Welcome to a new series here at CanucksArmy, where over the month of August we’ll ask a new question each day about the Vancouver Canucks. We’re calling it “31 days, 31 questions”. Today, we’re looking into what the Canucks’ top five most valuable assets are right now.

No one will argue that the Vancouver Canucks are in a very different place as a franchise than they were even a few years ago.

Turn back the calendar a couple of annums, and if one were to ask about the Canucks’ most valuable assets, almost all of the answers would be at least somewhat rooted in the present day. You’d hear names like Quinn Hughes, JT Miller, Elias Pettersson, and, if you went back far enough, Bo Horvat.

Times have changed. The rebuild is on, the focus has turned firmly toward the future, and now the Canucks’ most valuable assets, from both an objective and a franchise-specific perspective, are mostly based in the future.

Here in the aftermath of the 2025-26 season and the 2026 Entry Draft that followed, it seems like a fine time to take stock of the asset cupboards and see who or what is sitting on the top shelves.

Note: when we say “asset” here, we mean in the strictest sense of “a tangible asset that has value that the Canucks currently hold.” We are not, in any way, suggesting that the Canucks should think of most of the assets we’re mentioning here as trade assets. Much the opposite.

They say a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and that’s what we’re thinking in listing Caleb Malhotra as the Canucks’ top overall asset. Sure, next year’s first round pick could be even higher. It could be as high as first overall. But until that’s locked in, that pick’s value stays a little up in the air, especially when compared with Malhotra, the top-ranked centre in the most recent draft who, no matter what, will remain the third overall selection.

Technically speaking, the asset we’re listing here is Malhotra’s signing rights, as he’s yet to actually put pen to paper on a contract. Then again, the fact that he’s got his full entry-level contract ahead of him might give him a little extra value, on the whole.

Malhotra is just 18 years old, and will be until June of 2027. Until that 2027 first becomes a bit more well-defined, he’ll be the Canucks’ top prospect and top overall organizational asset.

We kind of gave it away in the last section, but following somewhat close behind Malhotra is a pick the Canucks haven’t even made yet.

The Canucks are the reigning last-place champs, and they head into the 2026-27 with seemingly high odds of finishing there again. According to most odds-makers, the Canucks and the Calgary Flames are the favourites for the 2027 Draft Lottery, and that gives this pick some seriously lofty theoretical value – especially if it were ever to be moved in its current, pristine, unprotected condition.

As we said in the last section, a top-three pick recently made beats a future pick that is just very likely to be top-three. But the closer we get to the 2027 Draft, the more the distance between the two should close. This pick could feasibly leapfrog Malhotra on this chart sometime after the new year.

It’s tempting to just start listing the Canucks’ next few first round picks here, and there would be some logic to that. But the further out we get from the present day, the tougher it is to guarantee that those picks will still be high ones. The Canucks will, after all, eventually climb out of the basement, and that could definitely start to happen by 2028.

Which is why it’s actually pretty easy to slot Zeev Buium in here. From the point of the Quinn Hughes trade to the point at which Malhotra was drafted, Buium was the centrepiece of the Canucks’ proposed rebuild. He arrived in the NHL as an incredibly hyped prospect last year and, at various points, has been ranked as a top-ten under-23 talent league-wide.

It’s true that Buium’s body of work in Vancouver has left a little to be desired so far and hasn’t quite delivered on all the hype, but that was probably largely circumstantial. In the end, there are few young defenders in this league said to have a brighter future than Buium, and at the very least, he’s increased his value well beyond the 12^th overall selection that was used on him back in 2024.

Here’s the one asset on the list that might actually be cashed in for trade value sometime in the medium future. When it comes to Canucks’ veterans, Hronek is not only number one with a bullet (from the point), he’s really the only one with an extreme surplus of value.

Pinning down Hronek’s value is a bit tricky in his current status as a player with a no-movement clause and no interest in waiving it. But objectively speaking, Hronek is a 28-year-old defender in the prime of his career who just posted a high of 49 points. He sits comfortably within the top-32 defenders league-wide, which makes him not just a top-pairing talent, but at least a borderline 1D. On top of all that, he shoots right, and he’s signed for six more years at an absolute bargain rate of $7.25 million a year.

Were Hronek to be shopped around, he’d no doubt return multiple first round picks and quality prospects. But we don’t really need a theoretical trade on the table to say that he holds immense value, and more than anything else in the organization, aside from the truly premium rebuild pieces.

This seems like the right spot for this pick. Overall, the odds of the Canucks climbing out of their current standings hole by 2028 seem slim, and this selection can be projected fairly comfortably within at least the top 10. Still, it’s a long way out, and so much can change in that time.

It’s all a little silly to think about, because there’s just no way a team in Vancouver’s position could ever trade a pick like this with no protection. But if they were to, there are plenty of teams that would step up to pay big for it, betting on the Canucks’ continued lack of success.

Of course, back in the real world, the Canucks are counting on this pick to be the fourth foundational piece to their rebuild puzzle, joining the aforementioned Malhotra, Buium, and whomever they draft first in 2027, and that’s where it fits into this value-based depth chart, too.

There are a few more names worth mentioning in this discussion.

We almost listed Tom Willander at #5, ahead of the 2028 first. Willander is 21 and was drafted at 11^th overall in 2023, and while he’s not the most dynamic prospect in the world, he has already shown a capacity to probably be at least a long-term top-four D in this league. The fact that he shoots right gives him serious bonus value, too.

After him, one has to consider the 2029 first round pick, and probably the 2030 first, too, at which point we’ve got to think about that 2030 first the Canucks picked up from the Rangers, which converts into a 2031 unprotected first if it falls in the top-10.

But we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves there. Following up Willander on the value depth chart is Braeden Cootes, the 15^th overall selection in 2025, who briefly made the Canucks out of his first camp and happens to be a right-shot centre. That position puts Cootes ahead of other recent firsts, like Adam Novotny, at least for now.

In keeping with what we said in the Malhotra section, even though Willander and Cootes have miles of development left ahead of them, they’re already much more certain assets than any future pick might be.

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