Around the league (signings, RFAs injuries)

[Chef Boi RD]

Whatevs to Stecher. This UFA season is about avoiding it like it’s the plague. It’s about Petey and Hughes. The core untouchables:

Petey
Hughes
Miller
Horvat
Boeser
Demko
Podkolzin
Hoglander
Rathbone

The pieces to keep around them:

Juolevi
Tryamkin
Virtanen
Lind
MacEwan
Gaudette
Woo
Lockwood
DiPietro
Motte

And wait out for Covid and for these contracts to fall off the cliff and go quietly into the night:

Sutter - 1 year
Pearson - 1 year
Edler - 1 year
Baertschi - 1 year
Spooner - 1 year
Benn - 1 year
Eriksson - 2 years
Beagle - 2 years
Roussel - 2 years
Luongo - 2 years
Ferland - 3 years (I think he retires)

We can then start being players in the UFA market in 1 to 2 years. Patience, let thus young group evolved. My OEL win now dream is over!

[Carl Yagro]

I guess Barrie wasn't a priority for the Canucks if 1yr./$4mill didn't get done

Is planning to pad his stats with McDavid on the PP for a year and then hunt for a new contract? He couldn't do that here behind Hughes.

I see this as his rationale. Trying to maximize his future, last big contract?

Smart to see what McCovid & Co. can do before possibly re-upping. Who'd want to be in Edmonton long-term without some massive bonuses?

[Curmudgeon]

Whatevs to Stecher. This UFA season is about avoiding it like it’s the plague. It’s about Petey and Hughes. The core untouchables:

Petey
Hughes
Miller
Horvat
Boeser
Demko
Podkolzin
Hoglander
Rathbone

The pieces to keep around them:

Juolevi
Tryamkin
Virtanen
Lind
MacEwan
Gaudette
Woo
Lockwood
DiPietro
Motte

And wait out for Covid and for these contracts to fall off the cliff and go quietly into the night:

Sutter - 1 year
Pearson - 1 year
Edler - 1 year
Baertschi - 1 year
Spooner - 1 year
Benn - 1 year
Eriksson - 2 years
Beagle - 2 years
Roussel - 2 years
Luongo - 2 years
Ferland - 3 years (I think he retires)

We can then start being players in the UFA market in 1 to 2 years. Patience, let thus young group evolved. My OEL win now dream is over!

But they still need to replace Tanev and Stecher for this coming season and don't appear to have the cash. If they miss the playoffs it won't be Benning here to tap into the the next UFA market and rightly so. Benning should be sweating bullets.

And shame on ownership because ultimately the buck stops there unless they gave total autonomy to Benning to cut the deals that got them into this mess and I find that very hard to believe. I had significant autonomy my last 18/19 years on the job and if my managers had approached me with the equivalent in our business to the tactical monetary investments or personnel moves Benning made, I would have shot most of them down and questioned that individual's ability to run the business they were responsible for going forward and it would have been a much shorter leash or they would have been redeployed elsewhere in the organization or even "coached" out of the business.

[Madcombinepilot]

Benning is fine. Even if they miss the playoffs next year. If they miss 2 years in a row, then he is on the hit plate, but that won’t happen.

Look around the league...

Who really got better so far? Like by a large margin?

You can argue the Alberta teams improved, but the off season isn’t over yet, and our prospect pool is deeper and better than theirs, so we don’t really know until next training camp.

We do know that Calgary locked a bunch of their salary cap in for the next few years on aging guys, while we are poised to be flushing cap space out over the next few years...

JB hasn’t made a mistake this offseason yet.

[Chef Boi RD]

Replacing Stecher is not even a problem

Replacing Markstrom = Demko/Holtby. Not a problem

Only have to find a top 4 D-man to replace Tanev whom btw was regularly injured. Not concerned, lots of time left still.

[Chef Boi RD]

Benning is fine. Even if they miss the playoffs next year. If they miss 2 years in a row, then he is on the hit plate, but that won’t happen.

Look around the league...

Who really got better so far? Like by a large margin?

You can argue the Alberta teams improved, but the off season isn’t over yet, and our prospect pool is deeper and better than theirs, so we don’t really know until next training camp.

We do know that Calgary locked a bunch of their salary cap in for the next few years on aging guys, while we are poised to be flushing cap space out over the next few years...

JB hasn’t made a mistake this offseason yet.

Exactly!

Benning is fine. The flat cap, Covid and Luongos cap recapture and the unexpected rise of Hughes and Petey created some tough obstacles for Benning. He’s doing the right thing by not handing out big contracts with term to more 30 year olds (Tanev and Edler) Petterson and Hughes are 20 year olds. They are the face of the next decade. Everyone needs to chill. We need to shed some shitty contracts before adding more

[ESQ]

Maybe smart for Barrie, he could have a career year there offensively...but Tippett teams tend to drop off after his first season (at least, they tend to peak in his first season). And, he tends to be an offense-suck. The only reason to sign there is to juice the offensive numbers.

Quite a coup for Holland though, it's been many years since he got top UFAs to sign for under market value, especially in Edmonton.

[Chef Boi RD]

It’s funny. Barrie is a shit shoe defensively. What did McDavid say when his season ended? “We need to start being better defensively”

Good luck with Barrie under Tippet, lol.

[BCExpat]

The Oilers resign Mike Smith - LOL. The team only concentrates on offense, even from their goalie . Their defense was a goat rodeo before free agency, and now it is much worse.

[Chef Boi RD]

LMAO, the media and angry Benning Haters are losing it right now. This is better than when Benning got extended

[Cousin Strawberry]

JB hasn’t made a mistake this offseason yet.

Fact!

He may have learned something from the past and its probably a great thing for the canucks.

Good thing none of us are pulling the triggers aaaahaha....

[Curmudgeon]

Nate Thomson would have been a good 4th line center option at $750k but fortunately the Canucks have that covered with $3,000,000 Jay Beagle for the next couple years. lol

[Curmudgeon]

Benning is fine. Even if they miss the playoffs next year. If they miss 2 years in a row, then he is on the hit plate, but that won’t happen.

Look around the league...

Who really got better so far? Like by a large margin?

You can argue the Alberta teams improved, but the off season isn’t over yet, and our prospect pool is deeper and better than theirs, so we don’t really know until next training camp.

We do know that Calgary locked a bunch of their salary cap in for the next few years on aging guys, while we are poised to be flushing cap space out over the next few years...

JB hasn’t made a mistake this offseason yet.

Exactly!

Benning is fine. The flat cap, Covid and Luongos cap recapture and the unexpected rise of Hughes and Petey created some tough obstacles for Benning. He’s doing the right thing by not handing out big contracts with term to more 30 year olds (Tanev and Edler) Petterson and Hughes are 20 year olds. They are the face of the next decade. Everyone needs to chill. We need to shed some shitty contracts before adding more

You're right, they need to shed some shitty contracts that Benning signed but the problem isn't COVID and the recapture, it's that they have over $16,000,000 tied up in 4th liners (Eriksson, Beagle, Roussel, Sutter), need to keep room for a $3.5 mil concussion prone Ferland unless they LTIR him, have $3 mil Baertschi buried, a million tied up in the Spooner buyout that was a result of a poor Gagner signing, and overpaid by $1 mil through self created necessity on Myers and $500k or so on Benn. But I blame ownership more than Benning on all that anyway. He's an average GM and they signed off on everything.

Benning hasn't made a big mistake this offseason YET, I wouldn't have done the Markstrom and Tanev deals either, but that's only because he doesn't have the cash to do it and Arizona saved him from himself. Stecher at what Detroit signed him at was slightly cheaper than Benn and a little over what he really should have been renewed at when his ELC deal was up and might have been workable if they hadn't treated him as an afterthought.

We'll see how it goes but they don't have much room to manoeuvre and I'd be shocked if ownership gave him a pass in missing the playoffs next year. Hughes and Pettersson can't be happy with their buds leaving either.

[Chef Boi RD]

Curmudgeon you’re beating the dead horse again. EVERYONE is well aware of the shitty contracts even Benning has admittedly said so.

[Mickey107]

Just missing the playoffs this year will be a huge step backwards. Bad for the attitude of the fans that would, hopefully, buy tickets or keep their tickets, to games for the year after.
A "go thru the motions" style season, where the team might even become a lottery, team again would also be a real pisser for the high
profile players on the team. Pettersson, Hughes, Horvat, Boeser, and I can't even imagine how pissed JT Miller would be. NOT good.