The Vancouver Canucks made their first foray into this year’s trade market, acquiring Markus Granlund from the Calgary Flames in exchange for Hunter Shinkaruk.

The move wasn’t without its detractors. In fact, Trevor Linden admitted to making the transaction, knowing full-well that it wouldn’t go over well amongst the Canucks fans. There were fans of the move, though. Most notably in the scouting community. Both of the players involved have yet to carve out a full-time NHL career, so their opinions carry a certain amount of weight on the matter.

What is your position on the trade? Is it a trade you would make in Jim Benning’s shoes? If so, why?

Last week I asked if Willie Desjardins has run his course as head coach of the Canucks. Put simply, should the Canucks fire Desjardins. Here are some of the best responses…

While i don’t think he has been an effective coach and is out of his depth at the NHL level I don’t see much point in firing him right now.

I hope after those two turds the Canucks dropped management has finally realized this team does not have a hope of making the playoffs and becomes sellers at the deadline.

If that is the case, let 4-line willie finish out this year and they can sacrifice him on the altar of season ticket holders this summer.

Further Green has to be the #1 choice for his replacement right now and no way you want him having to step into this mess. Better to have him, like some of the prospects, insulated from the big team and pushing for another Calder Cup run.

The question shouldn’t be whether or not to fire him, but who to get to replace him. Bringing in a new Coach at this point may do more damage if he has to prove something.

On the other hand, a new Coach may put some life back into this group and improve morale. The players are saying the right things but on the ice it looks too often like a race to the lifeboats.

If Benning wants Utica to make a Cup run and keep some of the prospects there, then start off-loading what can be traded from the Canucks roster and bring Higgins back up to just play out the season.

It was mentioned elsewhere that maybe Willie should get 20 games next season to prove himself when he has a healthy team and can make different decisions.

It might behoove management to simply bring in Travis Green at the start of next season as Willie’s assistant so he gets a chance to be there from the beginning. Players will get to know him better, he can see what the system is like and where he might want to make changes. If Willie then gets fired, the transition would be smoother and more natural.

It has been a long, long, long, long time since the Canucks failed to make the playoffs and somebody’s head didn’t roll.

Whether it should happen or not, I’m fully expecting to see Willie’s noggin bowl right down Robson come April, mustache in tow.

That Willie’s been able to get this much out of this lineup with the perfect storm of personnel changes, regression, injuries and the implementation of youth is remarkable, but he’d do well to drop the slavish devotion to rolling 4 lines if they wanted to achieve that goal of making the playoffs. That being said, neither of those things are going to happen, and in a break with tradition, the hockey gods will smile at long last, and give the Canucks the 1st pick in the lottery.

Can we all admit at this point that firing Alain Vigneault was a mistake? He is and was a truly great NHL coach and, like top-end on-ice talent, that doesn’t grow on trees. The norm in the NHL has become to fire the coach whenever the team fails to match expectations. I think history has shown that AV was doing a great job with the talent at his disposal.

At this point, we have fired so many people (remember, Nonis didn’t get much rope either, never mind MG) that it is going to be hard to attract top coaching talent to come here. Might as well give WD another year just to show the NHL that we will give our hires some rope. I agree that there are things to nit-pick in WD’s deployment, but considering the forest rather than the trees, we don’t really need a great in-game strategist at the moment, but rather, someone who can develop young players. At the moment, I’m not sure anyone is in a position to say whether WD is or is not good at that. 2016-2017 should tell us more. Reactionary, knee-jerk firings are probably not helpful though.

The biggest question here is not whether you think WD is a good coach, it’s whether the guy Benning would hire is an improvement.

The biggest criticisms of WD have been that he doesn’t really think like a modern NHL coach in terms of deployment. Would Jim Benning, who is decidedly “old school”, hire someone better in this respect? Maybe, but I tend to think that part of the skillset wouldn’t be part of the hiring decision.

I believe management will stay the course into next season, although it’s hard to understand what exactly is going on behind the doublespeak.

That being said, I was disappointed in the initial selection of Willie, but I suppose guys like Trotz and Ruff had better options anyways.

If would like to at least see some fight from the team closing out it’s season. The injuries, especially to Henrik, have once again crippled the team and it’s flow. Still does not completely excuse the dismal starts, performance and lack of sustained success.

I need to see WD use next year’s pre-season to actually establish lines, finding chemistry and complementary players. I’m hoping to see progression and not the insanity of repetitive mistakes. Sutter may be sporadically effective with the twins, but starting the season with your 2/3 centre on wing is silly. The same goes for Virtanen and McCann, they beat Vey out, yet are stapled to the 4th line/pressbox, and their excellent shots and Jake’s NHL size are absent from the failing PP.