Welcome back to WWYDW, the only hockey column on the internet that covers not just the Xs and Os, but all the wonderful letters of the alphabet.

Speaking of the Xs and Os, specifically, though, we’re onto the topic of NHL coaches as our Summer Silliness continues.

For a multitude of reasons, the majority of NHL head coaches are former NHL players. That being said, it’s not always easy to predict which players will wind up being quality coaches.

The greatest player of all-time, Wayne Greztky, was one of the most mid coaches to ever grace the big leagues. On the flip-side, we’re pretty sure that few people were watching Rick Tocchet fill in faces back in the day and thinking “this guy’s gonna look great in a suit.”

And yet!

All of which leads us to our summer topic de jour. Chances are pretty good that, somewhere on the current roster of the Vancouver Canucks, there lies a future NHL coach-in-waiting. Or, if not an NHL coach, then almost certainly a junior or minor pro coach. The trick is identifying them now, while they’re still plying their trade as a player.

And today, we’re giving you the opportunity to turn that trick.
Look over the depth chart of the Vancouver Canucks. Gaze decades into the future. And then make your pick.

(And just imagine the bragging rights way down the road if you actually nail it!)

This week, we’re asking:

Let it be known in the comment section.

You rattled off names below!

Tommi Santala, best 4th liner out there.

Patrick White sticks in my mind for all the wrong reasons. I remember wondering what the hell the Canucks were doing drafting so far off the draft rankings with this nobody.

He was a disappointment right from the beginning.

But the Canucks did trade him for Christian Ehrhoff, and that contributed to the Canucks 2011 Cup Finals run.

Patrick White never played a single NHL game, but he was part of a key trade that got the Canucks within one win of the NHL Stanley Cup.

Going into the way-back machine, when I was a kid we used to call throwing a hip check a ‘Robitaille’ for Mike Robitaille.

Charlie Hodge was my favourite Canuck in their first year as they were awful and his goaltending was the only thing keeping them in games. Going to his hockey school as a kid at 4Rinks (yes the predecessor to 8 Rinks) was amazing for an 8-year-old, even if he just showed up day one, said “hey,” and never returned.

Hilliard Graves, his hip checks were brutal.

Alex Stojanov just jumped into my head based on a response to something I posted in a different story.

I remember when he played for the Canucks, he was on tough SOB. His claim to fame was taking down Eric Lindros in junior. The Canucks drafted him during an era when size ruled and the Canucks were obsessed with reaching for some size on their front end.

I searched Stojanov and see that CA did an article 12 years ago referencing Kassian and perhaps the next Stojanov. It’s an interesting throwback piece.

Unfortunately, they traded this elite talent to Pittsburgh for some undersized Swedish kid who ended up doing all right as a Canuck, I guess.

100% Brent Sopel. He had that white trash, dirt-monger aura going on with the long hair popping out from under his helmet and some filthy stashes on his upper lip from time to time. No particular reason why he stuck, guess maybe he feels familiar in appearance, as ”The Brent Sopel” look is something I strive towards to this day.

I’m not enough of a diehard to have a really good name to pull out here… I always kinda liked Trent Klatt as a bottom-six grinder during the West Coast Express era, but I guess he was not that obscure in the grand scheme of things. My Dad, who has been a diehard fan since day one, would talk about Harold Snepsts like he was this unfairly forgotten legendary enforcer, but again I’m sure to the older folks in the audience that would not qualify as an obscure name. Just gotta give it enough time until Juho Lammikko becomes a name that can be dropped in an exercise like this!

Sheldon Kannegiesser.

Randy “Beer Can” Boyd. 62 games for the Canucks from 1987-89. Christened so by the late great Province sportswriter Jack Keating, in honour of Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd, who pitched for the Boston Red Sox at the time.

Or Ivan Hlinka, who might be obscure now, but wasn’t when he arrived in Vancouver in 1981. 6’2″, 220 lbs, which was huge for a center at the time.

Whenever I watch the replay of Burrows’s dragon-slaying goal and his teammates mobbing him afterward, I’m reminded that, oh right, the best roster the Canucks ever assembled included Victor Oreskovich.

Hmm…several jump to mind. Jim Wiley: always thought he looked wobbly on skates for some reason, I called him Weeble. Ron Sedlbauer: scored 40 one year for Canucks, think most went in off his butt, then I think he was traded the next year. Gregg Boddy because his wife taught my daughter in elementary school. Super nice guy. Eddie Hatoum: very funny guy. Rosie Paiement, Jack Mac. Cowan the Brabarian. Craig Coxe. Never saw a guy lose so many fights, but still stepped up every time. Had some memorable tilts with Probert. Ryp, rest his soul.

Andy Spruce. He scored 9 goals for the Canucks in their dismal 1976-77 season. I had been a born-in-Montreal Habs fan all my life, but there I was, working in a west coast pulp mill, listening to a Canucks game on the radio during a slowdown. Andy Spruce scored, and my co-workers were high fiving and going, “Yeah! Andy Spruce!” It would be a few years before I became a Canucks fan, during the Smyl-Gradin-Fraser era. I was pretty spoiled as a kid, watching my heroes – the Richards, Beliveau, Doug Harvey, Boom Boom, Dickie Moore, and Jacques Plante win all those Cups. I was kinda shocked at the state of hockey in expansion-era Vancouver. Unfortunately, Andy Spruce was not destined to lead us to glory, but I’ll always remember him because that was my first Canucks game. On the radio. And he scored! Unforgettable!

Lee Sweat. Truly one of the great can’t miss players of all-time…

When my daughter was in elementary school we watched most Canucks games together. She knew the team well and was a big Canucks fan.

I never knew why and she couldn’t explain it, but her favourite player was Alex Auld. She called him Auld-win and every game would hope he would get the start.

The real memory is watching hockey with my daughter and for reasons I will never understand, Alex Auld is a part of it.

Jeff Brown. Showed up out of nowhere on a trade and help lead us to a Game 7 in the Stanley Cup Final. And then he was gone.

Gary Lupul — The Palindromic One.

Dan Cloutier and the infamous center-ice goal..

Jim Mair. May have been the worst Canucks team ever in their second or third season. I think Vic Stasiuk was the coach. Mair was a small defenceman who was picked up off waivers and scored in the first period of his first game as a Canuck. I remember that it was in Buffalo and it was the only Canuck goal in yet another loss. Must be one of the most obscure Canucks ever.

Libor Polasek. I’ll never forget that draft year, when everyone thought the Canucks would draft Pavel Bure’s younger brother but Quinn wanted someone tall instead.

Jyrki Lumme.

Not so obscure, but great player and great name.

Always loved Jim Sandlak from that era, too.

Many players have been memorable for all the right reasons, but no one has had women in the stands (or men, whatever) throwing undergarments on the ice like Jeff Cowan. To peak and then sign a two-year deal where, due to injury and overall play, he disappeared. But for a very short time, he, um, peaked to the point where Bra’s were thrown on the ice giving him the best nickname ever of Cowan the Bra-barian. Probably because I was at the game and it was hilarious, but a player that always sticks in my head.

Petri Skriko… 8th rounder.

Very good Canuck for many years…

I feel like he is a very obscure name now, but back in the day… He could score some…

If we are talking even more obscure…

Maybe I’d go with Robert Kron…

5th rounder.

My first live NHL game took place during the 1999-2000 season. Kevin Weekes got hurt in the first period and was replaced by Alfie Michaud making his NHL debut, playing in what turned out to be the first of only two career NHL appearances (the Canucks traded for Corey Schwab the next day). He gave up four goals in a loss to the Coyotes, but somehow I always feel a strange cosmic connection to Alfie.

My favorite obscure player of all-time on the Canucks was and always will be Lubomir Vaic. I’m sure most don’t remember him, as he played a grand total of nine games in Canucks colours, but I’ll never forget him from his first training camp.

He was all of 5’9″ and didn’t back down from anyone. He laid some huge hits on teammates and the opposition alike during camp, and was eventually a late cut.

He went to Syracuse, then came back for a five-game stint, scoring one goal and adding an assist. He was undersized, especially at the time, which worked against him, but I always hoped he’d be able to crack the team one day – and he never did.