yave1964 Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 Jim Benning has to make the folks in Vancouver long for the days of Brian Burke......Or even Mike Keenan. In his playing careerJim Benning was a stay at home defenseman and the Canuck faithful have to wish that he did just that. He has absolutely ruined this organization with nothing to look forward to over the next five years or longer but a treadmill heading downhill. The Canucks are destroyed. Benning took over for the wildly unpopular Mike Gillis who went from having two fo the games top goalies to none in the span of less than a year and who watched the Canucks slip into mediocrity. Benning has taken a bad situation and made it much, much worse. He traded popular Ryan Kesler for Nick Bonino who bombed and now toils in Pittsburgh, Luca Sbisa who cannot crack the regular rotation of the leagues worst defense and a first rounder. Then he signed Ryan Miller who had just embarrassed himself out of St. Louis with a putrid first round loss to the Hawks. That allowed him to donate Eddie Lack to the Hurricanes where he is a competent semi-starter for a small fraction of the money. He signed Radem Vrbata which seemed like a good idea at the time but Vrbata is one of the guys in the game who simply folds like a cheap suit if he is roughed up at all, he is sitting at a nifty minus 32 right now. combined with the Sedin sisters it gives Vancouver hockeys softest top line. He traded for Brandon sutter, generously considered a third liner on his best day and gave him a five year deal at second line center money. Sutter has not been heard from since. Off counting his money and pinching himself. He keeps signing guys who were supposed to be good once but have not worked out, hoping that a change of scenery will help. It has not, to a man his signings have been dreadful bordering on bizarre. Linden Vey came over from the Kings Bartkowski from the Bruins, Dorsett from the CBJ, Prust from whichever Eastern conference team had just given up on him after all the others had as well, Sbisa, Bonino, Emerson Freaking Etem. And is there anyone alive save for Jim Benning who really beleives that SVEN FREAKING BAERTSCHI IS ANY FREAKING GOOD? Marcus Granlund is the newest addition to this horror show. It seems apropriate that he signed a goalie named Richard Bachman. Only Stephen King could imagine something this macabre. Vancouver has had a long history of hating its GMs and management teams, Benning is the worst of a bad lot and it is not even close. Before the deadline, Benning actually said that Vancouver 'is open for business' with such players as Higgins, Vey, Bartkowski, Cracknell, Prust and Yanick Weber. I am sure he regretted it from the snide reactions he got from columnists for the stupidity of thinking that there was actually a market for any of these players. Or maybe he meant it, maybe he thinks that someone else is salivating just waiting to give a third or fourth chance to these guys who were out of chances before he came along. He is the worst of the worst. The rabid fans in Vancouver deserve better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 2 hours ago, yave1964 said: Jim Benning has to make the folks in Vancouver long for the days of Brian Burke REPORTED!!! I knew things were going downhill in Vancouver when they: A) Flubbed the Stanley Cup final. (Their best ever chance to win it. No team recovers from that kind of choke.) B) Screwed up their goaltending situation in the most historically worst way possible: Losing both #1 guys. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samifan Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 10 hours ago, yave1964 said: Then he signed Ryan Miller who had just embarrassed himself out of St. Louis @yave1964-you had me at Miller being an overrated embarrassment Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluPuk Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 I just wanna put in a word for my choice in this category - Edmonton...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpikeDDS Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 22 minutes ago, BluPuk said: I just wanna put in a word for my choice in this category - Edmonton...... This WAS the right answer. But if I look now at the future of these two teams, for one team I see one. For the other I don't. To be fair, the Oilers SHOULD have more of a present than they do now. And there is no argument that they have had more raw material to work with given the insane number of #1 (and other lottery) picks that have had. But the Canucks have BOTH had talent that they have squandered--not potential talent, REAL talent--AND they have seriously misjudged ability, leaving them with a shell of a team. McDavid obviously made a big difference as far as the future goes for Edmonton, but if you make us pick which team we expect to improve in the next few years, you won't see too many picking the Canucks. We like to remind ourselves of how bad Holland's choice of Franzen over Hossa was, but with Franzen at least we got SOMETHING! The Canucks had two #1 goaltenders and got practically nothing for them. Vancouver is now the model for how to squander real talent. It is obvious that they have no idea how to judge talent and ability, and it has cost them the REAL talent that they actually had. @yave1964 is right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J0e Th0rnton Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 Yeah Benning is the godfather of stupid at the moment. Sweeney looked silly last draft, but so far it is working and they did not even fire the coach Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JagerMeister Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 His stupidity is impeccable and unrivaled by anyone else in the league..... all you can do is pray for us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 @yave1964 You just wait......Benning can't WAIT till the offseason, where he will promptly sign upcoming UFA hometown boy Milan Lucic to a 6 yr / $6M per contract to help "right the ship".... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Podein25 Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 The other day in an interview Benning said something like "I come from the [amateur] scouting part of the game" - and it's true, he was a scout with the Ducks then the Sabers before becoming their Director of Amateur Scouting. Just because you're an amateur scout, it doesn't mean you know jack apparently about player evaluation. It will indeed be interesting to see who they draft in June Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluPuk Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 Nah, Vancouver never had the talent (on paper) that the Oilers have/had. With the exception of goaltending. The Sedins? Overrated. The 'Nucks were never going to win a cup with the line-up they had anyway, but they did at least get to the dance. The oilers never even got a sniff, with all that talent! They have not even made a play-off appearance since '05/'06. That's unbelieveable. The Canucks have a much better record. I'm sticking with Edmonton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted March 2, 2016 Author Share Posted March 2, 2016 41 minutes ago, Podein25 said: The other day in an interview Benning said something like "I come from the [amateur] scouting part of the game" - and it's true, he was a scout with the Ducks then the Sabers before becoming their Director of Amateur Scouting. Just because you're an amateur scout, it doesn't mean you know jack apparently about player evaluation. It will indeed be interesting to see who they draft in June Sometimes a team trades a player or signs a free agent and I am puzzled but think, 'they have all been around the game forever, they obviously know more than I do.' But after watching Benning this year I am no longer giving credit for this. Sutter came over for Bonino, a career bottom six forward who has underachieved at every stop. Benning gushed, declared him to be the number two center ahead of young Bo Horvat who came on last year nicely. That raised my eyebrows, then giving him a ridiculous contract had me shaking my head. But the number one move was the signing and declaring that Baertschi was a legit top six winger, maybe even good enough for the top line. Baertschi was a first rounder for the Flames a few years ago, he has not worked out as planned, another of those guys who is undersized and gets pushed around and not really fast enough to make up for his weaknesses. In parts of four seasons in Calgary over 66 games he had 8 goals, the Flames gave up on him and Benning gave up a second rounder for him. And gushed. Baertschi has been given every shot this year, 12 goals in 54 games, only 21 points and looks like a waste of a second rounder. It is enough to convince me that I know more than Benning, lol. This team has several decent prospects, however they traded Shinkaruk to the Flames a week or two ago for Markus Granlund who is a borderline question mark at best. The longer Benning runs this team the deeper the hole will get. I have no horse in the race, just objectively looking at it from the outside looking in I see a GM who has no clue and is so far over his head that he gives up a second rounder for a player who has bombed in Calgary, then trades a real prospect (Shinkaruk) for a guy who will be in the KHL within the next two years tops and never heard from in the NHL again in Granlund. Just awful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Podein25 Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 @yave1964 I think this fondness for "second chances" to former high draft picks is an occupational hazard for all GMs (in Philly, there are numerous examples under Clarke and Homer), but its scouts who became GMs are particularly vulnerable to its logic. Because it makes sense: players who were drafted high were all identified as having what is needed to be not just a pro, but a good or great pro. That potential remains there, until all avenues are exhausted. I tend to think this way myself: I like the idea of second chances and change of scenery etc. It's only human after all. What we need are GMs who are more like Robots. Think about it: untethered to the human world of emotions and feelings, informed by advanced stats metadata, these Robot GMs will never make a mistake. Yeah, that's it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JR Ewing Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 35 minutes ago, yave1964 said: Sometimes a team trades a player or signs a free agent and I am puzzled but think, 'they have all been around the game forever, they obviously know more than I do.' But after watching Benning this year I am no longer giving credit for this. Steve Tambellini... I can't believe an NHL team allowed him to run the direction of their franchise. All he knew how to do was move out NHL players without the slightest hint of a replacement for them. I've never seen anything like it before. We've all seen GMs make mistakes, but I never knew you could see such weapons grade incompetence from a guy whose job it is to run a major league franchise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JagerMeister Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 2 hours ago, BluPuk said: Nah, Vancouver never had the talent (on paper) that the Oilers have/had. With the exception of goaltending. The Sedins? Overrated. The 'Nucks were never going to win a cup with the line-up they had anyway, but they did at least get to the dance. The oilers never even got a sniff, with all that talent! They have not even made a play-off appearance since '05/'06. That's unbelieveable. The Canucks have a much better record. I'm sticking with Edmonton. I can say the same for your precious Sundin.... the fact of the matter is, you guys haven't had a player of Sedin calibre since Charlie Conacher and Dave Keon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JR Ewing Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 The Sedins were studs, and viewed breaking down an NHL defense as a fun little diversion in life. My only problem with them is that they didn't play for my team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted March 2, 2016 Author Share Posted March 2, 2016 14 minutes ago, JR Ewing said: The Sedins were studs, and viewed breaking down an NHL defense as a fun little diversion in life. My only problem with them is that they didn't play for my team. The problem as we both know is often when a team wins average players get too much credit, while when a team loses its stars get too much blame. I love the Sedin twins, they play the game the right way, it is the supporting cast that nobody has ever managed to get right around them. They ran Luongo out of town and Schneider too and then looked around and said, oooh, what do we do now? The year they went to the finals was a perfect storm, in all truth I feel they were the better team but Thomas got in Luongo's head and was living there rent free. Who knows, if they had won, it might have been a different story. As for giving chances to other teams rejects, the Wings a decade ago coming off the strike signed Mikael Samuelsson, Danny Cleary and Lilja, all of whom were found wanting elsewhere and all three went on to prove valuable. The difference between what the Wings did and what Benning has done is the Wings signed them with SPECIFIC purpose, to take advantage of obvious strengths and to gloss over obvious weaknesses. What Benning is doing is throwing darts at a dart board and hoping for a bullseye with no real idea of what he is doing. He needs a d-man, he signs Bartkowski off the street with no idea how to use him. He needs a second line center and signs Sutter for appaling money. Radem Vrbata can score so he signs him without thinking of the consequences of doing so are adding another player with the same weaknesses as most of his forwards, lake of physicality. There is no plan, just react by adding whatever is available and hope the coach can sort it out. Baertschi and Granlund for a second rounder and Shinkaruk alone should get Benning ran out of town. He has simply no clue. Two more soft forwards with glaring deficiencies for a early pick and a top prospect who is a PPG player in the AHL. Appalling mismanagement of assets. As for your Oilers I believe they have turned the corner, they at least appear to have a plan, same with the Leafs and the Hurricanes leaving the Canucks alone as the most inept organization in the game. Benning is the one GM in the game that I feel we could put a coterie of fans from this site together and do a better job than he, top to bottom. None of us would have broke the bank for Sutter, Vrbata, Miller, none would have given up on prospects like he does. It is shameful. I have been to BC several times and there are no more rabid fans than Canuck fans, they deserve so much better than what they are getting. Dartboards belong in bars not in the GM's office. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JR Ewing Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 21 minutes ago, yave1964 said: As for your Oilers I believe they have turned the corner, they at least appear to have a plan, same with the Leafs and the Hurricanes leaving the Canucks alone as the most inept organization in the game. Benning is the one GM in the game that I feel we could put a coterie of fans from this site together and do a better job than he, top to bottom. None of us would have broke the bank for Sutter, Vrbata, Miller, none would have given up on prospects like he does. It is shameful. I have been to BC several times and there are no more rabid fans than Canuck fans, they deserve so much better than what they are getting. Dartboards belong in bars not in the GM's office. As for Chiarelli, he identified what a lot folks saw: they're small and easy to play against or can't defend. He moved out players that are smaller and/or don't engage, or brought in much larger men, almost all of whom happened to be a skill upgrade as well. Most of the roster was in the 185lb range, and that's not the case anymore. Will all of these additions work out? No. They never do. But there is a purpose and direction, and that matters a lot. I don't see much of that with Benning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 2 hours ago, JagerMeister said: I can say the same for your precious Sundin.... I rank Sundin higher than either of the Sedins because Sundin never had an elite winger to play with other than Mogilny (for all of two years). The Sedins have played on great Canucks teams. Sundin never played on a great Leafs team. But I digress... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JR Ewing Posted March 2, 2016 Share Posted March 2, 2016 Ouch. And now, according to Darren Dreger, from speaking to Dallas contacts: after the Stars aquired Kris Russell from the Flames, they still wanted Hamuis, and made an offer... The Canucks never even returned the phone call. Who knows if this is on management or ownership, but... The optics are poor. I know this much, living in the Canucks market, a short ferry ride away: the fans are absolutely livid. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluPuk Posted March 3, 2016 Share Posted March 3, 2016 18 hours ago, JagerMeister said: I can say the same for your precious Sundin.... the fact of the matter is, you guys haven't had a player of Sedin calibre since Charlie Conacher and Dave Keon. I hate(d) Sundin. So we actually agree on that. (!) And, if the Canucks had had either (not even both) of Conacher or Keon in stead of the Sedins, they would have come through the last 5 years with at least 2 Stanley Cups. Just sayin'. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JagerMeister Posted March 3, 2016 Share Posted March 3, 2016 1 hour ago, BluPuk said: I hate(d) Sundin. So we actually agree on that. (!) And, if the Canucks had had either (not even both) of Conacher or Keon in stead of the Sedins, they would have come through the last 5 years with at least 2 Stanley Cups. Just sayin'. Oh right, he's not Canadian... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluPuk Posted March 4, 2016 Share Posted March 4, 2016 Let's just say that in the end, he showed his true character. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 Come and play with us....... We can lose games FOREVER...... ............ and ever......... ..............................and ever............... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BluPuk Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 LMAO @WordsOfWisdom. How many times do you think they've switched numbers - just to see if anybody noticed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 2 hours ago, BluPuk said: LMAO @WordsOfWisdom. How many times do you think they've switched numbers - just to see if anybody noticed? LOL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.