Monday Mailbag: Substitute Teacher Edition

Alright, class. It’s time to swap desks with your pals and answer “Present” when your name gets called—because Mr. McDonald is home sick today, and you’ve got a substitute.

Pencils out, ring the bell, let’s go.

I’m probably the person on the CanucksArmy staff least qualified to answer this question. I don’t follow prospects all that closely until they’re drafted, and I’ve watched very little hockey this season aside from NHL action.

With that being said, I think drafting a left-handed defenseman at 10^th overall would be a bad selection. I tend toward always drafting the best player available, but this year there should be plenty of prospects available at 10^th that have a similar skill level—and so drafting into an already overloaded position would be foolish.

That means that Philip Broberg, Thomas Harley, and Cam York should probably all be avoided.

To always carry all necessary personal identification with him at all times.

In all seriousness, the big lesson of the Raptors historic victory is that sometimes it pays off to gamble on a single season. Benning took a lot of heat for making one last run at the playoffs with the Sedin twins when he was first hired—but the Raps are a testament to the upside of taking such a risk.

Will the Raptors suffer in the long-term for their 2018/19 acquisitions? Maybe. But nobody will mind, because they brought the first championship in team history to the city of Toronto.

When the Canucks regain contender status, here’s to hoping that they pick a specific year and just go for it—whether it’s Benning at the helm or someone else.

Quite frankly, I haven’t heard many of these rumours—and those I have heard don’t seem legitimate. With the Draft being held in Vancouver, I just don’t envision a scenario in which the Canucks don’t select a player on Day One—which means the notion of trading the 10^th overall straight-up for an asset is incredibly unlikely.

Of the players listed, only PK Subban would represent fair value for the 10^th—and even then the Canucks would be better off using the pick and acquiring Subban’s onerous contract with different assets.

I’m all for exploring the option of trading the 2020 first round pick—but the 10^th overall should stay put.

I wrote an article about this earlier in the year, and at that point I deemed that there should be somewhat of a market out there for Brandon Sutter. As we head toward July, however, the leaguewide situation is bound to change.

Right now is probably not the best time to be shopping Sutter, since teams will shortly have the option of adding players—many of whom are significantly better than Sutter—for free via unrestricted free agency. The Canucks will have to wait until the Free Agent Frenzy has died down to approach those franchises still lacking center depth and see if they might have interest.

As of right now, the New York Islanders and Arizona Coyotes still look like reasonable destinations.

As of right now, I think Nikolay Goldobin still slots in on the left wing of Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser. With Tanner Pearson pretty much locked to Bo Horvat’s hip, we should see Goldobin battle it out in training camp with Sven Baertschi and Josh Leivo for the coveted spot—though it also wouldn’t be all that surprising if Jim Benning acquired a new left winger to play on the top line.

In other words, Goldy could find himself on the top line to start the 2019/20 season—but he could just as easily find himself on the outside of the lineup looking in. Training camp will be vital for him.

I don’t think it’s the two-year KHL commitment that is scaring teams away from Vasili Podkolzin—it’s the very real possibility that he stays in Russia much longer than that. Unlike players from other European nations, Russians have to deal with the pull of a well-funded local league and a lot of political pressure to stay when weighing the decision to cross over to North America.

Countless Russian prospects have gone back to the KHL after encountering moderate difficulty in their transition to the NHL, and countless others have simply not come over. I think that NHL teams are well within their right to weigh the likelihood of a player actually being willing to join their franchise before they select them.

I expect Podkolzin to slide—and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the Canucks took a pass on him at 10^th overall.

Andre Burakovsky is a restricted free agent whose salary was $3.25 million in the 2018/19 season—which means the Washington Capitals would have to give him a one-year qualifying offer of the same amount to retain his rights. Burakovsky also has the right to arbitration if he is qualified.

With the Capitals already tight up against the cap, chances are good that they will simply choose not to qualify Burakovsky—which will lead to him becoming an unrestricted free agent.

In other words, the Canucks could trade for Burakovsky, but if they wait a little longer they can get him for free—and probably for much cheaper than $3.25 million.

A few months ago, I would have said the idea of the Canucks starting 2019/20 without any of Loui Eriksson, Brandon Sutter, and Alex Edler in the lineup was crazy—but now it’s starting to look like a real possibility.

Eriksson should be the hardest asset to move, but the amount his name has been in the media makes me believe that there’s a good chance it happens. Ottawa seems a likely destination.

I commented on Sutter’s situation above, but I believe that Jim Benning will be quite active in trying to deal the center—mostly so that Adam Gaudette can receive an extended opportunity next year.

As for Edler, I do think he’ll hit the market on July 1—but I still think the likeliest outcome is a return to Vancouver. I wrote an article about it a couple weeks ago, and I stand by it.

Dion Phaneuf still has the cachet around the league to earn himself at the very least a training camp tryout—and in all likelihood he’ll snag himself a one-year contract. With that being said, Phaneuf has played almost exclusively for franchises that are hated by the Canucks fanbase—so he probably won’t be making his comeback in Vancouver.