Vancouver Canucks Roster Nears Major Turnover?
By Adam Savard
The Vancouver Canucks are loaded with as much talent as they have questions about them. The answers may be coming soon.
The Vancouver Canucks are a difficult team to figure out. A team with this kind of roster talent to be at risk of missing the playoffs for the second consecutive season is bizarre. Even with the Western Conference being a deep with quality teams as it is, the Canucks feel like they should be competing for home ice advantage.
But the fact is they aren’t. Though Henrik Sedin, Daniel Sedin and Radim Vrbata are firing there isn’t enough production at the center position to support them and generate the secondary scoring necessary to compete. Nick Bonino leads centers with 25 points (11 goals) in 50 games and the drop off to Shawn Matthias is steep. Bo Horvat is finding his way in his rookie season and projects to be a good player but unless he can take a major leap next year the Vancouver Canucks will still be stuck in the same hole up the middle they find themselves in now. And the production numbers seem related to weak possession stats. I’m not going to make this about dissecting advanced stats but if that’s your cup of tea, check out stats.hockeyanalysis.com.
I do believe the Vancouver Canucks are faced with tough questions with a group of players that has largely under achieved. Since the loss in Game Seven of the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals to the Boston Bruins, the Canucks have been bounced in the first round by the Kings in five games then the Sharks in a clean sweep. Last season the Canucks did not qualify for the playoffs. The goaltenders changed completely and the general manager was shown the door. But clearly with the team still clinging to a wild card spot those changes are not enough.
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What makes the Canucks interesting is the contract structure and how that may play into the trade deadline this year. For this year the biggest contract changing is Luca Sbisa whom becomes a restricted free agent at season’s end. Matthias is also up and unrestricted after this year which makes him particularly interesting should Vancouver decide to be a seller instead of a buyer. That’s not likely to happen so the problem now becomes how to sign both players, assuming GM Jim Benning wants to keep both. Looking further down the road to 2016 Dan Hamhuis, Kevin Bieksa and Vrbata are all unrestricted. Five more players come off their current contracts in 2017. All with cap space just over $2 million dollars.
That means the Vancouver Canucks could look drastically different and some of those players could walk away with no return if Benning isn’t careful. The question to answer is do you acquire players to help for this years playoff run? Do you sell off assets for futures and create the cap space to hold the players you want to keep? Or do you stand pat and do nothing if the players up this year aren’t part of your plans? Sbisa being restricted means he will at least get a qualifying offer or the Canucks lose him for nothing and you’d think Benning would get value for him in a deal.
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If I’m Benning I’m looking to see if I can get better by moving some combination of prospects and/or players to bring back help in multiple areas. Winning the Western Conference will require going through three great teams from where the Canucks are positioned now and they will need to add some physicality at the blue line. Nick Schultz from Philadelphia could fit that bill if Benning looks at just UFA options at the position. Of course dozens of options would be on the table should the player acquired have term left on their deal. That would give the opportunity to provide cap relief to Vancouver to sign their own players. A little skilled grit up front wouldn’t hurt either but that’s very difficult to come by. Depending on how the Arizona Coyotes feel about trading within the conference Antoine Vermette could be a good addition here with reasonable size and solid production. Add to that the past rumors involving Zack Kassian and it’s very difficult to get a read on what Benning is considering up front.
It’s difficult to get a read on the Vancouver Canucks at any position this year. If Benning chooses to get involved this year how he does it will tip his hand and show fans the direction he intends to take the team. The pressure to go for the playoffs this year after last years miss and the ghosts of Bruins past not long ago may cause Benning to look short-term. Only time will tell if that creates long-term pain for Canucks fans. It will be an interesting three weeks in Vancouver.