The Huggie Bear Dilemma - What to do with QH43

[Meds]

I think Donny is right, this is worth conversing, and it keeps coming up in damned near every thread so why not actually put it in one place?

Unless San Jose rings up Allvin and offers up Celebrini, Sam Dickinson, their 1st round picks for the next couple of seasons, throw in Shakir Mukhamadullin for Blobby, and insist on including Askarov in exchange for Lankinen, then the preference is definitely to see Hughes re-sign here for another 7 seasons.

BUT.....

This place is where we wax hypothetical as rabid fans of a team that has chronically disappointed us.

I'll start by saying that I disagree with the sentiment that Hughes' max value in trade is after July 1st 2026. I think his max value is in the next couple of months as it gives an acquiring team 2 cracks at a Cup with him, plus that extra time to sell him on an extension in whatever that new home might be. A deadline deal gives a short window for him to gel with a new group and a new system heading into the post-season grind. That is less attractive for both the acquiring team and Hughes in regards setting up for playoff success. I think there are very few players who step onto a new team at the TDL and lead that team in the playoffs the way Rantanen did in Dallas last year.

Any team that is going to be in the mix for acquiring and extending Hughes will have to be a playoff team right now, one that has a legit shot at having Hughes consider sticking around on an extension. So you may need to find a third partner in trade if you want to acquire a 1st round pick that has any sort of actual value.....otherwise you have to be asking for a Celebrini in return because you can't expect to find franchise players in bottom-15 picks. It happens, but too rarely if it means giving up a player of Hughes' calibre.

I really like a few of the players we have here, and I'd love to see the Canucks challenge for a Cup with Boeser, Garland, Hughes, and Demko, on the roster.....but I have to say that I'm with JPP on this one, rebuild it, and rebuild it right.

[donlever]

I'll add to this and respond to JPP's post I commented towards in the GDT.

Later to both as my time allows because I'd like to get in depth with it and see if we can create a solid discussion thread as I believe this to be an important topic certainly harboring repercussions from either side of the equation, both the short and the term prognosis of your Vancouver Canucks and the ability to win that Cup we all desire.

But.

For clarity of approach.

If any of us were managing this team we would need to have taken a pro-active, what if mind set to this situation from months and years ago in an effort to make the correct business decision.

As could we as a reasonably intelligent hockey talk board.

[Meds]

If any of us were managing this team we would need to have taken a pro-active, what if mind set to this situation from months and years ago in an effort to make the correct business decision.


As could we as a reasonably intelligent hockey talk board.

This, unfortunately, seems to be an impossibility for any management group under the current ownership.

I await your in-depth perspective.

[donlever]

...and that is another issue not only with respect to this discussion but also our overall Fandom.

The Canucks ownership equates to big Government?

Bend over the little guys (us) while creating illusions of intended success but in reality only satisfying corporate greed.

Maybe Topper was right.

Maybe the Canucks always were a real estate play for the A's.

But I digress....

[UWSaint]

I think the best time to sell him if he’s to be sold is after next July not because his return is greatest, but because it maximizes expected value.

The maximum value is Hughes as a lifelong Canuck. He is either the best or second best defenseman in the league; and he’s one of the league’s 10 best players. Whereas other stars can turn a game around, he can control it. He makes the defense way deeper. He changes how teams have to play against the Canucks. The chance an organization gets a Quinn Hughes is 1 every 50 years….

The Canucks really won’t know whether they can sign Hughes until they are allowed to make the offer and have it be enforceable, such that the counter offer (or lack thereof) is real information. I will give up the extra first rounder and more to know that it was move or get nothing. I might even choose nothing if there’s reason to believe (more than there is today) that one final year with QH brought a realistic chance of a Cup.

[UWSaint]

Adding to my comment after seeing Donny’s

(1) Keeping Hughes as a lifelong Canuck means 10 more years of excellence (health cooperating) at a position you must have excellence. It means regardless of where the Canucks are in a cycle, there will be another Hughes is part of.

(2) Trading means likely means boosting # of futures for the next cycle. But who has built success from a goosed up future asset mix instead of just getting more than one high pick in bunched up years using their own picks from their own shitty play? Just like quality for quantity doesn’t usually lead to best outcomes for a trade if nhl players, it doesn’t typically work for future assets. I mean, it *could* work, but it typically doesn’t. And it’s not how Stanley Cup winners (or back to back also rans) are created.

Florida—winning trades + Barkov (their own high pick)
Edmonton—their own damn picks
Vegas—free agency and trades
Tampa—their own damn picks
Colorado—their own damn picks
St Louis—wtf, how did that happen
Pitt—their own damn picks
Washington—their own damn picks

When I say their own picks, I means the picks they didn’t trade for, but earned by sucking. It wasn’t futures quantity, it was futures quality which are rarely on offer mid season because shitty teams aren’t making trades for Hughes and Hughes will make any shitty team draft outside the top ten absent lottery luck (see Canucks since having Hughes).

[Madcombinepilot]

I think all of common sense, intelligent fans should simply try and manage the expectations of the media and fair weather fans and simply understand no decisions will be made until late next July… after any big moves in FA are done and Hughes then decides his future here.

[rats19]

I agree it will depend on the direction management shows with trades and FA…however that doesn’t mean we can’t talk about possibilities….

Trade would bring large returns but would likely slow down our window.

[theman]

If the Canucks wanted to maximize their return from a Hughes trade, the time to trade him would probably be this season. Of course I am not advocating they do that, but it would be the time to get 'best value.' The acquiring team would have 1 and a bit of a season to win him over or to move him to minimize any potential loss.

Obviously the Canucks are not going to do that however.

Should the Canucks entertain a trade? No, not right now, as said. As I said in another thread, I am not in a 'trade Hughes' camp and I believe they only should trade him if he makes it clear he will not re-sign in Vancouver or his ask is going to be way to high, something like 20 mil per season.

[Ronning's Ghost]

The maximum value is Hughes as a lifelong Canuck.

Agreed. But...

For the first time ever I see QH wanting to leave.

...the decision is not entirely the Canucks to make, which is why we're having this discussion. While I agree with the thesis other posters have offered that a forward-looking ownership/management group could, theoretically put the Canucks in a better position to win a Cup in the next 7 years with a fire-sale, ground up rebuild, I agree with UWSaint that there's enough challenges and variables in the execution that even a competent management group has a significant chance of coming out behind, at least on the value-for-Hughes part of the process. In any case, I think we have established to most poster's satisfaction that the Canucks do not have a forward-looking ownership/management group, so the only reason that they'd be trading Hughes is if it's clear that's the only return on the asset that they can get.

I figure Hughes is in "wait and see" mode, and there's no reason why he shouldn't exercise the leverage he has got. But I think it's also possible that he gets all the information he needs by Christmas, and whether for his own best interests, or as a favour to the team that drafted him, he might let the Canucks know as soon as he does if he doesn't see a future with them.

If he does, I think that the maximum return value window will be right after the Olympics, when the rest of the League has just seen how effective Hughes can be with a talented supporting cast.

[UWSaint]

... a forward-looking ownership/management group could, theoretically put the Canucks in a better position to win a Cup in the next 7 years with a fire-sale, ground up rebuild...

...I figure Hughes is in "wait and see" mode, and there's no reason why he shouldn't exercise the leverage he has got. But I think it's also possible that he gets all the information he needs by Christmas, and whether for his own best interests, or as a favour to the team that drafted him, he might let the Canucks know as soon as he does if he doesn't see a future with them....

On the second point, telling the Canucks he's not going to entertain re-signing is the equivalent to demanding a trade and quitting on the team mid-season. I don't see that coming from QH43, but who knows.

The first point is an interesting question -- its not what to do with QH43, but what the Canucks do if QH43 is not going to be in the plans. Should it then be a total fire sale or should the Canucks seek a return that includes NHL players and near NHL-ready prospects to keep this group going.

From the perspective of maximizing expected future value, this is another one where you are going to get more information about this group this season that would inform whether the goal of a trade would be to get competitive in a shorter window or extend it out further. But from my perspective, the Canucks are a team of complements without a core (outside of Hughes, the questionable-health goalie, and EP40 if he bounces back this season). The argument for a fire sale is pretty strong in that circumstance, but honestly if EP40 doesn't bounce back, the chance of a return is low. And still the question is whether to load up on future draft picks (not a particular successful strategy historically, but I get the argument), or whether it is to target teams in win now mode willing to part with their top prospects or new NHLers (consider how Boston dealt Jumbo Joe and The Uniballer and Seguin....). The market might wag the strategy as to whether there is a 3 year plan or a 5 year plan.

[Meds]

The first point is an interesting question -- its not what to do with QH43, but what the Canucks do if QH43 is not going to be in the plans. Should it then be a total fire sale or should the Canucks seek a return that includes NHL players and near NHL-ready prospects to keep this group going.

When you look at the current production of the team, and cast that gaze back to last season, then the fire sale really is the only option.

BUT!

When you look at what the team has done the last 5 games in the face of multiple injuries during a very compressed schedule, then there is room for speculation and discussion regarding the other way of handling it. It is, however, predicated heavily on the several "ifs".

IF.....

Willander is 75% of the player that Hughes is.

IF.....

Sushi returns and shows us that we probably have a 25+G top-6 winger in him.

IF.....

Pettersson's 5 game trajectory stays the course.

IF.....

D-Petey shows us that he can be a second pairing guy.

Then there absolutely is room to discuss making a trade that brings back now and "almost-now" players.

Let's look at the Florida Panthers for the last two seasons.

They did not then, and do not now, have a player on their roster of Hughes calibre.

The only forward they have that possesses the natural skill and IQ that we have seen from EP40 is Barkov.

Regardless of two SC rings, Demko is a better goaltender than Bobs.

Now, if Pettersson returns to the player we had in year's 4-6, and we see some of our younger, homegrown, players bear a bit of fruit, then the package that Hughes would return could absolutely fill the holes in this line-up.

[Ronning's Ghost]

On the second point, telling the Canucks he's not going to entertain re-signing is the equivalent to demanding a trade and quitting on the team mid-season. I don't see that coming from QH43, but who knows.

I know that there are cultural elements of hockey that I do not understand, but the way I see it, Hughes offering the team certainty -- either way-- on an advanced timetable is a huge benefit and a favour to the organization. It's not "trade me right away!", it's "trade me when and where you can get the most help, because I know I'm not staying here -- and hey, if you keep me all season, maybe we can still do some good things this year". (or, preferably, "I've picked my numbers, and if you're willing to pay my price, we have a gentleman's agreement on re-signing")

[Ronning's Ghost]

IF.....

We have agreed for a while that there were a lot of "ifs" coming into this season, and on a purely statistical basis, it was never likely that the Canucks would hit on all of them. It's a long season, and although I offered a "Hughes has his answers by Christmas" scenario above, there's also a good chance we don't know most of the answers until after the trade deadline.

But IF the Canucks come up on the right side of most of the "ifs", then

1) I'd expect Hughes to be much more interested in staying

and

2) as UWSaint argued above, in that case, the most value he can bring to the organization would be by obtained by his staying on the roster

[Lancer]

IMO, Quinn is the canary in the coal mine.

If Hughes decides not to re-sign - whenever he does so - it should be the clearest sign to ownership and management that the roster is fatally-flawed. If Quinn, their team captain, doesn't believe in them - or in management's ability to build a roster he can believe in - then you don't need to be a Rutherford or Allvin to figure out he's likely right.

In that case, tear it down to the studs. Keep what youngsters and 'culture carriers' you think can still be contributing pieces once the roster is ready to make the playoffs, and sell the rest for what you can get. If Petey nets you a 5th and some AHL stand-ins, take it and move on. If you believe in your goaltending pipeline, ship Lankinnen and Demko for what you can get and go with Tolopilo and Young until the promised youth talent comes in.

Just get ready to suffer watching those departed stars succeed elsewhere while the home team plays unwatchable hockey and all you have is the hope that some of those lottery tickets pan out. In other words, get used to what Buffalo and San Jose fans have had to put up with in recent years. The Sharks have some nice young pieces, but they're still in the McKenna hunt in the standings. Anybody ready for that??

Because I wager ownership isn't.