Emulate that. Canucks breaking the way the NHL works

[The Lock]

On 1/21/2024 at 12:47 PM, Tocchet.A.Hockey.God said:

NHL GMs like to emulate what Cup winners do. 

 

So for fun, I was thinking what if the Canucks won the Lord Stanley's Cup? How would GMs emulate the Canucks. I will start.

 

Suck for 8+ years, re-tooling each year with a mediocre GM (Because the Owner likes to meddle and doesn't understand what a re-build is) going through multiple terrible inexperience coaches that favor AHL quality players at best.

 

Fire that mediocre GM and hire the oldest fart as President that wants to re-tool and compete for the playoffs, hire a rookie GM and an inexperience Head Coach.

 

Change half the the players and then do the most unexpected of all things become a Cup contender.

 

  

I missed a lot of other things that happen prior to this season fill in the Blanks. 

 

Disclaimer: This is for fun and make it ridicules because how we got here was ridicules and unexpected. 

 

If they theoretically won the cup this year, it would probably be because of depth and luck. It would be similar to how St. Louis won the cup.

 

Could you mimic that? I guess it would be like with a lot of teams that won a cup. Have a GM create the base, fire that GM, then have a 2nd GM finish the team.

[PureQuickness]

4 hours ago, DSVII said:

 

I mean, the context here is that Gillis really had one season to do a reset (against Ownership's wishes) with a coach he didn't want before being fired and Benning benefited from not only the patience of ownership but also considerably more draft capital and positions than GMMG. Considering he pulled Markstrom and Bo Horvat out of that, it's not a bad haul. 

 

A GM's job is more than drafting, and Demko aside, a lot of these breakouts from Benning's players are happening after PA and JR revamped the entire organization from coaching staff/system to development pipeline.  Hoglander and Podz for instance were finally given time to marinate in the AHL rather than thrown to the wolves like Jake and McCann.

 

Both absolutely deserved to be fired of course, but my judgment of the Gillis prospect pool is tempered a bit given the time and capital Gillis had to really commit to it (yes Gillis' team absolutely sucked at drafting, he himself admitted it and it cost him his job), same way I temper the credit to Benning as he's had more shots in the top 10 than any GM in our history and he hit 50% on that and Linden had to step in to change the way the draft was handled post 2016.. Am I glad Benning hit in that latter half? Sure, but he's going to remain a case study of what not to do for GMs for years to come in the salary cap era

 

 

Gillis is only being defended to the extent history is being re-written to prop up Benning for some strange reason. Evaluate both fairly and sure, I'll pile on Gillis, there's a lot of legitimate gripes with his regime. 

 

 

 

I don't understand the excessive excuses with some of the fanbase with regards to Gillis - and I've made no excuses for Benning's regime when it was indefensible.

 

I have judged BOTH regimes fairly. How I see it is that you can't weigh something more than the other when they both had their own flaws. Benning DEFINITELY drafted better. You can count the number of players (if you were to exclude first rounders) that are either still on the team and system, as well as the players around the league.

 

On the other hand, Gillis had five years (five!) worth of draft picks with absolutely nothing to show at the start of the Benning era. The records show that Gillis succeed sometimes with first round picks, but he would never succeed in other rounds, including other first round picks. Players like Gaunce are still around, which is something I remember now, as well as Horvat and Hutton. Every other prospect besides the above has been a monumental bust in the five years of drafting. That's beyond horrible.

 

Benning's regime left behind a working core that was working in its prime, whereas Gillis left all the players who were on their way out. That's a big difference. You'll really have to see what kind of core that Gillis left behind by the time of his firing: aging Twins, no prospect pool (!), Tanev, and a disgruntled Kesler, plus Markstrom. There's lots of good players, but does it compare to (Pettersson, Hughes, Boeser, Miller, etc)?

 

Now some people will say that Benning had more opportunities for high first round picks, but that wasn't by design, was it? We got some scraps from the Kesler trade that had TWO cities he would waive his NTC for.

 

If you're going to be fair, Benning was left with a terrible situation. And ownership, as we can both agree, was DESPERATE to push out playoff teams.

 

This, of course, doesn't excuse Benning entirely. He's made plenty of bad trades (sans the Miller one - his only rare good one); he's had his share of buyouts; let some good players walk away from free agency, and overpaid players. He didn't always draft that well, but Demko and Hoglander are two of his best players who are NOT 1st rounders. Why couldn't Gillis draft these kinds of non-first round pick players in five years?

 

So there's no need to remind me to judge both GMs fairly. Gillis indisputably created awesome playoff runs that everyone can remember fondly, even myself. It's the aftermath of those playoff pushes that I also don't forget.

 

In short, I was once critical of Allvin, but I'm really glad that I was wrong about him now.

 

 

Edited January 23 by PureQuickness

[DSVII]

9 hours ago, PureQuickness said:

 

I don't understand the excessive excuses with some of the fanbase with regards to Gillis - and I've made no excuses for Benning's regime when it was indefensible.

 

I have judged BOTH regimes fairly. How I see it is that you can't weigh something more than the other when they both had their own flaws. Benning DEFINITELY drafted better. You can count the number of players (if you were to exclude first rounders) that are either still on the team and system, as well as the players around the league.

 

 

 

Please list some of these excessive excuses, I'm interested.

 

I wasn't referring to you specifically, I don't think we've ever talked about this, just referring to some of the other arguments I've seen floating around.

 

Benning did draft better, but he operated with a bigger handicap than Gillis, several times more draft capital. How many top 5 picks did Gillis work with? Benning simply had an enormous advantage drafting in a position where anyone with a hockey magazine could land a player (top 5 picks are ~75% likely to be NHL players.) 

 

Different context too, if we look at the prospect pools of teams that are perennial contending, I'm not expecting as much high tier prospects either. Carolina being an exception.

 

The guy starting out with $100k will almost always make more money than the guy starting his investment at $30k. 

 

Quote

On the other hand, Gillis had five years (five!) worth of draft picks with absolutely nothing to show at the start of the Benning era. The records show that Gillis succeed sometimes with first round picks, but he would never succeed in other rounds, including other first round picks. Players like Gaunce are still around, which is something I remember now, as well as Horvat and Hutton. Every other prospect besides the above has been a monumental bust in the five years of drafting. That's beyond horrible.

 

Gillis gave Benning his Captain and number one goalie, which were both realized when he pivoted in that one year to get a top 10 pick. 

 

Gillis hit 50% in the top 10 (Hodgson, Horvat). And Benning hit on 50% of his picks in the top 10 (Virtanen, Juolevi, Pettersen, Hughes). 

 

The other side of the equation is development. Gillis operated at a point where he simply had no control over how the Chicago Wolves deployed his prospects, they were controlled by a separate ownership group and often put winning with vets above development (Loading up on AHL vets and playing them over NHL prospects). Gillis at least changed this with the Utica comets. He just never had time to see the fruits of it come to be. 

 

Again, should Gillis have drafted more prospects while gunning for a cup? Yes, that eventually caught up to him. But the natural result of having winning teams and selling to go for it will result in having those lower probability picks that are worth several times less than the top ten positions Benning had to work with. Combine that with the development environment that wasn't in his control, I'm not as harsh on that, considering the result was reaching Game 7 of the SCF.

 

Quote

Benning's regime left behind a working core that was working in its prime, whereas Gillis left all the players who were on their way out. That's a big difference. You'll really have to see what kind of core that Gillis left behind by the time of his firing: aging Twins, no prospect pool (!), Tanev, and a disgruntled Kesler, plus Markstrom. There's lots of good players, but does it compare to (Pettersson, Hughes, Boeser, Miller, etc)?

 

Now some people will say that Benning had more opportunities for high first round picks, but that wasn't by design, was it? We got some scraps from the Kesler trade that had TWO cities he would waive his NTC for.

 

I would say going by the fact that Benning capped out the team on veterans to gun for playoffs, that wasn't the design. The Kesler trade and the targeting of roster players over picks and prospects that Anaheim was willing to part with pretty much plays in line with that. Had Benning succeeded in the mandate, we'd probably be discussing Ty Smith or Dylan Merkley rather than Quinn Hughes. The high draft position (which I am thankful for) is the unplanned result. And it's great we capitalized on it.

 

Gillis left Benning with a roster of SCF veterans, two first round picks, a number 1 goaltender, future captain, cap space and a solid defense core.  If you were deciding to rebuild, that's a lot to work with. If you were retooling, it still would have worked if you played your cards right with the two 1st rounders. Not to mention the cap squeeze inherited by Benning was nowhere near as bad as the one Benning left JR/PA. 

 

Again, I'm not too harsh on Gillis here. He really only had the 2013 offseason and draft to pivot to a reset/retool, and that was muddled by a new coach forced on him by ownership. It was a different context the club was operating under from 2009-2012 that explains why the prospect pool and draft asset was weak.

 

And in that span of a few weeks, we got Bo and Markstrom, I can only imagine what an extra year would have looked like (rumor was he wanted Larkin with the Jake pick.)

 

I'm happy to agree to disagree here.

 

Quote

If you're going to be fair, Benning was left with a terrible situation. And ownership, as we can both agree, was DESPERATE to push out playoff teams.

 

The terrible situation Benning had was the mandate from ownership to compete, I agree. Given that, I think Benning did decent up to the 2016. That was really when the trend of his bad deals began with Loui and Sbisa.

 

Quote

but Demko and Hoglander are two of his best players who are NOT 1st rounders. Why couldn't Gillis draft these kinds of non-first round pick players in five years?

 

I give full credit to Benning for Demko, and I loved the Hogs pick at the time too (who doesn't love a player that can juggle and ride a unicycle?)

 

That being said, the simple answer for Gillis is that he traded away his picks to compete. But here's where I do agree with you, some of the 2nd rounders like Anton Rodin, Yaune Sauve, Mallet. Just horrible.

 

Quote

So there's no need to remind me to judge both GMs fairly. Gillis indisputably created awesome playoff runs that everyone can remember fondly, even myself. It's the aftermath of those playoff pushes that I also don't forget.

 

In short, I was once critical of Allvin, but I'm really glad that I was wrong about him now.

 

Yep that's fair.

 

Personally, I'm just thinking that the guy was trying to steer the organization towards a path that was showing some promise, but was ultimately canned for it. I was willing to give the guy a year to address the aftermath of those pushes, which he tried to do. I'm not going to judge him too harshly considering the foundation he laid in one offseason.

 

----------

 

Funny philosophical question here, because my brain works like this sometimes, but all this talking about who inherited what and what not, just reminds me of the philosophical thought experiment, the ship of Theseus.

 

If you take a ship with rotting planks and old wood and replace them with newer ones, is it still the original ship at the end of the day or a new ship? I guess in our case, the ship is rotting, but some of the wood is of very high quality.

 

Likewise, the Canucks team in 2021 placed 24th in the league. And at the time Benning was fired, last in the Pacific at 8-15-2, with a historically bad PK dead last. That team included the same core we are praising Benning with (Miller, Hughes, JT, Petey, Demko.)

 

Then PA and JR came in and removed the rotten planks/dead contracts/staff, and refitted the ship with their pieces (Hronek, Bleuger, Soucy, Mikheyev, Kuzmenko, Cole, Lafferty, Suter, Zadorov), an entirely new coaching staff, a new executive team at pretty much every level of the organization.

 

Is it still the same ship Benning put together? 

 

We've seen teams with great core pieces like McDavid and Mathews flounder. I think there is something to be said for building around that core as well to make a good team (or in the analogy, a new ship), which I hope you can agree Gillis did well enough with the core he got from Nonis and Burke. 

End of the day, I think our disagreement is we all have varying degrees of what makes up this ship that is currently the 2023-24 Canucks. I think it's great that the foundation from the past incarnation of the ship is still here and realizing their potential, but I'm not so sure it would have been realized in the old incarnation. I'm putting a little more weight on the people who've disassembled the old ship and reassembled it to what it is today.

 

 

Edited January 24 by DSVII

[PureQuickness]

3 hours ago, DSVII said:

 

Please list some of these excessive excuses, I'm interested.

 

I wasn't referring to you specifically, I don't think we've ever talked about this, just referring to some of the other arguments I've seen floating around.

 

Benning did draft better, but he operated with a bigger handicap than Gillis, several times more draft capital. How many top 5 picks did Gillis work with? Benning simply had an enormous advantage drafting in a position where anyone with a hockey magazine could land a player (top 5 picks are ~75% likely to be NHL players.) 

 

Different context too, if we look at the prospect pools of teams that are perennial contending, I'm not expecting as much high tier prospects either. Carolina being an exception.

 

The guy starting out with $100k will almost always make more money than the guy starting his investment at $30k. 

 

 

Gillis gave Benning his Captain and number one goalie, which were both realized when he pivoted in that one year to get a top 10 pick. 

 

Gillis hit 50% in the top 10 (Hodgson, Horvat). And Benning hit on 50% of his picks in the top 10 (Virtanen, Juolevi, Pettersen, Hughes). 

 

The other side of the equation is development. Gillis operated at a point where he simply had no control over how the Chicago Wolves deployed his prospects, they were controlled by a separate ownership group and often put winning with vets above development (Loading up on AHL vets and playing them over NHL prospects). Gillis at least changed this with the Utica comets. He just never had time to see the fruits of it come to be. 

 

Again, should Gillis have drafted more prospects while gunning for a cup? Yes, that eventually caught up to him. But the natural result of having winning teams and selling to go for it will result in having those lower probability picks that are worth several times less than the top ten positions Benning had to work with. Combine that with the development environment that wasn't in his control, I'm not as harsh on that, considering the result was reaching Game 7 of the SCF.

 

 

I would say going by the fact that Benning capped out the team on veterans to gun for playoffs, that wasn't the design. The Kesler trade and the targeting of roster players over picks and prospects that Anaheim was willing to part with pretty much plays in line with that. Had Benning succeeded in the mandate, we'd probably be discussing Ty Smith or Dylan Merkley rather than Quinn Hughes. The high draft position (which I am thankful for) is the unplanned result. And it's great we capitalized on it.

 

Gillis left Benning with a roster of SCF veterans, two first round picks, a number 1 goaltender, future captain, cap space and a solid defense core.  If you were deciding to rebuild, that's a lot to work with. If you were retooling, it still would have worked if you played your cards right with the two 1st rounders. Not to mention the cap squeeze inherited by Benning was nowhere near as bad as the one Benning left JR/PA. 

 

Again, I'm not too harsh on Gillis here. He really only had the 2013 offseason and draft to pivot to a reset/retool, and that was muddled by a new coach forced on him by ownership. It was a different context the club was operating under from 2009-2012 that explains why the prospect pool and draft asset was weak.

 

And in that span of a few weeks, we got Bo and Markstrom, I can only imagine what an extra year would have looked like (rumor was he wanted Larkin with the Jake pick.)

 

I'm happy to agree to disagree here.

 

 

The terrible situation Benning had was the mandate from ownership to compete, I agree. Given that, I think Benning did decent up to the 2016. That was really when the trend of his bad deals began with Loui and Sbisa.

 

 

I give full credit to Benning for Demko, and I loved the Hogs pick at the time too (who doesn't love a player that can juggle and ride a unicycle?)

 

That being said, the simple answer for Gillis is that he traded away his picks to compete. But here's where I do agree with you, some of the 2nd rounders like Anton Rodin, Yaune Sauve, Mallet. Just horrible.

 

 

Yep that's fair.

 

Personally, I'm just thinking that the guy was trying to steer the organization towards a path that was showing some promise, but was ultimately canned for it. I was willing to give the guy a year to address the aftermath of those pushes, which he tried to do. I'm not going to judge him too harshly considering the foundation he laid in one offseason.

 

----------

 

Funny philosophical question here, because my brain works like this sometimes, but all this talking about who inherited what and what not, just reminds me of the philosophical thought experiment, the ship of Theseus.

 

If you take a ship with rotting planks and old wood and replace them with newer ones, is it still the original ship at the end of the day or a new ship? I guess in our case, the ship is rotting, but some of the wood is of very high quality.

 

Likewise, the Canucks team in 2021 placed 24th in the league. And at the time Benning was fired, last in the Pacific at 8-15-2, with a historically bad PK dead last. That team included the same core we are praising Benning with (Miller, Hughes, JT, Petey, Demko.)

 

Then PA and JR came in and removed the rotten planks/dead contracts/staff, and refitted the ship with their pieces (Hronek, Bleuger, Soucy, Mikheyev, Kuzmenko, Cole, Lafferty, Suter, Zadorov), an entirely new coaching staff, a new executive team at pretty much every level of the organization.

 

Is it still the same ship Benning put together? 

 

We've seen teams with great core pieces like McDavid and Mathews flounder. I think there is something to be said for building around that core as well to make a good team (or in the analogy, a new ship), which I hope you can agree Gillis did well enough with the core he got from Nonis and Burke. 

End of the day, I think our disagreement is we all have varying degrees of what makes up this ship that is currently the 2023-24 Canucks. I think it's great that the foundation from the past incarnation of the ship is still here and realizing their potential, but I'm not so sure it would have been realized in the old incarnation. I'm putting a little more weight on the people who've disassembled the old ship and reassembled it to what it is today.

 

 

 

Not meaning to direct this at you personally here, but I still see many posters continue to make excuses for Gillis' failures. There's always a 'but' behind why he failed. I bolded this one from your own post at the top to show you exactly what I mean. That's what I mean by an excuse. There was also another poster a while back that said "but drafting is not important." Um, yes, it is. What's the point of doing a draft if it's just a crapshoot? Being good in the playoffs doesn't mean you can neglect the drafting aspect of the job.

 

Also, Gillis left behind Markstrom, sure, as well as Tanev. But in terms of the forward - we REALLY didn't have much: twins, Kesler, and so forth. You can't seriously be trying to make the argument that the pieces left behind by Gillis were good. We had maybe two good seasons after Gillis' firing. But it was clear that the core was in sore need of a rehash. Who would succeed the Twins? We didn't have a Pettersson in the system. Boeser was our most exciting player to come in - that was not a Gillis pick though. I really should mention that I was a huge fan of the Shinkaruk pick. He could've been Gillis' version of a Boeser.

 

The problem with the annual poor drafting meant there weren't players in the system who could help with the team. Shinkaruk was one of Gillis' better picks as I mentioned about, but got injured. He probably would've been able to help the team. Hodgson as well if he stayed longer without that significant injury. The lack of successful drafting meant there was A LOT of pressure for players to succeed, but they couldn't for whatever reason under Gillis.

 

Gillis did try to get an AHL team and he did try to help the roster players as best as he could. The lockers were renovated and Gillis used sleep doctors (very progressive). I'm not criticizing him for not trying. I just wished that he actually drafted better. By the time he got fired, we really had a bad prospect pool. And there shouldn't be anyone trying to defend that. It's not an excuse that we were perennial playoff teams. The Lightning (it's an exceptional example and not the norm) and the Red Wings were decent drafting teams that were competitive. Nashville was also sneaky good with their drafting. Drafting isn't everything, but saying that drafting is pointless is a bad argument as well. With good drafted players, we could've saved the UFA money for areas that needed attention.

 

That's where I'm going with that. Benning or not, I think the successor after Gillis would've had a hard time starting up. The leftover pieces were just not enough to start a real rebuild.

 

As for top 10 drafting. You have to consider that Horvat and Hodgson represented 90 to 100 percent of Gillis' drafting success. That's awful for five years of GMing. The others? Gaunce? Hutton? Connaugton (didn't play).

 

Boeser should be included in the discussion of a 1st round pick success by Benning because Gillis DID have late 1st rounders himself (Jensen and Gaunce being two examples). If we're going to start changing goal posts by saying "let's not include first rounders", this is how we could look at this:

There were no successful second round picks under Gillis that remotely resembled Demko OR Hoglander. We needed a GM that could hit these good players in other drafts, and Gillis just didn't do that.

 

Never mind the 3rd and 4th round picks, or beyond, except Hutton.

 

We need to stop making excuses for Gillis' failures. People will say ownership interfered with his job, but you could say the same thing about Benning. You can't change the rules for another GM just because one feels like it.

 

Benning also kept Green way too long, but that wasn't because of Aquilini. Benning never hired a legit coach and that could've saved his ass. Green never had a winning record at any point in time. Even Desjardins did better with weaker players.

 

Benning had easily worn out his welcome here, but to pretend that his core isn't the reason why Allvin is having a lot of success is disingenous.

Edited January 24 by PureQuickness

[SV.]

With the greatest respect to everything happening in this season for us, I don't for wish any serious NHL team to try and emulate this organization.  Seriously.  There's been enough mistakes and blunders made by this organization in the last decade to go around the other 31 teams.  Twice.

Let's just be thankful the past 12 or so months have been a series of more good decisions than bad, which have put the team in this unexpected, fantastic position for this season.  Hopefully, it culminates into a successful season.

[-dlc-]

On 1/21/2024 at 1:43 PM, Nucker67 said:

Prepared by several Stanley Cup winning "chefs"

 

1 Swedish superstar forward

1 ultra-gritty veteran star forward

1 elite goaltender

1 generational mobile Dman

6-7 dashes of physicality

 

Mix and serve 

 

Add the Blueg Line for garnish

Lots of cowbell

[5forFighting]

You need all your players having career years. 

 

It's that simple.

[kettlevalley]

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/canucks-happy-didnt-trade-boeser-garland

 

I though this article interesting and on this topic.  Other GM's didn't want Garland or Boeser for fair market and what are they playing like now?   It is unpredictable what mixing different players together turns into.  Apparently Allvin and Rutherford are good at it.  

[filthy animal]

On 1/22/2024 at 9:56 PM, PureQuickness said:

 

Gillis has no players on this core. In fact, he doesn't have any other NHL player in the league besides Horvat and Hutton, so it's not like they flourished elsewhere. Connauton never played in the Canucks and he had a reasonably ok career.

 

Enough said about that.

 

Gillis' legacy is pretty bad to be perfectly honest. The 2011 run was 13 years ago. It's great that we had that magical run, along with a couple of others, but he left behind a terrible prospect pool. That's not being brutally honest. That's just fact. If he had drafted better, he could've been a legendary GM.

 

Benning's core is currently running the main engine of this team. Like it or not, this is to the credit of Benning and his many regime subjects. Gillis couldn't even DRAFT a goaltender in any of the rounds using a 2nd or 3rd rounder.

 

We had Boeser (23rd overall) and Hoglander (2nd rounder) + Demko. And the 1st round trade for Miller (a rare successful trade for Benning who failed many trades). This doesn't excuse Benning for sucking as a GM though. Lots of bad trades.

 

GMing is more than just playoff runs. It's managing the team's futures as well. He clearly sucked at managing his futures. Look at the prospect pool that Benning had when he came in. Absolute dogshit.

 

Quit defending Gillis. He sucked when it came to constructing his own teams/core. There's a reason why he's not GMing on another team in the NHL, and so is Benning. They both failed at other parts of their jobs.

 

Geezus, you think? Its been what? 10 years since Gillis has been here, what did you think, Edler was still going to be around? How is Gillis legacy bad exactly? Hes got division titles and presidents trophies up on the rafters ( the first 2 this franchise has ever had), sorry to burst your bubble but like it or not, hes etched in Canucks lore as one of the best GMs this franchise has had. Best? Thats up for debate. Numbers don't lie. Nonis, Burke, Gillis, and Pat Quinn has banners up there, wheres Bennings? Oh wait, he's got that 7th man crap. Thats cute. Alvin's gonna have banners too, hopefully the stanley cup variety.

 

You talk about prospect pools, did you think what Benning left Rutherford was any better? LOL They were ranked what? 23rd or below in organizational rankings, like thats any better. Other than podkolzin are you really hanging your hat on? Jet woo, aiden mcdunough, Klimovich? Better plan the parade route now, because Im just getting hyped up with those guys winning us 10 cups in a row LOL. The top prospects pool predominantly consists of all Rutherford/ Alvin players so clearly Benning, left his predecessors with garbage

 

 

 

 

[filthy animal]

On 1/23/2024 at 11:48 AM, PureQuickness said:

 

I don't understand the excessive excuses with some of the fanbase with regards to Gillis - and I've made no excuses for Benning's regime when it was indefensible.

 

I have judged BOTH regimes fairly. How I see it is that you can't weigh something more than the other when they both had their own flaws. Benning DEFINITELY drafted better. You can count the number of players (if you were to exclude first rounders) that are either still on the team and system, as well as the players around the league.

 

On the other hand, Gillis had five years (five!) worth of draft picks with absolutely nothing to show at the start of the Benning era. The records show that Gillis succeed sometimes with first round picks, but he would never succeed in other rounds, including other first round picks. Players like Gaunce are still around, which is something I remember now, as well as Horvat and Hutton. Every other prospect besides the above has been a monumental bust in the five years of drafting. That's beyond horrible.

 

Benning's regime left behind a working core that was working in its prime, whereas Gillis left all the players who were on their way out. That's a big difference. You'll really have to see what kind of core that Gillis left behind by the time of his firing: aging Twins, no prospect pool (!), Tanev, and a disgruntled Kesler, plus Markstrom. There's lots of good players, but does it compare to (Pettersson, Hughes, Boeser, Miller, etc)?

 

Now some people will say that Benning had more opportunities for high first round picks, but that wasn't by design, was it? We got some scraps from the Kesler trade that had TWO cities he would waive his NTC for.

 

If you're going to be fair, Benning was left with a terrible situation. And ownership, as we can both agree, was DESPERATE to push out playoff teams.

 

This, of course, doesn't excuse Benning entirely. He's made plenty of bad trades (sans the Miller one - his only rare good one); he's had his share of buyouts; let some good players walk away from free agency, and overpaid players. He didn't always draft that well, but Demko and Hoglander are two of his best players who are NOT 1st rounders. Why couldn't Gillis draft these kinds of non-first round pick players in five years?

 

So there's no need to remind me to judge both GMs fairly. Gillis indisputably created awesome playoff runs that everyone can remember fondly, even myself. It's the aftermath of those playoff pushes that I also don't forget.

 

In short, I was once critical of Allvin, but I'm really glad that I was wrong about him now.

 

 

 

You haven't judged them fairly. You're a Benning fanboy that just claims to be unbiased

 

Seriously, we are all agreeance that Benning drafted better, and Gillis was terrible at it, is there a reason why you keep bringing up his draft history? Are you arguing with yourself or something?

 

The Bennning regime left behind a working core. Sure, if you count just players skating around like a bunch of dummies as "working" in its prime considering where they finished in the standings. This core that you keep bragging about had 1 playoff run aided by a pandemic and finished near the bottom of the league every year the rest of the time during Bennings tenure. Things didn't look up until we got a GM (Rutherford/Alvin) with working brain that took that very same core and turn them around to near top of the league in what, 2 3/4 seasons? As much as you love to throw your flowers and your panties at Benning, he deserves little credit on what is happening here in Vancouver. If there was another GM that got hired to replace Benning, there's no guarantee this team with the existing core would've been at this position. Theres no evidence if another GM took over this team that it would be better or worse, its hypothetical. But whats fact is that this core didn't do squat for 4-5 years and was the laughing stock with Benning in the helm. Coaching stuff, culture, new players, thats all Rutherford/Allvin that helped elevate this franchise out of the rubble

 

So take DVSIIs analogy on the ship, is it really still Bennings? I don't think so. Sure he gets credit for a few planks or two but in the end, the ship is not only staying afloat, but sailing to a destination where Jimbo wishes he's gotten even his baby toe into. The USS Allvin is doin just fine

 

Oh look, you've owned up to your assessment of Allvin. Who really cares? Its a forum bro

 

[kilgore]

On 1/22/2024 at 3:50 PM, AnthonyG said:

Strongly disagree here.

without the core you have nothing to support. 
with a core in place, you have assets amongst your organization to acquire the smaller support pieces. 
 

No pick is a guarantee

no timeline is exact for development

injuries play a role as well.

 

Drafting and development are the hardest thing to do because you cannot control the outcome.

 

Its the painful, slow, tedious work of developing your picks into NHL talent that is key. 

 

Did I say a team doesn't need a core?  Strawman

 

Just pointing out that the part of the job that requires final approval on a top ten pick that is the consensus of the drafting execs, is not difficult to do.  You just nod your head. That is not the hard part.

 

I also did not mention development being the easy part either.  You lumped them together. Which is an area that Benning was not great at.  Or he simply gave up on too many of them early. Or didn't even give them a chance first and traded for FA garbage.  You point out that McCann only reached his potential years after trading him away.  How much was that Benning "ran out of time"? Maybe if he'd actually done the hard work of developing him he'd still be here.  Tryamkin could have been a useful player if JB hadn't poisoned that well, even after Nikita apologized and said he was ready to re-commit. 

 

On 1/22/2024 at 3:50 PM, AnthonyG said:

Top 10 picks are not a guarantee, its all potential as is every pick.

 

https://www.coppernblue.com/2018/4/25/17282484/picks-apart-whats-a-draft-pick-worth 

Batting .500 in the top ten is not great.   I scoured the interwebs but could only find this sampling study, from the years 2008 -2012 but out of the top ten picks its a 90% average success of players who played at least 100 games. Virtanen played more than 100, but since then fallen right out of the league so I wouldn't count him as successful in the long run despite his 100+ games. Same with Joulevi.

 

 

On 1/22/2024 at 3:50 PM, AnthonyG said:

Also.. lets be real… Horvat and Tanev are not the guys you build a team around. If thats what you wanna build around, get used to being a doormat.

 

And Markstrom.  Its a start for the new management team to at least start a proper rebuild with. Together with two first round picks to jump start. And actually Benning DID choose to make captain and build the team around Horvat. And players coming off of a SCF are players that other GMs are interested in, for the experience alone.

 

On 1/22/2024 at 3:50 PM, AnthonyG said:

Benning was never here to win a cup. He was here to build. You all think he was hired to win. That is a naive thought and shallow perception.

 

while rebuilding he made playoffs twice in 6 years, went from no real serious prospects or anyone to replace the 2010-11 core, to playoffs two seasons after the twins retired and the core was essentially gone.

 

I'm pretty sure Francesco wanted him to win a Cup. He said he wanted to win it for his Dad. It was a mini circle jerk with Francesco and Jim that sprialed the team downwards during that eight year period. Frank kept him employed, and Jimbo tried  his very best to push a square block into a round hole for his boss's amusement.

 

The quote from Francesco at the time was " get into the playoffs anything can happen".

 

So Benning wanting to get paid, attempted the near impossible, to revamp an aging declining team with other pieces from around the league other teams were willing to trade away for a few juicy draft picks or prospects. On the short term quest to squeeze into the playoffs where, as aquaman envisioned, we go on a miracle run to the Cup.

 

On 1/22/2024 at 3:50 PM, AnthonyG said:

He turned the future around so much faster than ANYONE could anticipate.

 

Yup it was quick alright. from a Presidents trophy winning team to a buy-out laden, prospect starved, cap crunched, team half full of overpriced and overvalued peons. sitting at the bottom of the league standings.

You say Benning was "building" a team.  For eight fricken years? And after those eight years....he left the new GM with an empty farm, the OEL problem, and a losing culture.  Oh but he was there on Draft Day sitting at the table to get all the glory picking from the top ten, 5 different times, who by stats have a 90% chance of making it,  after his amateur scouts did most of the work.  If that is the main point of praise you have to stoop to in order to fluff Benning up with to prove his brilliance, then I have nothing else to say.  I shudder to think of the ways he would have screwed up finding the actual support pieces if he'd stayed on.  Petey would be halfways out the door by now.

 

 

[filthy animal]

18 minutes ago, kilgore said:

 

Did I say a team doesn't need a core?  Strawman

 

Just pointing out that the part of the job that requires final approval on a top ten pick that is the consensus of the drafting execs, is not difficult to do.  You just nod your head. That is not the hard part.

 

I also did not mention development being the easy part either.  You lumped them together. Which is an area that Benning was not great at.  Or he simply gave up on too many of them early. Or didn't even give them a chance first and traded for FA garbage.  You point out that McCann only reached his potential years after trading him away.  How much was that Benning "ran out of time"? Maybe if he'd actually done the hard work of developing him he'd still be here.  Tryamkin could have been a useful player if JB hadn't poisoned that well, even after Nikita apologized and said he was ready to re-commit. 

 

 

https://www.coppernblue.com/2018/4/25/17282484/picks-apart-whats-a-draft-pick-worth 

Batting .500 in the top ten is not great.   I scoured the interwebs but could only find this sampling study, from the years 2008 -2012 but out of the top ten picks its a 90% average success of players who played at least 100 games. Virtanen played more than 100, but since then fallen right out of the league so I wouldn't count him as successful in the long run despite his 100+ games. Same with Joulevi.

 

 

 

And Markstrom.  Its a start for the new management team to at least start a proper rebuild with. Together with two first round picks to jump start. And actually Benning DID choose to make captain and build the team around Horvat. And players coming off of a SCF are players that other GMs are interested in, for the experience alone.

 

 

I'm pretty sure Francesco wanted him to win a Cup. He said he wanted to win it for his Dad. It was a mini circle jerk with Francesco and Jim that sprialed the team downwards during that eight year period. Frank kept him employed, and Jimbo tried  his very best to push a square block into a round hole for his boss's amusement.

 

The quote from Francesco at the time was " get into the playoffs anything can happen".

 

So Benning wanting to get paid, attempted the near impossible, to revamp an aging declining team with other pieces from around the league other teams were willing to trade away for a few juicy draft picks or prospects. On the short term quest to squeeze into the playoffs where, as aquaman envisioned, we go on a miracle run to the Cup.

 

 

Yup it was quick alright. from a Presidents trophy winning team to a buy-out laden, prospect starved, cap crunched, team half full of overpriced and overvalued peons. sitting at the bottom of the league standings.

You say Benning was "building" a team.  For eight fricken years? And after those eight years....he left the new GM with an empty farm, the OEL problem, and a losing culture.  Oh but he was there on Draft Day sitting at the table to get all the glory picking from the top ten, 5 different times, who by stats have a 90% chance of making it,  after his amateur scouts did most of the work.  If that is the main point of praise you have to stoop to in order to fluff Benning up with to prove his brilliance, then I have nothing else to say.  I shudder to think of the ways he would have screwed up finding the actual support pieces if he'd stayed on.  Petey would be halfways out the door by now.

 

 

 

Whats hilarious is that AnthonyG-oof claims that a team built around Tanev, Horvat and Markstrom would be a doormat team. Correct me if Im mistaken, but we've never made it to the playoffs without those 3 guys during the Benning era up till now.