Canucks Young Guns

[SKYO]

Pierre McGuire:

See's Gaudette eventually as top-six forward, 50-70 point player;

Canucks may need to focus on drafting defencemen - not best player available -if want to shore up weak back-end

[Strangelove]

Assuming the Canucks sign 2 UFA top-4 D this year:

If you had to move on from a pair of Canucks D, who'd you rather see leave:

Edler/Tanev or
Hutton/Stecher

Edler and Tanev are the better players, but Hutton/Stecher are younger and far more durable. Its a tough call for me, but I'd go with moving on from Edler/Tanev - frees up more cap space, gets younger, have a more reliably healthy top-4.

I can't see how they can afford to lose either Tanev or Stecher because they have no depth on the right side of the D beyond those two.
I can see either Hutton or Edler moving on. They have some decent prospect depth on the left side.

Yeah gotta keep Tanev and Stetcher... unless we sign Karlsson.

There's still Tryamkin, who I keep insisting will play the right side.

[Cousin Strawberry]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

[SKYO]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

[DonCherry4PM]

Pierre McGuire:

See's Gaudette eventually as top-six forward, 50-70 point player;

Canucks may need to focus on drafting defencemen - not best player available -if want to shore up weak back-end

Like the optimism on Gaud. He is showing lots of promise and as many have said is making Sutter more expendable.

I have a bit of an issue with picking positionally vs. BPA unless the player you are picking is likely to make an immediate impact. Picking positionally on a player who is a ways away from making an impact is banking on the team’s strengths and weaknesses remaining constant or at least similar which is less and leas likely the farther the player is from the bigs. In my mind it is generally better to acquire more valuable assets and then trade from positions of strength to augment positions of weakness. Obviously the margin of difference in skill should factor in the decision as well as the estimated timeline for the player making the team.

That said, given JB’s skill at trading I think I might be convinced to move towards positional drafting rather than BPA.

[DonCherry4PM]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

Trade Boeser, Goldie and Horvat for #1 pick.

[Blob Mckenzie]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

The guy has been buried for months playing the heaviest, shittiest minutes on the team. I’m not shocked this has eluded you. Not to mention he has gotten scrubs for line mates for most of the year

[SKYO]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

The guy has been buried for months playing the heaviest, shittiest minutes on the team. I’m not shocked this has eluded you. Not to mention he has gotten scrubs for line mates for most of the year

Sounds like the situations Sutter & Beagle are in.

[Blob Mckenzie]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

The guy has been buried for months playing the heaviest, shittiest minutes on the team. I’m not shocked this has eluded you. Not to mention he has gotten scrubs for line mates for most of the year

Sounds like the situations Sutter & Beagle are in.

Except Sutter is never healthy and Beagle is purely a 4th line player. The deployment of Horvat is a joke

[Cousin Strawberry]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

Well his numbers are dropping like widows panties on a european vacation so whats there to debate?

Hes slowed down considerably and his scoring has dried up. Why?

[Blob Mckenzie]

Whats happening with Horvats production? Has he been run down or is there an injury? He seems to be notably slower than the first 30+ games and am curious what peoples opinions are on his game

Careful UDL people are real touchy about talking about Horvat and saying anything bad about him.

Held scoreless past 5 games, hopefully he breaks out of his slump.

Well his numbers are dropping like widows panties on a european vacation so whats there to debate?

Hes slowed down considerably and his scoring has dried up. Why?

Playing 25 min a game against the other teams best players with losers like Spooner, Pearson etc.

I don’t have too many problems with Green but the deployment of Horvat, Gaudetteand Granlund is alarming

[Hockey Widow]

Hughes blocks a shot. Getting X-rays on his foot. Day to day now. He should fit right in with the Canucks!

[Chef Boi RD]

It doesn’t sound serious but more importantly - Michigan lost. I believe it’s one more loss to the Gophers and it’s Lockwood and Hughes signed sealed and delivered. The Benning Haters are really, really, really going hate the excitement these two signings will bring to this city in a few days, furthermore sealing Bennings future at the helm!!! The future is here. Behold! Accept!! And love!!!

Ronnings Ghost, your thoughts?

[nuckster]

Was listening to podcasts this am, and there was some discussion about the coaching choices to made when your team is out of the running for the playoffs. They joked about how someone might need to carefully tell Green that we're done, but ultimately, it should be JBs job. They raised the notion that at this point, emphasis should be on playing your rookies to see what u got, including giving Gaudette more ice-time and seeing what Virtanen can do when he gets back.

An unfortunate piece for the Canucks, is that at this point of time, there's really no one to bring up and take a look at other than maybe Mckewan now that Dahlen is gone. Kinda sad man. This thread is called 'Young Guns', ooh yeah cool... guns! Truth is, other than who is already on the 'big team', there are no young guns on the farm to look at. Thankfully we have some collegians to consider, and Woo, but no one other than Quinn that we can really bring up, which is unfortunate.

[Ronning's Ghost]

It doesn’t sound serious but more importantly - Michigan lost. I believe it’s one more loss to the Gophers and it’s Lockwood and Hughes signed sealed and delivered. The Benning Haters are really, really, really going hate the excitement these two signings will bring to this city in a few days, furthermore sealing Bennings future at the helm!!! The future is here. Behold! Accept!! And love!!!

Ronnings Ghost, your thoughts?

I already said I thought the Canucks should re-examine the cost/benefit on defencemen blocking shots in an 82 game regular season. I also went way out on a limb and said I suspect Hughes will disappoint in the long term, and turn out not to be the best defenceman available at that draft position, and/or manifest attitude problems.

Or did you mean, do I think it's wise to blow a year of a prospect's pro contract to play such a small number of games that there isn't even developmental value? No, I don't think so. But then, it's been clear for a while now Benning has a very different thought process from me on almost every element of how to run the rebuild, so I'm not surprised or disappointed. My hope is that, after the second consecutive Stanley Cup in the Canucks dynasty, if I eat crow with sufficient humility, one of you Benning-backers will explain the guiding principles behind these choices, as they may become clear in retrospect.