Friday Roundtable: What to do With Virtanen

If you’ve been following the World Juniors in any capacity, you’ve likely heard of Jake Virtanen’s struggles. They are very much so real.

Although these tournaments are hardly the defining moment in any player’s NHL career, there’s descriptive value in them all the same. This makes it especially concerning that a Draft+2 player such as Virtanen – who is at the top of the totem pole in terms of age – can’t seem to find the scoresheet for the life of him.

I’ve never been overly sold on Virtanen as being NHL ready this season and it’s fair to place this on the growing list of indicators. Reports abound in the lead to this tournament that the Canucks were considering sending Virtanen back to the Calgary Hitmen afterwards. A sentiment touched upon in Thomas Drance’s article for Sportsnet just yesterday.

So, I figure now is as good a time as any to ask the Canucks Army staff for their thoughts on the possibility of returning Virtanen to the Calgary Hitmen following the World Juniors. They didn’t disappoint.

They said they want to keep him here but his WJC output and  his current Canucks output suggest that like Justin Trudeau attack ads say “He’s just not ready”. They shouldn’t allow guys to come in early anyways, kinda like how college football has implemented 3 years i believe before you can declare.

Virtanen will be a very good player but rushing him in to appease us isn’t the best idea and let him make a run for someone in the Dub….maybe Kelowna?

I look at Leon Draisaitl (totally different player) and when he was sent back he looked like a man possessed. Now look at him.

It would be a poor decision not to. Virtanen doesn’t look NHL ready at this point; he’s got the physical game to hold his own against bigger (and more mature) competition, but he’s losing the rest of his game. It’s even showing at the World Juniors; he’s losing puck battles and making poor passes, even against teams he should be dominating. At this point, the Canucks run the risk of this becoming a mental thing (assuming it hasn’t already), where he’ll continue to see parts of his game diminish with each poor showing. There’s nothing wrong with another year of juniors, and there could be nothing wrong with AHL time spent next year as well. Keeping him in the NHL isn’t helping the team right now, and it certainly isn’t helping him.

Yes, absolutely. Despite making the WJHC he has looked out of sorts for a little while now, and his confidence seems to be taking a hit. He’s not getting enough minutes in Vancouver to counteract the slump and lighting kids up in the WHL might be good for his future in the NHL.

Absolutely. He hasn’t been showing the offensive flair you’d hope for out of a 6th overall pick in the NHL, and has hardly been noticeable at the world juniors. Going back to junior will give him the ice time and role he needs to develop his offensive game and hopefully become the player we’re hoping he can be.

Yes.

Everyone outlined why he should be sent back. He should’ve been there the whole year but gotta sell those tickets.

No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. Okay yes.

I’ve wrestled with this for a while. I’d long been a proponent of him staying in the NHL, under the belief that it was the best thing for him to further his development. Jake’s physical game has always been NHL ready, as is his skating and shooting. His biggest detriment has always been his hockey IQ, and on-ice awareness. So if hockey IQ is what he’s lacking, who better to spend time with than the Sedins? Why send him back when his issues are more mental than physical?

That was before his injury. Since his return, when he was a non-impact player in Utica and a little-impact in Helsinki, I’ve had to amend my opinion. Jake no longer looks like a kid in need of a confidence boost. He looks like his confidence needs a full on rebuild.

The Calgary Hitmen represent the best chance for Virtanen to regain that confidence. They’re currently in first place in the WHL’s eastern conference, and could also use the extra firepower. Additionally, players like Adam Tambellini and Connor Rankin that blocked Virtanen from permanent top line and first power play minutes last season have moved on to professional hockey. The Hitmen have just one forward scoring at above a point per game. Virtanen ​_should_​ be granted every opportunity to dominate in junior.

And that’s exactly what he needs.

The thing to remember about running an NHL franchise is that it is, in essence, an efficiency competition. I’ve already come to the realization that the current front office doesn’t think this way, but in reality, every single one of their decisions should be geared towards maximizing the health and stability of this franchise whenever they can realistically expect to compete for the Stanley Cup. Pardon my optimism, but that’s a minimum of four years from now.

With that in mind, the question doesn’t become “can Jake Virtanen help us win now”, but rather, how can we maximize our return on this asset when we plausibly can contend. The Canucks have already passed the nine game threshold for kicking in his entry-level contract, but they’ve yet to reach the forty-game plateau which will subtract a year from when Virtanen will hit unrestricted free agency.

So, in the sense that a return to junior could and likely would have a favourable impact on Virtanen’s development, there are very definitely merits to the idea of returning him to the Hitmen. Furthermore, this could provide a real fiscal benefit to the Canucks when they will be best situated to return to contention. Furthermore, I think there are players in Utica which are considerably further along than Virtanen and could at the very least bring enough to the table to mitigate his absence from the Canucks roster.

It’s an easy decision, really.