been 10 years" doesn't explain why we never had a replacement for Edler UNDER Gillis. That was a defenseman drafted in the 3rd round by the Nonis period. Yikes.

Honestly I just didn’t know any better with Green tbh. With Willy D and Green I guess I forgot what an NHL coach looks like but now that Bruce has taken over the system in place matches the NHL game and the team so much better than what Green did. They don’t look like they’re just collapsing around the goalies anymore which is a huge win.

 

As for Gillis, ya he didn’t leave much for Benning in terms of prospects but Edler and Tanev were still relatively young and good players when Benning took over. Tanev and Edler are still both serviceable NHL players. Benning knew where the team was when he took over but could never build an even average defence his whole tenure

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bennning left us with a good base of a team.  We have a #1C, #1D, #1G and some real good wingers.  The next GM will have a tough time working through the cap, but has many key roles already in place.

 

JB's biggest mistake was the coaching.  Almost all of the guys he brought in immediately underperformed.  Most of the guys he let go saw a bump in their play once they got to their new teams.  Once Green left this team, it starts playing the best hockey in a decade.  

 

I cannot put into words how awful Travis Green was a coach.  If Benning had recognized that, he would still be here.

  • Thanks 1
  • Cheers 2
  • Vintage 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

31 minutes ago, NewbieCanuckFan said:

Well we did have a President, albeit an inexperienced one in Linden.  He was forced out though & never replaced.

Yup, my point exactly. Benning was left flying on his own for too long, is my personal opinion, and THAT is on ownership.

 

  • Cheers 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Dazzle said:

Welp, I'm not surprised with the takes you've had bashing Benning, and sparing Green of the same treatment.

 

At the same time, claiming that his team has bad defence is not wrong, but also a point of repetition. Before Benning, there was no succession plan for Tanev/Edler. Draft/development is still ultimately costing the Canucks, with or without Benning. That goes back to the Gillis time period.

 

I'm sorry, but using the excuse "But it's been 10 years" doesn't explain why we never had a replacement for Edler UNDER Gillis. That was a defenseman drafted in the 3rd round by the Nonis period. Yikes.

Difference is we won back to back presidents trophies under Gillis. We've never even been a contending team under Benning. Drafting under Gillis obviously wasn't great but he was better in every single other area than Benning and it could've likely been fixed by clearing out the amateur scouting staff which was long overdue at that point. This isn't even mentioning the fact that Gillis saw this roster after 2013 and wanted to retool which ended up being part of the reason he was fired. Keeping Gillis could've saved us years of frustration if we got ahead of things and executed a proper rebuild after that first round loss to the Sharks.

  • Like 1
  • Cheers 2
  • Wat 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Over the years we saw some interesting moves by Benning that just didn't seem to work out. Now that we have witnessed the Canucks under a new coach, I wonder if what looked like bad moves were really great moves killed by an atrocious coach. 

Was Player Louie E ruined by Green? Nate Schmidt? Goldobin? Baertchi? Tryamkin?

Edited by dr.naughtypants
spelling
  • Cheers 2
  • Vintage 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

JB assembled this current team.  But he should have been aware that coaching might have been a problem after seeing Schmidt and Holtby perform way better than their time with the Canucks. 

 

In the end, he "ran out of time" by wait too long to fire Green.

  • Cheers 1
  • Vintage 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, VegasCanuck said:

It could be said, that a big part of the failing of Benning and the outgoing team, was not keeping an experienced President in to oversee operations and team direction / changes.  

^^This is it 100% this.^^

 

Jim wasn't the problem the problem was that there was no one above Jim. No one to go between Jim and Aqua and importantly Jim and the media. No one to say no Frank we shouldn't sign Loui 6x6 because he had a good outing with them for team Sweden.   

  • Cheers 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Crimson said:

Can he though?  Sure, we have Pettersson/Hughes/Podkolzin but those are top 10 picks that you expect to hit.  

 

Outside of them there is Boeser, Demko, Hoglander and Rathbone is looking like something.  Otherwise there isn't really much there.

I guess glass half full vs glass half empty debate.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

With competent coaching, will always wonder how far we could've gone in the EDM bubble? In retrospect, don't think it's a pipe-dream to suggest we could've faced TBay in the finals. After their CBJ lesson, would say it's impossible any young upstarts could have toppled their loaded roster though.

 

Drafting will be JB's historical-legacy.

The coaches, vet FA-signings & ludicrous pressers his hysterical-lunacy.

 

Ultimately, an almost 8 yr run is pretty decent at that position. He suuure left a better scenario for the new hire than MG did!

  • Cheers 1
  • Vintage 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

47 minutes ago, wallstreetamigo said:

I think the real failure of Benning was in the culture he and Weisbrod created. It’s been alluded to many times that the front office was essentially a 2 man show and they didn’t use even the skeleton crew front office staff they left themselves with after pushing out any dissenting voices. 
 

If the culture from the top excludes any kind of confidence in the people around them, why would anyone expect the coach or the players to do so?

 

Green clearly did not implement much of any input from Shaw. The players clearly weren’t playing a team game and supporting each other.

 

Like it or not, the culture change has been the biggest factor in confidence throughout the team right from the top down.

was it the culture he created, or the one he let Green create? Jim is very old school, I can see him just leaving that up to Green.

  • Cheers 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, JM_ said:

was it the culture he created, or the one he let Green create? Jim is very old school, I can see him just leaving that up to Green.

The culture in the front office was apparently 100 times worse than the one in the room. 
 

No dissenting voices survived the Benning/Weisbrod management style. That says a lot about the culture. 
 

There was also a lot of talk that the covid situation last year came down to a communication gap from Benning to the player group. 
 

Leadership - good or bad - always starts at the top. Best case scenario for your theory is that Benning was an absent GM who allowed a coach to destroy the culture on his watch. More likely is Benning destroyed the culture and the $&!# flowed downhill to his entitled coach.

  • Like 1
  • Cheers 1
  • Vintage 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

26 minutes ago, wallstreetamigo said:

The culture in the front office was apparently 100 times worse than the one in the room. 
 

No dissenting voices survived the Benning/Weisbrod management style. That says a lot about the culture. 
 

There was also a lot of talk that the covid situation last year came down to a communication gap from Benning to the player group. 
 

Leadership - good or bad - always starts at the top. Best case scenario for your theory is that Benning was an absent GM who allowed a coach to destroy the culture on his watch. More likely is Benning destroyed the culture and the $&!# flowed downhill to his entitled coach.

yeah, hard to argue with that. Whenever you see a leader insulated by a right hand man / troll like Weisbrod its not good. 

  • Cheers 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, J.I.A.H.N said:

I really feel it was time for a change. Both at the Coaching level and at the GM level, but as we go further into our season, it is becoming abundantly clear to me, that Benning had finally put together a decent club, who can compete at competitive level. Where will we end up? Well in the playoffs, I hope. The team has given us solid confidence, in their ability to compete. We have the tools! Great Goaltending, an all star Dman, and very strong down the middle.

 

Let us remember who got us here. Let's remember that the Canucks have not added one player to the team in the last 8 games. They have always been here. That is the doing of Jim Benning. That is very applaudable. We owe a great of appreciation to JB for that. This is the good! Personnel wise, he had a plan, he drafted well, and his moves in the last several years, were to his credit.

 

Now, to his determent, he fumble with his own UFA's loosing valuable asset for nothing, he made moves that were good, yet, still gave a bad taste, because they had future ramifications....an example would be the removal of Ericksson, Roussel and Beagel, and the acquisition of OEL and Garland.........visually, it look like a big win, but there are cap ramification on OEL and the loss of our first hurts the future. Still in the big picture Garland alone makes it look like a big win. 

 

But the single biggest mistake Jim Benning made, the one that cost him his job, was the re-signing of Green. Coaches all come up through the ranks, and those that stay in the fraternity, find where their skill level is, some make it to the NHL, and succeed, other do not succeed, and disappear. others find that they are not head coach matterial, for various reasons, including a failure to adapt to different opposing systems, while others can not lead, others can not make hard decisions, while others can not build lines, and defensive pairings that compliment each other, and some do not have the ability to recognize talent and contributions (past/present or future) Green pretty much falls into all the above. And Benning could not or would not admit to his failure in hiring Green.

 

People should understand that both the 1sts traded have increased in value, and a good GM, one with the ability to identify good moves, and one who has a extremely respected resume, can navigate those offers, and in the case of Miller and Garland, Rutherford "could" move them for assets, IMO, better than the picks moved for them. So IMO, there was no loss of asset there.

 

And it will be a issue that Rutherford will have to deal with, one way or another. 

 

Again, Benning built a decent team, but crumbled when having to make the tough decisions on Green..........

 

Benning appeared to be an honest, and loyal man, and in the end, that took him down..........................but as Rutherford said, it will take another 2 years to fill in the holes

 

Ahhhhhh......................another promise!

 

But, People! Benning was not all bad!

 

 

Nobody is all bad.

but Benning was bad

the  fact that we are winning with the same team Green could not win with, and killing penalties with the same team Green made historically bad and also scoring PP goals begs the question, how bad were any of the teams that sucked for the last 5 years?

We had Schmidt last season, and Virtanen, in other years Sutter, Beagle and Ericksson played his whole Canuck career under Green

maybe they  all could have played better under a different coach

Jim Benning built a team full of holes 

lets wait at least until the summer before we start talking about a JB statue

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, ken kaniff said:

Honestly I just didn’t know any better with Green tbh. With Willy D and Green I guess I forgot what an NHL coach looks like but now that Bruce has taken over the system in place matches the NHL game and the team so much better than what Green did. They don’t look like they’re just collapsing around the goalies anymore which is a huge win.

 

As for Gillis, ya he didn’t leave much for Benning in terms of prospects but Edler and Tanev were still relatively young and good players when Benning took over. Tanev and Edler are still both serviceable NHL players. Benning knew where the team was when he took over but could never build an even average defence his whole tenure

So again, you've pushed the responsibility back to Benning on this. Benning HAS drafted some defenseman - we see Woo, Rathbone, and so forth. If Benning had preceded Gillis, these players would ALREADY be on the team. However, that window with Gillis has meant that our defenseman are not in the lineup (they take time to develop).

 

Juolevi was pretty much mishandled, especially under Green last year and this year. That being said, Juolevi has been injured A LOT. That is just sheer bad luck. Had Juolevi turned into a stable stay-at-home defenseman, I don't think anyone would continue to complain about the Tkachuk/Juolevi draft. It is very hard to get a top four defenseman in the draft. At the time, Juolevi's ceiling was top four (at best). He was a highly regarded prospect that had won at every level (memorial cup/Finland at the Olympics).

 

I get that Sergachev was exciting, but given how poorly we developed Juolevi (again, this might be a management thing as a whole), I would say it's pretty unlikely Sergachev would pan out in the way that he did with Montreal/Tampa.

Edited by Dazzle
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, ken kaniff said:

I hated Benning for years. I thought he was an awful GM and I’m still pretty confident I could have done better. But now that he has gone and I have calmed down a bit, looking back… He was still not very good, but maybe not as bad as I thought. Yes the team is now competitive but teams often get a bump when a coach is fired mid season, let’s see how long this last for. And there is still some glaring issues with this team.

 

The defence is still not very good. OEL, Hughes and Myers are the only NHL level dmen on the team. The rest are fringe NHL players.
 

The forward group is above average but the depth is still lacking imo.

 

Prospects are almost non existent. Yes the noteworthy prospects have graduated to the NHL club but considering we were supposed to be rebuilding and Benning being a “great drafter” it’s still disappointing how many picks he traded away, or let prospects with potential walk.

 

Looking back I thought his 8 years were one step forward, 2 steps back. Draft a great prospect, signs some bad contracts. Make a good trade, have a bad draft and sign some bad contracts. Sign a good contract, make a bad trade. For every positive he had there were 2 negatives. I would give him a pass for some negatives but when average fans were saying his moves were bad and then they turn out as bad or worse then expected, that’s unforgivable. 
 

I think Benning made some good moves for sure, but I think this team is more of a result of sucking for 8 years and drafting high than Benning actually putting together a good team. I think without all the painfully obvious screw ups by Benning this team could have been competitive 2-3 years ago.

 

I will give him credit for building a good foundation. Good young players. The best D-man in franchise history. A #1 G. Made some good trades to bring in supplementary talent. It took him a long time, longer than it needed to but there is ten!he making of a great team here and that’s something a good GM and Rutherford can use to take this team to a Cup

Referring to the Highlited...........

 

Benning and you were the only 2 that thought that, Ken...................................YOU'RE FIRED! (joke!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...