Monday Mailbag: Assistant Coaches, Hockey Movies, and Predicting the Division Winners

Even head coaches are notoriously difficult to evaluate, so making any type of value judgment on the rest of the Canucks’ coaching staff feels like a fool’s errand. Having said that, I do think the man advantage is a controlled enough environment to at least make an educated guess at how Newell Brown has fared since returning to the Canucks in the summer of 2017.

Despite being an abysmal team overall in 2017-18, the Canucks actually fared quite well on the power play and given the pieces they had to work with I actually think Brown did a fairly good job. Unfortunately, that success didn’t carry over into last season despite the addition of a budding superstar in Elias Pettersson. It’s tough to say how much losing the Sedins hurt the Canucks on the man advantage, but considering the pieces they had I think it would be fair to say their performance on the power play in 2018-19 was a tad disappointing. At this point, I’d say I’m agnostic on Brown’s abilities running the power play. He’s not the root of their problems, but he hasn’t excelled at the job enough to make him untouchable, either.

If the intention was always for the Canucks to bring back Travis Green – a defensible choice, I’d argue, based on the results and what he had to work with over the past two seasons – then I think you have to bring the assistants back, too. For better or worse, I think you have to give your coach the tools he needs to coach the style he wants. As a GM, if you and your coach don’t see eye to eye on that, then it’s likely you’ve hired the wrong guy.

It’s not technically impossible, but it is highly unlikely. Even with most of his salary paid, Eriksson stands to make more money playing out his contract than he would if he were to terminate his contract and sign elsewhere. Based on his performance over the past three years, what team is going to give Eriksson anything resembling a three-year, nine million dollar contract?

Like it or not, there isn’t an easy way out of this for the Canucks. They can waive him, buy him out, or trade him – likely with a sweetener attached and salary coming back the other way – or they can wait him out. Anything else is pure fantasy.

Out of all the movies you listed, I think Goon is my personal favourite. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen Slap Shot, so it’s definitely possible I would like it more than Goon upon rewatching, but I’ll give Goon the edge for now.

If you’re looking for the best hockey movie, though, I’d have to nominate a little-known gem called Hello Destroyer. It’s the feature-length debut for director Kevan Funk, a Vancouver native and Emily Carr graduate; about a junior hockey enforcer whose life comes apart at the seams when he unintentionally maims an opposing player by laying out a dirty hit. It’s depressing as hell, but it’s beautifully shot and the performances are top-notch.

Mandatory plug for the recently-launched Roxy Fever Patreon, where we watched and reviewed Miracle (2004) with Sportsnet 650’s Justin Morrisette. We’re definitely going to be doing a lot of hockey movie episodes over the coming year, and 5$ a month will get you access to all the additional bonus content, too.

I don’t know, but if he is, I know the only reasonable response would be to get really pissed online and fill my diaper over it for two days.

I’ll go with A&W if only because they have more variety.

I think it’s an interesting idea, although I’m not sure how it would work in practice. Obviously, the goal anytime you’re on the man advantage should be to score, but you have to make sure you’re not giving up too much the other way, too. I’d like to see a team try it, if only just as an experiment.

He certainly looks a bit thicker. Luckily, no one has to jump on that grenade for us, since players generally weigh-in at the start of the season.

I dunno, I hear that Paiement kid is pretty good ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I still think Brandon Sutter is moveable, provided the Canucks don’t expect much in return. There’s still an appetite around the league for a bottom-six centre with name recognition, and so long as the Canucks are willing to take a bit of salary back, they should be able to find a taker for him. Eriksson is going to be trickier, and his contract is onerous enough to justify adding a sweetener, provided the price isn’t too steep. In both cases I think the game plan should be to target players with a lower cap hit that are owed more in base salary. It’s going to take some creativity, but I think it’s doable.

If Juolevi can hover around a half-point per game and earn a look with the big club by the end of the season, that qualifies as a successful year. At this point, the Canucks have to simply be looking to develop an NHL-calibre defender. With his injury history, asking for anything more might be expecting too much.

As far as Goldobin is concerned, I don’t really feel comfortable making any predictions until I see him in game action. The pessimist in me leans towards no, but I believe in him enough that I won’t be surprised if he’s carved out a top-nine role by the end of the year. It’s going to depend a lot on how Travis Green decides to deploy his middle-six.

I’m not sure how serious that last question is, but please find a better way to spend your money. I beg of you.

This is a tough one, but I’ll give it my best shot.

Pacific: Calgary Flames

Central: Winnipeg Jets

Atlantic: Tampa Bay Lightning

Metropolitan: Carolina Hurricanes

I already hate these predictions and have a very good feeling I’m going to end up being horribly wrong, but I didn’t want to just list off last year’s winners, and wanted to throw in at least one prediction that qualified as bold. Don’t sleep on the Hurricanes, guys. They’re real good.