[DEBATE] Which player is the greatest disappointment in Vancouver Canucks history?

[NewbieCanuckFan]

12 minutes ago, canuck73_3 said:

Loui set the franchise back a literal decade plus now with the OEL buyout.

That damn Gillis.

[ABNuck]

I think the biggest disappointment for me was Loui. We were on the recovery upswing and had a few pieces that we could spread out through the lineup to make us tougher to play against...but, alas...the chemistry that we were all so enamored with at the World Hockey Championship level never materialized in the day-to-day NHL grind, and we ended up without much depth. It really did set the tone for the next half decade, where complacency and lower expectations replaced our joy and hope. Some poor decisions can be buried, traded or fixed with a better next pick or trade, but not so in this case...there was no fixing it and no golden parachute to bail us out...we just had to suck and live with it.

[NewbieCanuckFan]

2 hours ago, MeanSeanBean said:

Jake Virtanen. 

 

I was only about 10 during the Messier debacle, so I'm going off the player I felt the most disappointment over.

 

Jake had all the talent, natural ability, and size to be a elite force in the NHL. He was drafted by his hometown team and could have been a very special player for us. Unfortunately he was lazy, entitled, and unmotivated to do anything with his career. Not to mentioned he was bought out by the team for being accused of sexual assault.

 

F that lazy bum, biggest disappointment in franchise history.

Great amateur scouting by our Western Canadian scouts again 

[canuck73_3]

45 minutes ago, ABNuck said:

I think the biggest disappointment for me was Loui. We were on the recovery upswing and had a few pieces that we could spread out through the lineup to make us tougher to play against...but, alas...the chemistry that we were all so enamored with at the World Hockey Championship level never materialized in the day-to-day NHL grind, and we ended up without much depth. It really did set the tone for the next half decade, where complacency and lower expectations replaced our joy and hope. Some poor decisions can be buried, traded or fixed with a better next pick or trade, but not so in this case...there was no fixing it and no golden parachute to bail us out...we just had to suck and live with it.

Wish we landed Lucic instead of Loui, at least he hit. 

[JamesB]

On 8/10/2023 at 4:11 AM, Toni Zamboni said:

sad list of disappoints

 

On 8/10/2023 at 7:11 AM, kloubek said:

I measure failure based on the negative affect it had on the team as a whole.

 

And for that reason, I still deem Messier to be the biggest disappointment in that list. For me, the runners up are OJ (for being a high draft pick we really needed on D but ended up incapable of being an NHL player) and LE, for forgetting how to play hockey the moment he signed his 6 year pact with Vancouver.

 

 

On 8/10/2023 at 7:37 AM, CanucksForever2 said:

For me it's hands down Mark Messier. It's wasn't just disappointment, but he had the most negative impact as a Canucks player. 

I have pretty much the same read as @kloubek.

 

One way of thinking of disappointment is poor performance relative to reasonable expectations.  So -- a player I thought might do well but turned out, well, disappointing. I would put OJ and Virtanen and OEL in that category. I did not like either of the picks and I did not like the OEL trade but I thought that all three guys would at least be ok -- bad decisions by Benning, but not disastrous decisions, which is what they turned out the be. 

 

The other type of disappointment is the disappointment the moment the move was announced. I remember the moment I learned about the Messier signing. Paying a huge amount of money as a "shortcut" to success never works and signing a guy with a big ego and strong sense of entitlement in his late prime to a huge contract is asking for trouble, which is what the Canucks got. Messier gets my vote overall.

 

Another move where I said "Oh, no" the moment it was announced was the Erkisson move. Of course, everyone knew that Benning was going to throw away a lot of money on at the opening of free agency.

 

To me, the most disappointing "moves" have been the sequence of owners. The combination of Aquilini as owner and Benning as GM was, in my view, the worst one-two combination in the NHL.  The question now is whether a good President and GM can overcome a bad owner. I am actually hopeful. And it is a good sign that no move made by JR and PA is even close to consideration for the "worst move" list. 

[Citizen Erased]

On 8/10/2023 at 9:48 AM, Canuck You said:

All the players that Burkie acquired at the TDL when Moore was oBerted and then suspended were all a big disappointment also.

Hey, Marc Bergevin was a good character player!

[Citizen Erased]

No honourable mentions for Jesse Schultz, Fedor Fedorov, Sergei Shirokov or Leif Rohlin?

[Timråfan]

3 hours ago, canuck73_3 said:

Loui set the franchise back a literal decade plus now with the OEL buyout.

Hardly, he played like a 3 mill but that was on Benning that hadn’t got a clue what players the coach needed.

It seems he asked around and was happy with ghat. Not any serious analyse how Loui played and if that style fitted how the coach played.

 

Ferland was over three mill right down the toilet at once.

 

But I chosed Messier due to the overall negative impact he had on the team.

[Snake Doctor]

No one player is more disappointing than the current ownership group.

[dpn1]

On 8/10/2023 at 4:29 AM, Alflives said:

Cody was doing quite well until the muscular disease he has (Malignant Hyperthermia) started to impact him. So not an injury, like Brock suffered, to impact his play but a debilitating disease. 
A player who had all the physical gifts, and didn’t suffer a serious injury or have a debilitating disease that was craperolla was Virtanen. He is by far the most disappointing player we’ve had. 

Jake never was much to this team.  He was never good enough.  Mess was such a great player and he just shit the bed so profoundly that he has to be the worst. 

[Sell.the.team]

Messier is the only answer.  He was a disgrace during his time here.  

[alt kilgore]

On 8/10/2023 at 11:51 AM, canucklehead44 said:

•  

  On 8/10/2023 at 11:51 AM, canucklehead44 said:

  • David Booth - lived up to expectations his first season, and was a nice add-on despite us not having a good run. LTIR second season. His final season he fell out of favour as Torts hated him. He actually played OK in the roles he was given - on the 2nd line he was on pace for 23 goals and in the bottom six he played fine in that role (underlying numbers and hits were solid) but was paid too much. Given we traded Samuelsson in his final year after extracting a tonne of value out of him, dumped Sturm who was a mistake, and acquired a 3rd round pick out of it he was worth the gamble but didn't pan out. 
     
  • Micheal Ferland -  I was super sad Ferland's career ended the way it did. Was so excited about this signing but we only got 14 games out of him. It is hard to place a guy who doesn't pan out because of injuries vs one who doesn't live up to expectations. 
     
  • Nikta Tryamkin - Sad he didn't come back but he was a 3rd rounder who gave us a season +. 
     
  • Keith Ballard - A great acquisition at the time who unfortunately had an undisclosed injury despite playing 82 games. He sort of falls into the Booth camp of he wasn't really that bad but pushed down the lineup and overpaid. This was a bit of a different era - fans were behind Ballard and more hate was directed toward Vigneault. What makes Ballard not so disappointing is part of the reason he got pushed down the lineup was Hamhuis who was excellent - if we never acquired Hamhuis things would have gone different. 
     
  • Olli Juolevi - Hated this pick at the time, but at least expected him to be a 2nd pairing dman for us. Maybe the most disappointing draft pick. 
     
  • Loui Eriksson - Eriksson was a very good player then signed in Vancouver and went to absolute crap. 
     
  • Jake Virtanen - I was never that high on Jake - even when we drafted him I thought he would be a 15 goal guy who hits. 
     
  • Alek Stojanov - don't remember
     
  • Shawn Antonski - don't remember
     
  • Jay Beagle - I know this signing was a disaster from the onset but Beagle was a bit worse than I anticipated. 
     
  • Mark Messier - Huge disappointment but they put way too much on the shoulders of an aging player. In hindsight he was actually far better than Eriksson (was top 2 in either scoring or points per game in his 3 seasons)
     
  • Cody Hodgson - I was disappointed when he was traded, but he ended up having that insane medical condition anyway. Sad because if not for that I think he would have been better than Horvat and would have been our captain after Henrik. 
     
  • Oliver Ekman-Larsson - I knew he sucked - disappointed from the onset. 
     
  • Sven Baertschi - meh
     
  • Vladimir Krutov - don't remember
     
  • Linden Vey - stupid giving up a 2nd for a guy that would have ended up on waivers. Small, slow, didn't light the world on fire BAD pro scouting. 
     
  • Jordan Schroeder - I'd say Schroeder would have to be up there - he was anticipated to go top 10 and I really liked what I saw from him. Injuries and a bad environment from NCAA to the Chicago Wolves to John Tortella destroyed him. 
    
    
    It is kind of hard to put it in rankings, but I'd put it in this order:
    
    1. Most underperfrming signing - Eriksson
    2. Most disappointing draft pick - Juolevi
    3. Saddest signing based on potential - Ferland
    4. Saddest draft pick based on potential - Hodgson 
    5. Worst trade (at the time and in hindsight) - OEL
  • 6. Biggest cancer - Messier

   

“It is kind of hard to put it in rankings, but I'd put it in this order:

1. Most underperfrming signing - Eriksson
2. Most disappointing draft pick - Juolevi
3. Saddest signing based on potential - Ferland
4. Saddest draft pick based on potential - Hodgson 
5. Worst trade (at the time and in hindsight) - OEL”

 

 

Yeah you almost have to categorize the failures into different kinds. Like one of the failures said “you can’t just eat one”

 

 what is it about this franchise hiring people from other teams that had just eliminated us from a SCF? Keenan and Messier after 94, and then we hire Benning after 2011 to implement the “Boston model”

 

Virtanen, I never watched him play in junior so there wasn’t much to base any disappointment on. He basically played well below expectations from the start. I guess if it’s based on his draft position then I can see that. Same with OJ.

 

OEL whom Benning had tried to acquire a year before he finally landed his man, was already showing signs of decline in that final year in Phoenix. But that didn’t cause one moment of pause in our GMs quest. One of the dumbest signings in franchise history considering what we gave up and that we only had to wait out one more season for three  other of Bennings questionable signings to be off the books

 

 I’d have to say Cody Hodgson especially after watching him play in the World Juniors. Maybe tied with LE, and OEL for other reasons

Edited August 14, 2023 by kilgore

[NewbieCanuckFan]

16 minutes ago, kilgore said:

“It is kind of hard to put it in rankings, but I'd put it in this order:

1. Most underperfrming signing - Eriksson
2. Most disappointing draft pick - Juolevi
3. Saddest signing based on potential - Ferland
4. Saddest draft pick based on potential - Hodgson 
5. Worst trade (at the time and in hindsight) - OEL”

 

 reading

Still had a better NHL career than Juolevi & Virtanen (both drafted higher than him).

[canucklehead44]

35 minutes ago, NewbieCanuckFan said:

Still had a better NHL career than Juolevi & Virtanen (both drafted higher than him).

Yes true - but Hodgson was very hyped and at the time it was insane we grabbed him at 10. There was a legit debate over who was better between Tavares and Hodgson. I lived in Toronto for 8 years and there were a lot of rep hockey guys in my office would would bring up Hodgson and how disappointing his career was given the hype. Its not that Hodgson was bad - fans loved him his first season with Vancouver and his first year in Buffalo he was around a 25 goal / 60 point pace in a low scoring era - good for 2nd on the team at 22 years old. 

Also consider the accoldates Hodgson received after we drafted him - "In addition to OHL First All-Star Team honours, he was awarded both the William Hanley Trophy as the League's most sportsmanlike player and the Red Tilson Trophy as OHL player of the year. The media voted Hodgson ahead of forward John Tavares and goaltender Mike Murphy for the Tilson award". He also won some sort of defensive or faceoff accoldate (I can't remember). And also he had "future captain" written all over him. He also had 16 points in 6 games at the world juniors. 

Jake Virtanen and Olli Juolevi, even though drafted earlier, I never really had high expectations for. Juolevi played with elite forwards and even so his numbers weren't eye popping. Virtanen already had major red flags to his game and he was taken off the power play, scored 1 goal in 6 playoff games etc. Craig Button boldly ranked him at 43. 

So regardless of draft position, I expected Hodgson to be the same quality as what Horvat became, Virtanen a Raffi Torres type and Juolevi to be like a Jordan Leopold. 

Edited August 14, 2023 by canucklehead44

[alt kilgore]

47 minutes ago, NewbieCanuckFan said:

Still had a better NHL career than Juolevi & Virtanen (both drafted higher than him).

I was quoting canucklehead44 there and accidentally hit the submit button too soon

 

But I did pick Hodgson as most disappointing as a Canucks player, not as a league player. ie my disappointment with Grabner here (another one!) is not affected by his eventual success in New York. Disappointed in Cody’s on ice development being projected as future captain material and that he developed that injury/disease (though not his fault there) and in his overall attitude together with his helicopter father’s interference that Cody seemed in lock step with.

 

 

Edited August 14, 2023 by kilgore

[NewbieCanuckFan]

12 minutes ago, kilgore said:

I was quoting canucklehead44 there and accidentally hit the submit button too soon

 

But I did pick Hodgson as most disappointing as a Canucks player, not as a league player. ie my disappointment with Grabner here (another one!) is not affected by his eventual success in New York. Disappointed in Cody’s on ice development being projected as future captain material and that he developed that injury/disease (though not his fault there) and in his overall attitude together with his helicopter father’s interference that Cody seemed in lock step with.

 

 

That's fair as I too remember the hype around Cody at the time.

[Nurnge]

Dale Talon was NOT the next Bobby Orr as promised ! I was 8 years old I wanted the NEXT Bobby Orr !!!

[canucklehead44]

14 minutes ago, Nurnge said:

Dale Talon was NOT the next Bobby Orr as promised ! I was 8 years old I wanted the NEXT Bobby Orr !!!

What happened to Dale Tallon? 39 goals 79 points in 54 games in his draft year is insane and then he had a very strong rookie campaign with the Canucks with 56 points in 78 games. Keep in mind Boudrias lead the team in scoring with 66 points. 17 goals his second year, and two all-star appearances. 

 

His trade tree isn't too bad:

Traded for Gary Smith and Jerry Korab.

Gary Smith - becaome a starter for three seasons including one very successful year - traded for Caesar Maniago who played two seasons before retiring

Jerry Korab played only 30 games before being traded for John Gould and Tracy Pratt. 

John Gould flourished with the Canucks scoring back to back 30+ goal seasons and was traded for Larry Carriere and Hilliard Graves. Carriere had one mediocre season, Graves played two years his best showing a 21 goal 47 point season. 

Tracy Pratt a defenseman played 3 seasons with the Canucks, his best being 22 points. 

[NewbieCanuckFan]

44 minutes ago, canucklehead44 said:

What happened to Dale Tallon? 39 goals 79 points in 54 games in his draft year is insane and then he had a very strong rookie campaign with the Canucks with 56 points in 78 games. Keep in mind Boudrias lead the team in scoring with 66 points. 17 goals his second year, and two all-star appearances. 

 

His trade tree isn't too bad:

Traded for Gary Smith and Jerry Korab.

Gary Smith - becaome a starter for three seasons including one very successful year - traded for Caesar Maniago who played two seasons before retiring

Jerry Korab played only 30 games before being traded for John Gould and Tracy Pratt. 

John Gould flourished with the Canucks scoring back to back 30+ goal seasons and was traded for Larry Carriere and Hilliard Graves. Carriere had one mediocre season, Graves played two years his best showing a 21 goal 47 point season. 

Tracy Pratt a defenseman played 3 seasons with the Canucks, his best being 22 points. 

If they kept Jerry Korab instead the trade would've been a landslide home run victory for the Canucks even if Gary Smith (who was great for us in his right) never played a single second for the Canucks.  How good was Korab?  Obviously not Norris trophy calibre but think Byfuglien.  Korab was a tough, mean defenseman, especially well suited for 70s hockey.  Heck, he's *EXACTLY* the type of defenseman this team needs *TODAY*.

[Industrious1]

Has to be Messier.