The trade that sent Vasily Podkolzin to the Edmonton Oilers marked – in all likelihood – the end of his career with the Vancouver Canucks.
Which is significant for a few reasons.
It’s a disappointing conclusion for a player who was drafted 10th overall just five years ago. But despite that recency, Podkolzin also feels like a bit of a holdover from a previous era, and so this also marks a further end of that era.
Podkolzin was, after all, the last player Jim Benning drafted in the first round as a General Manager of the Vancouver Canucks. Benning would run two drafts after 2019, but traded away first round picks both years.
Which makes the Podkolzin trade a fine time to look back and perform a semi-final assessment on Benning: The Drafter.
Most of the players drafted by Benning and Co. have now firmly reached “they are what they are” territory. That’s not quite true for all of the players drafted between 2019 and 2021, but with only a small handful of them still holding reasonable potential to make an impact at the NHL level, we think this will constitute a fairly conclusive conclusion.
To paint the full picture, we’re going to go year-by-year in chronological order.
The 2014 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 6 | Jake Virtanen | 317 | 55 | 45 | 100 |
1 | 24 | Jared McCann | 586 | 162 | 175 | 337 |
2 | 36 | Thatcher Demko | 219 | 0 | 5 | 5 |
3 | 66 | Nikita Tryamkin | 79 | 3 | 8 | 11 |
5 | 126 | Gustav Forsling | 397 | 46 | 115 | 161 |
6 | 156 | Kyle Pettit | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 186 | Mackenzie Stewart | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Talk about starting off with a bang!
Let’s first mention that Benning got the job just a couple of months ahead of this draft, which means he can only realistically carry so much of the blame or credit for the picks. But there’s also a lot of blame/credit to be handed out.
That Virtanen pick was and remains dreadful. But past him, there are three genuine NHL stars, which is a huge amount to pull out of any one draft.
The problem? Two of those picks, McCann and Forsling, were traded away long before they had a chance to flourish at the NHL level.
But what happened to the picks after they were made isn’t all that relevant to grading a draft. Gaining all of McCann, Demko, and Forsling – not to mention Tryamkin, who had a real chance of making it – in a single draft year is a great haul. Whiffing on a sixth overall pick takes off plenty of shine, but not enough to call Benning’s first draft a failure.
Grade: B
The 2015 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 23 | Brock Boeser | 479 | 179 | 205 | 384 |
3 | 66 | Guillaume Brisebois | 27 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
4 | 114 | Dmitry Zhukenov | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 144 | Carl Neill | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 149 | Adam Gaudette | 220 | 27 | 43 | 70 |
6 | 174 | Lukas Jasek | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 210 | Tate Olson | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
If Benning missed on his first first rounder and traded his second before he should have, he at least absolutely nailed his third. Boeser was a great get at any point in this first round, but to get him at 23rd overall proved to be a real coup, and one that the Canucks are still benefiting from to this day.
Brisebois, too, remains with the organization, and while his impact has been minimal, he’s been a true warrior for the franchise for years and that carries value.
Even Gaudette, who never quite returned on his post-draft potential, still managed a respectable career for a fifth round selection.
There wasn’t anything else to show for this draft. One might argue that the first round pick was nailed so hard that the rest don’t really matter, and there’s sand to that argument. But this was also the beginning of a troubling trend of Benning and Co. getting very little out of the later rounds.
Grade: B
The 2016 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 5 | Olli Juolevi | 41 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
3 | 64 | Will Lockwood | 54 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
5 | 140 | Cole Candella | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 154 | Jakob Stukel | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 184 | Rodrigo Abols | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 194 | Brett McKenzie | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Oof.
We can quibble forever about how good Juolevi might have become if injuries were not a factor for him. But we can all probably agree that, even under the most optimistic of circumstances, the answer was never going to be ‘better than Matthew Tkachuk.’
Juolevi will go down as one of the least successful picks in franchise history. And the only other pick from this draft to see any action was Lockwood, who earned himself (and may continue to earn himself) a couple cups of coffee that wound up amounting to more career games than Juolevi totalled.
At least Abols is still kind of around. He’ll be suiting up with Arturs Silovs as Team Latvia tries to qualify for the Olympics later this month.
Grade: F
The 2017 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 5 | Elias Pettersson | 407 | 170 | 242 | 412 |
2 | 33 | Kole Lind | 31 | 2 | 6 | 8 |
2 | 55 | Jonah Gadjovich | 118 | 6 | 8 | 14 |
3 | 64 | Michael DiPietro | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
4 | 95 | Jack Rathbone | 28 | 2 | 3 | 5 |
5 | 135 | Kristoffer Gunnarsson | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 181 | Petrus Palmu | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 188 | Matt Brassard | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The only thing that takes the sting out of the Juolevi flub is that Benning totally crushed his next two first round selections, starting with Pettersson at fifth overall. That was a little higher than most pre-draft rankings had Pettersson, but those predictions quickly fell by the wayside as Pettersson hit the NHL running.
Past Pettersson, Benning found out that the reason nobody was taking Kole Lind was because he wasn’t that hot of a prospect. Gadjovich did go on to play an enforcer role for the Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers last year, which is a great success story in its own right.
This draft could be seen as frustrating, in that so many of the picks – Lind, Gadjovich, DiPietro, Rathbone – seemed to have such potential both before and in the years following their drafts. But none really ‘made it’ in the end.
Still, it’s hard to be upset with a draft that yields a player like Pettersson without even needing a lottery pick.
Grade: B-
The 2018 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 7 | Quinn Hughes | 365 | 43 | 290 | 333 |
2 | 37 | Jett Woo | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
3 | 68 | Tyler Madden | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 130 | Toni Utunen | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 186 | Artem Manukyan | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 192 | Matthew Thieseen | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
This one is really a one-man show.
Getting Hughes at seventh overall will go down as perhaps the greatest draft selection in franchise history (Pavel Bure shenanigans notwithstanding.) Who really cares if none of the other players selected ever played a single NHL game? Hughes altered the path of the franchise forever, and he’s already widely-recognized as the best player in his draft year.
Woo and Madden still have chances to crack the big leagues, but perhaps only as bit players at this point.
It’s a top-heavy draft class…but what a top.
Grade: B-
The 2019 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
1 | 10 | Vasily Podkolzin | 137 | 18 | 17 | 35 |
2 | 40 | Nils Höglander | 221 | 50 | 40 | 90 |
4 | 122 | Ethan Keppen | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 133 | Carson Focht | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 156 | Arturs Silovs | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 175 | Karel Plasek | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 180 | Jack Malone | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 195 | Aidan Mcdonough | 6 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
7 | 215 | Arvid Costmar | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
We’re getting a little close to the present, so everything we say beyond this point comes with a bit of an asterisk. But, really, most of the players from the 2019 draft have progressed enough in their careers to no longer really count as ‘works-in-progress.’
Podkolzin, even if he resurrects his career some in Edmonton, looks like a bust at 10th overall.
Höglander, on the other hand, has already provided more value than most second round picks, and is just getting started. He currently ranked sixth in this draft class in career goals with 50.
Then, of course, there is Silovs, who has only played nine career NHL games (and ten more in the playoffs) but has also established himself as the latest ‘goalie of the future’ in Vancouver.
The rest of the class looks to be decidedly non-impactful.
But getting two useful players past the first round in a single draft year is a victory, and a bit of an unusual one for Benning and Co.
Grade: C
The 2020 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
3 | 82 | Joni Jurmo | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
4 | 113 | Jackson Kunz | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 144 | Jacob Truscott | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 175 | Dmitry Zlodeev | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 181 | Viktor Persson | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The fact that this year’s first rounder was traded for JT Miller is plenty of consolation for what might be Benning’s worst draft overall.
Anytime a team’s first selection comes at 82nd overall, they’re fighting uphill. But what’s amazing about this draft class is how quickly each of the prospects played themselves out of consideration for an NHL future.
Just four years later, the only player on this list still considered to hold any sort of potential is Truscott…who chose not to sign with the Canucks and will become a free agent.
Oh well.
Grade: F
The 2021 NHL Entry Draft
Round | Pick | Player | Career Games | Goals | Assists | Points |
2 | 41 | Danila Klimovich | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 137 | Aku Koskenvuo | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
5 | 140 | Jonathan Myrenberg | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 169 | Hugo Gabrielson | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
6 | 178 | Connor Lockhart | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
7 | 201 | Lucas Forsell | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Remember when we said that JT Miller was the consolation prize for a bad draft in 2020? In 2021, the consolation prize was Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Hooray!
That said, it’s definitely too early to call this a ‘bad draft,’ especially without the prospects in question having fallen off as hard as the 2020 crew. There’s still at least a little ongoing potential at play here.
Klimovich was drafted as a challenging project, and continues to be exactly that in Abbotsford.
Koskenvuo and Forsell also have upside as long-term pieces, but they’ve each got a lot of development in front of them before they’re seeing any NHL minutes.
We can look at this draft now and state pretty conclusively that it’s not going to be a stellar one, but for the time being, we can’t yet call it an outright failure.
Grade: D
Conclusions
If you average up all the grades across eight drafts, Benning and Co. wind up with something in the ‘C/C-’ range, brought down heavily by those two outright failures. It also sounds about right.
Benning did manage to draft a decent crop of impactful NHLers over his eight years, including McCann, Demko, Forsling, Boeser, Pettersson, Hughes, Höglander, and Silovs. But that’s, at best, one good NHL player per draft year, and considering how the Canucks typically performed on the ice – and in the standings – during those years, it’s decidedly not good enough.
Canucks fans can walk away from this final-ish assessment feeling grateful that so many Benning picks are still making a difference in the organization, but also grateful that another managerial team is in charge of the picks from here on out.
They say ‘Cs get degrees,’ but they don’t win championships.
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