Those who did not want a GM change.

[lmm]

On 10/22/2022 at 9:01 PM, Master Mind said:

Benning should have been fired after the 2020-21 season, if not earlier.

 

You don't keep an incompetent GM because you're afraid the replacement will be incompetent.

welp, I was hoping for Gorton

[IBatch]

9 hours ago, AnthonyG said:

Lmfao so Benning, rebuilding had nearly half as many play off appearances as JR did in 20 years. Sure he caught lightning in a bottle and won a cup. But damn, that aint gunna happen every year.  His pt% before going to Pittsburgh was .481........

If we are just going by this we traded one GM, with 2/7 playoff appearance to the league leader in missed playoffs at 15 out of 20 lol... yikes!    No context makes things stupid though.   Of course GMs rebuilding post cap with 32 teams, are going to have some crap years ... notice Yzerman is only listed for TB... what about his Detroit years?  Also why is Holland only got his DET years up? And didn't they miss more then 3 before he was given the hook?   

 

Edit: I'm guessing this is a list for only one team...so once records are added to another team some of these guys won't look as good, while others will look better...JR would be one that looks better, because well PIT and all.   He didn't have to suffer through their rebuilding years someone else did ... but he did suffer through some of CAR's...ten years between playoff appearances is a long time, but they did finally get it right...and those 2000's CAR teams were very good for awhile (won a cup, another appearance i think too, Ward was one of 2 other goalies capable of putting up 40 wins etc etc) ... 

 

CAR ... i'd rather have gone through what they did, then bumble along.   Now they are a beast in the east again. 

Edited October 24, 2022 by IBatch

[combover]

On 10/23/2022 at 1:21 AM, DownUndaCanuck said:

.

 

JB right now would wipe this team clean, take on some bad contracts and load up on picks and prospects.

Is that a joke? 
he had 8 years of sucking to do any of those thing he traded more picks than any gm we’ve had 

he let quality ufas walk year after year 

he over paid almost every contract he handed out 

He had a fantasy winning a bidding war for ufas made us better. 
Mediocrity was his goal he couldn’t even pull that off. His team still sucks. He failed at Everything thing he said since the day he was hired. Competitive turn this around fast window to win… 

he is and was a garbage gm even his drafting was crap 2 busts in the top 6  no late pick gems. 

he screwed this club for years to come 

sure looking like coaching might not have been the issue Green is probably laughing it’s pretty clear the GM was the issue he should have been canned when he stabbed linden in the back but that’s scumbag  do, find which asss they have to stick there head up to get more control.you’d be hard pressed to find a gm that could have done worse in that time frame. 

 

PA seemed to go down the rabbit hole to when he resigned miller instead of try to addressing the terrible D and lack of any prospects he left behind. Hopefully that mistake can be corrected and miller moved out before his Jb anchor style contract kicks in. 

Sadly ownership is the issue here it has been since this group got  full control. Nothing will change until they are gone. 
FA better be ready for the sell the team chants that are coming. 


 

[klw604]

REBUILD, SELL SELL SELL, 

High draft picks and prospects

[MaxVerstappen33]

17 hours ago, combover said:

Jr should have lived up to his reputation

this team needed major changes. bennings  build was a league wide joke  and it still is. 

I was hoping for major changes to improve the crap job JB did but I get cap screwed mess jr/pa inherited and the total lack of nhl prospects and depth at any position.

oh well hope he does shake thing up in a big way this group isn’t good enough. 
. 
 
 

That is nonsense. The league hates the Canucks. Bashing Benning was just another way of putting down the Canucks. And yet some Canucks fans thought that agreeing with this was going to earn them some friends in the league. 

 

On balance JR has a bad reputation. If only Francisco read some threads about JR's trades on HF

[Eddie]

I don't wanna get into this whole pissing contest again . . . 

 

I mean clearly the JB rebuild was a failure as we've had 11 years of misery with nothing but a crazy bubble run to show for it, and at this point the future is looking as bleak as ever. How much of this was Bennings fault, and how much lies on the impatience of F.A to do a proper rebuild is a point of debate for sure - as only rumour and conjecture exist to support either side.  Tho the many high profile draft misses and organizational failures are hard to not pin on Benning i have to say., 

 

JR / PA., like JB before them have come into a team that is really backed into a corner.  No blue chip prospects, No cap space and filled with bad contracts, and a horrifically imbalanced squad. Its going to take at least 3 years to see if this group can turn the 'rebuild' around.  Weather doubling down on JTM or not was Aquaman or JR/PA is also still unclear and a massive point of debate. 

[MaxVerstappen33]

15 hours ago, Alflives said:

As a GM didn’t JR win three Cups though?  Benninb won none, right?  So isn’t it three Cups to zero?

imhao we could have Sam Pollock as GM and it wouldn’t matter.  Our owner refuses to all trading his top players for futures.  

[AnthonyG]

12 hours ago, whysoserious said:

So let me get this straight, the years prior to the Sedins retiring, Benning was trying to put together a cup contender, despite us perpetually missing the playoffs and being bottom feeders in the league. Then after the Sedins retired, that's when the rebuild started despite us trading away multiple 1st round picks and signing aging UFAs and being capped out. 

 

You talk about Benning as if he's an elite drafter, when there are other teams around the league that drafted similar quality group players in a shorter amount of time. We are in fact nowhere after 8 years, barely a playoff team with no cap space, no prospect pool and deficit of draft picks.

Benning was multi tasking prior to the Sedins retiring. Trying to build a winner through Free Agency, while quietly shipping vets out for picks and prospects along the way.
 

He kept his 1sts, he added very little through trade and acquired free agents to help supply goal scoring. He was in no way trying to sacrifice the future. Arent all of you b!tching that our owner wouldnt allow Gillis to rebuild, wouldnt allow JB to tear it down either? Is probably handcuffing JR and PA? So when the twins retired Aquaweenie had no other choice but to accept a rebuild. Benning slooowly moved out vets that had any value and got picks or prospects in exchange. Which most of them wouldnt even play another year in the league.

He quietly moved out Bieksa, Hansen, Burrows, Vanek, Lack and let Hamhuis walk, all leading up to the twins last year. It was a stealth “rebuild” without doing a full tear down. Then he snagged JT Miller for a great price, signed Myers and added Toffoli prior to the TDL. We were a potential playoff team, 2 years after the twins retired, we EARNED a playoff spot by winning the play in round vs Minnesota, then we took out the blues and met our match against VGK. The COVID year really screwed us and then last year we had a garbage start but turned it on and played like the team we all expected. The rebuild is over, its now about growth, experience and maturity.

[Fred65]

Actually JB traded away 2 1st round picks and 2 second round picks. How many years are we going to rebuild, trading away 1st round picks is not the way to re build a team IMO. If the team decides to rebuild after 49 years as a STH I'm out of here. You can't keep insulting fans with unkept promises. Let me remind you of JB assessment when he joined the club.

 

“I like this team - I like the core players. This is a team we can turn around in a hurry.” - Benning

— Vancouver Canucks (@VanCanucks) May 23, 2014

 

It was a lie

Edited October 24, 2022 by Fred65

[alt kilgore]

10 minutes ago, AnthonyG said:

Benning was multi tasking prior to the Sedins retiring. Trying to build a winner through Free Agency, while quietly shipping vets out for picks and prospects along the way.
 

He kept his 1sts, he added very little through trade and acquired free agents to help supply goal scoring. He was in no way trying to sacrifice the future. Arent all of you b!tching that our owner wouldnt allow Gillis to rebuild, wouldnt allow JB to tear it down either? Is probably handcuffing JR and PA? So when the twins retired Aquaweenie had no other choice but to accept a rebuild. Benning slooowly moved out vets that had any value and got picks or prospects in exchange. Which most of them wouldnt even play another year in the league.

He quietly moved out Bieksa, Hansen, Burrows, Vanek, Lack and let Hamhuis walk, all leading up to the twins last year. It was a stealth “rebuild” without doing a full tear down. Then he snagged JT Miller for a great price, signed Myers and added Toffoli prior to the TDL. We were a potential playoff team, 2 years after the twins retired, we EARNED a playoff spot by winning the play in round vs Minnesota, then we took out the blues and met our match against VGK. The COVID year really screwed us and then last year we had a garbage start but turned it on and played like the team we all expected. The rebuild is over, its now about growth, experience and maturity.

Wow.  Is this from the novel 1984? You got to give me your weed supplier.

[DSVII]

14 hours ago, AnthonyG said:

Replying to the bolded sections

 

1. Its not impossible, but its not always that easy either. We were lucky that WPG desperately needed a dman and Schmidt was willing to leave town.

That's really all that needs to be said. It's not impossible to move an NTC/NMC. Now an overpaid overager like OEL? that's more effective than any NTC. 

 

 

 

Quote

2.  You aren't seriously saying Benning was blind and couldnt see a world wide pandemic coming as he is midseason making acquisitions and then not even 3 weeks after, with as I laid out QUITE CLEARLY the time line and expectancies of the upcoming cap situation prior to COVID, WHEN we acquired Toffoli and when COVID shut the planet down and flattened the cap. Like seriously dude??? Are you actually blaming JB's "short sightedness" ???? He was prepared for an 84-88mil cap ceiling and then all of the sudden out of nowhere it gets stuck at 81.5 after he made trades. Come on man, lets be realistic here, there was nothing he could have done to see or prevent that. Feb 17th he made a trade to get ready for playoffs. He would have had plenty of cap space in the offseason had the cap not been frozen, to re-sign any combination of Toffoli, Tanev and Markstrom. Hell he probably could have signed all 3 that off season and unloaded one later in the season for picks or ran with it.  Just a reminder of the time line of events in 2020.

 

- February 17th 2020 Toffoli was acquired

- March 4th 2020a statement made about the caps projected rise in 2020-21

- March 12th 2020, 8 days later and just under 3 weeks after acquiring Toffoli, the NHL season is suspended

- Uncertainty about the cap

- July 10th 2020 Flat cap announced

- August 1st 2020, Playoffs resumed

- Playoffs ended Sept 28 2020

- October 9th 2020, Free agency began

- October 9th 2020, Tanev signed with CGY

- October 9th 2020, Markstrom signed with CGY

- 

 

Like really dude?? No GM in the league saw what was coming, they all expected a rise in the cap and then out of left field everything gets flipped upside down.

Again, there was no expectation to keep all of Markstrom, Tanev, Toffoli, or Stetcher. But it was certainly possible to fit three or two of them. I've made it quite clear Marky walking was fine.

 

There's shortsightedness, but there's also flexibility and ability to multitask. The reason why we missed out on 2020 wasn't just because of all those factors listed, but because Benning didn't bother delegating anyone to talk to Tanev, Toffoli or Stetcher because he was too busy trying to put himself into a hole with an OEL trade. Tanev never received an offer from the team till day 1 of UFA and no one even talked to Toffoli. That is simply inexcusable.

 

It was the myoptic tunnel vision that sunk him. 

 

I'm fine with saying Benning could not control everything when it came to losing that chunk of the team, like you said every GM had to deal with it, but he wasn't flexible enough and didn't do anything to mitigate the damage, he exacerbated it and we are paying for it today. 

 

 

Quote

3. What was there to do in the 2020 offseason? Frozen cap, a lot teams handcuffed or scared to make moves with the cap being frozen for a few years. What could we have done?

If we had that extra 3.5-7.5mil in cap space, we could have done a lot, but that was no longer an option.

 

Well for one thing. Lock in Tanev instead of paying a 3rd and $2 mil more for Nate Schmidt. Don't try and pursue OEL. These were things people were saying back then. 

 

He could have done that.

 

Or lock in Toffoli and not qualify Jake. There were ways to operate within the constraints you laid out that every GM faced. Jimbo blew it.

 

Quote

4. Tanev+Toffoli+Markstrom = 15mil roughly 2mil less. JB made moves to free up cap space. A cup winning goalie after we let Markstrom walk, arguably an upgrade on Tanev and then the hopes of Virtanen who had consistently been improving his production each season, to pan out. That right there is looking forward to the future, not holding onto the past and paying a little extra in a frozen cap climate. Like you said, cap space comes at a premium.  Benning managed to find a way to replace players and save cap. And I would argue to the death that if it wasnt for Vancouver getting decimated by COVID, that we would have been a playoff team that season. We barely missed and we had no Pettersson and guys were still overcoming the effects.. One guys career is over because of it. 

Again, exclude Markstrom from this, everyone knew it was impossible to keep him. If i had to nitpick anything it was that he talked only to Markstrom and not to Toffoli/Stetcher and Tanev till it was too late. 

 

This is derailing the conversation, but I didn't like the Holtby signing just because if you think Demko is ready, you can try to sign a cheaper 1A like Greiss or Mike Smith or Miller)

 

Let's get back to the main point here.

 

1.) NTC/NMCs are not the boat anchors you are painting them to be, especially NTCs/NMCs that have a lower favorable cap hit, as evidenced by us moving Bieksa, Burrows, Garrison, hamhuis being willing to waive. In fact, i'd argue Benning's roster is more locked in than Gillis' ever was. Market context plays into it of course but it doesn't change the fact that the 2015 team had moveable assets with value.

 

2.) Benning sucked at cap management. Even working within the contraints of the 2020 season which every GM had to deal with, he lost the most value out of all the GMs in the league, and ended up paying more to replace what he lost because he didn't know how to prioritize and delegate in his negotiations.

Edited October 24, 2022 by DSVII

[DSVII]

19 minutes ago, AnthonyG said:

Benning was multi tasking prior to the Sedins retiring. Trying to build a winner through Free Agency, while quietly shipping vets out for picks and prospects along the way.
 

He kept his 1sts, he added very little through trade and acquired free agents to help supply goal scoring. He was in no way trying to sacrifice the future. Arent all of you b!tching that our owner wouldnt allow Gillis to rebuild, wouldnt allow JB to tear it down either? Is probably handcuffing JR and PA? So when the twins retired Aquaweenie had no other choice but to accept a rebuild. Benning slooowly moved out vets that had any value and got picks or prospects in exchange. Which most of them wouldnt even play another year in the league.

He quietly moved out Bieksa, Hansen, Burrows, Vanek, Lack and let Hamhuis walk, all leading up to the twins last year. It was a stealth “rebuild” without doing a full tear down. Then he snagged JT Miller for a great price, signed Myers and added Toffoli prior to the TDL. We were a potential playoff team, 2 years after the twins retired, we EARNED a playoff spot by winning the play in round vs Minnesota, then we took out the blues and met our match against VGK. The COVID year really screwed us and then last year we had a garbage start but turned it on and played like the team we all expected. The rebuild is over, its now about growth, experience and maturity.

Tinfoil conspiracy time. 

 

Benning started trading away his 1sts and 2nds after losing Judd Brackett to the wild. What a funny coincidence 

 

Benning has bled draft value in his entire tenure here. This team has consistently ended up with less draft capital than a playoff team.

 

Worst of both worlds, the results of a tank, but the draft payoff of a contender.

[AnthonyG]

6 hours ago, IBatch said:

If we are just going by this we traded one GM, with 2/7 playoff appearance to the league leader in missed playoffs at 15 out of 20 lol... yikes!    No context makes things stupid though.   Of course GMs rebuilding post cap with 32 teams, are going to have some crap years ... notice Yzerman is only listed for TB... what about his Detroit years?  Also why is Holland only got his DET years up? And didn't they miss more then 3 before he was given the hook?   

 

Edit: I'm guessing this is a list for only one team...so once records are added to another team some of these guys won't look as good, while others will look better...JR would be one that looks better, because well PIT and all.   He didn't have to suffer through their rebuilding years someone else did ... but he did suffer through some of CAR's...ten years between playoff appearances is a long time, but they did finally get it right...and those 2000's CAR teams were very good for awhile (won a cup, another appearance i think too, Ward was one of 2 other goalies capable of putting up 40 wins etc etc) ... 

 

CAR ... i'd rather have gone through what they did, then bumble along.   Now they are a beast in the east again. 

So would I.

I have the patience and understanding of what a rebuild is going to take to get to where we need to be. But this fan base… lmfao 2 losses and the fan base was ready to explode. We’ll never see a proper rebuild because the “fans” here. They cant handle losing to build a future. It sucks that we’re already off to a brutal start based on our record, I dont feel that we’ve played all that bad, but nonetheless winning is all that matters. But who knows, this goes 1 of 2 ways now, either we get back on the horse and go on a rampage and make playoffs, which we all want to see, or we are a lottery team and draft really high and find the missing piece to the future.

[Baggins]

16 minutes ago, AnthonyG said:

Benning was multi tasking prior to the Sedins retiring. Trying to build a winner through Free Agency, while quietly shipping vets out for picks and prospects along the way.
 

He kept his 1sts, he added very little through trade and acquired free agents to help supply goal scoring. He was in no way trying to sacrifice the future. Arent all of you b!tching that our owner wouldnt allow Gillis to rebuild, wouldnt allow JB to tear it down either? Is probably handcuffing JR and PA? So when the twins retired Aquaweenie had no other choice but to accept a rebuild. Benning slooowly moved out vets that had any value and got picks or prospects in exchange. Which most of them wouldnt even play another year in the league.

He quietly moved out Bieksa, Hansen, Burrows, Vanek, Lack and let Hamhuis walk, all leading up to the twins last year. It was a stealth “rebuild” without doing a full tear down. Then he snagged JT Miller for a great price, signed Myers and added Toffoli prior to the TDL. We were a potential playoff team, 2 years after the twins retired, we EARNED a playoff spot by winning the play in round vs Minnesota, then we took out the blues and met our match against VGK. The COVID year really screwed us and then last year we had a garbage start but turned it on and played like the team we all expected. The rebuild is over, its now about growth, experience and maturity.

He did say from the very beginning the goal was "compete for a playoff spot while transitioning to a younger team". Basically rebuild without tanking. He said it over and over. To me that made sense because virtually the entire team needed to be replaced with nothing worthwhile on the farm team. It didn't matter how he did the rebuild it was going to be quick.

 

You are right the rebuild is over. It's in build phase, surrounding the high end talent with support.

 

[AnthonyG]

13 minutes ago, Fred65 said:

Actually JB traded away 2 1st round picks and 2 second round picks. How many years are we going to rebuild, trading away 1st round picks is not the way to re build a team IMO. If the team decides to rebuild after 49 years as a STH I'm out of here. You can't keep insulting fans with unkept promises. Let me remind you of JB assessment when he joined the club.

 

“I like this team - I like the core players. This is a team we can turn around in a hurry.” - Benning

— Vancouver Canucks (@VanCanucks) May 23, 2014

 

It was a lie

Actually that wasnt until 2020 and 2021. But thanks though.

That was also right after he was hired.

Secondly, he DID turn it around from 23rd to 8th in one off season through free agency. Without giving up a pick.

[AnthonyG]

5 minutes ago, DSVII said:

Tinfoil conspiracy time. 

 

Benning started trading away his 1sts and 2nds after losing Judd Brackett to the wild. What a funny coincidence 

 

Benning has bled draft value in his entire tenure here. This team has consistently ended up with less draft capital than a playoff team.

 

Worst of both worlds, the results of a tank, but the draft payoff of a contender.

He kept his picks for 5 years and acquired an extra first. Did you pay. ANY attention. It wasnt until 2019 that he sold off his first 1st round pic

he was done building through the draft at that point. He stole Miller, signed a top 4 RHD in Myers and we went for a fun little run. Its still a very young team. Just like Colorado, it wasnt all sunshine and rainbows from the day the drafted Landy and Mackinnon, took nearly 10 years to put it all together with several more high end draft picks

Edited October 24, 2022 by AnthonyG

[MeanSeanBean]

7 minutes ago, kilgore said:

Wow.  Is this from the novel 1984? You got to give me your weed supplier.

Seriously! What vets did we ship out for value? From the top of my head I remember Marky, Tanev, Stretcher, Edler, Vrbatta, Hamhuis, Taffoli all walking under Benning. What Vets were traded for value? I recall Vanek, and... Wait is that it? There has to be more....please let there be more.

[DSVII]

9 minutes ago, AnthonyG said:

He kept his picks for 5 years and acquired an extra first. Did you pay. ANY attention. It wasnt until 2019 that he sold off his first 1st round pic

he was done building through the draft at that point. He stole Miller, signed a top 4 RHD in Myers and we went for a fun little run. Its still a very young team. Just like Colorado, it wasnt all sunshine and rainbows from the day the drafted Landy and Mackinnon, took nearly 10 years to put it all together with several more high end draft picks

Saving the first rounders up till the was the bare minimum. But JB never entered any draft with more picks than the league alloted 7. In fact he's traded most of all his mid picks. And picks he acquired from the rare vet trades were shipped right off for more instant help.

 

He started selling his 1sts because his job security relied on instant playoffs. Not because of any long term vision.

 

How Sakic and Benning approached rebuilding was night and day. 

 

And even if you want to give him credit for hitting on 1st round draft picks that were so high anyone with a hockey magazine could land a player. It's offset by missing out on Tkachuk and Ehlers/Nylander. The consensus BPAs.

[AnthonyG]

2 minutes ago, Shayster007 said:

Seriously! What vets did we ship out for value? From the top of my head I remember Marky, Tanev, Stretcher, Edler, Vrbatta, Hamhuis, Taffoli all walking under Benning. What Vets were traded for value? I recall Vanek, and... Wait is that it? There has to be more....please let there be more.

Bieksa, Burrows, Hansen, Vanek, Lack, also dealt with the Garrisson contract and managed to get a 2nd. Got 2 young players, swapped 3rds and got a 1st for Kesler. 
 

Tanev, Toffoli and Markstrom were cap casualties due to a pandemic that froze the cap that was projected to be 84-88mil. No one was going to make bold moves without any certainty. Lmao yea Benning started COVID, forgot that was his fault. You really think he acquired Toffoli weaks prior to COVID only to want to let him walk, when he expected 3.5-7.5mil in extra cap space.

 

Lmfao ya cuz plenty of teams were lining up for Vrbata’s 5mil 27 point production. 
Edler chose to leave

Stetcher has little value

Hamhuis had a 4.5mil cap hit and back issues. He hardly played 3/4 of a season his last 2 seasons in Van. How much value does that bring?

[Baggins]

8 minutes ago, DSVII said:

Again, exclude Markstrom from this, everyone knew it was impossible to keep him. If i had to nitpick anything it was that he talked only to Markstrom and not to Toffoli/Stetcher and Tanev till it was too late. 

I still don't understand Stecher being included as a complaint. I fully expected him not to be re-signed at the end of that season. The kid is certainly likeable and has heart but he's certainly not a guy a good team would keep as a regular. In free agency he signed with a bottom feeder in Detroit. Was traded as a pending ufa at the deadline for a 7th round pick. The best job he could find this year was laughing stock Arizona. He was and is a fringe d-man you don't worry about losing to free agency. It's silly to even mention Stecher as a complaint about Benning.