1. Mason Raymond or Jeff Tambellini registering a hit on the stat sheet = toughest team in the playoffs.
2. Our best players being punched, hacked, cross-checked and otherwise mistreated every time they are on the ice is no big thing.
3. Young offensively-gifted players often need an opprtunity before they break out as NHL players, and for most of them they require that opportunity to be more than just a couple of games.
The first two feel wrong to me, the third feels wrong to AV.
lol
that's the funniest sad truth I have read in awhile.
Exactly. Too many players on the Canucks with a lack of hands or no hands at all. Someone said before that this team is slowly being taken over by grinders, and while I don't think it's that extreme, I do think there is a definite lack of "skill". Guys who you know are going to be able to roof the puck forehand or backhand on a breakaway almost every time. Someone who can roof it in tight. Who do we have who's capable of that?
Outside of Daniel or Kesler, who else on the team has at least a 'good' shot? Henrik? Doesn't shoot enough so it doesn't even matter. Burrows? Not really. Raymond? Nope. Samuelsson? Maybe, but he misses a lot too. Higgins, Malhotra, Hansen... the list goes on.
It's why you shouldn't rest on your laurels of being "the No. 1 team in the NHL" and say we don't have room or time to experiment.
Why not experiment? Regular season don't mean s**t at this point, since only the playoffs matter now. So what would it matter if we insert a rookie and he makes a couple of mistakes? Are we going to miss the playoffs because of it? Hell no. There isn't really any downside, and the upside of what you could potentially get is worth much more than just a couple of points in the standings.
No room for learning on the fly? Until you win the damn Stanley Cup, there is always room to experiment and improve. Don't get locked into the mindset that your bottom 6 must be all 'tough' and 'gritty' and 'hard to play against'. While those are admirable traits, the premium should be goal scoring. Look at our offensive numbers in the playoffs - pretty much almost no goal support from anybody when our top-heavy offence dries up!
Led the NHL in goals, top PP, successive Art Ross winners - other teams would kill for the Canucks "lack of hands".
Fair, but considering that all Keith Ballard has ever done is play decent inconsequential hockey it's probably equivalent. Grabner played more good games in his 20 regular season games in 09-10 than Ballard did in the entire 10-11 season (including playoffs)
No point harping on it now though. It was a bad trade and Gillis gave up the wrong asset, but otherwise had a good summer last year. Besides, the masterstroke of keeping Bieksa when many of us -- myself included -- ranked it as a non-move that ruined a summer of good work makes up for it ten fold.
Gillis gave up the right asset at the time.
Grabner did nothing in Florida in training camp (his history) and was waived. NYI being a god-awful team had the luxury of letting him play despite his poor play through the early part of the season. On the Canucks that was not going to happen.
In Vancouver Grabner was redundant and would have been lost with no return.
Led the NHL in goals, top PP, successive Art Ross winners - other teams would kill for the Canucks "lack of hands".
Not in the playoffs though, unfortunately.
It's the way we score though, that's the thing. How many of those league-leading goals for were actually scored off individual goal-scoring ability? We're a very good passing team, I'll give you that, and rely on a lot of good teamwork to score goals. But when a few guys are struggling in the game we have real difficulty generating any offense.
We score in a very methodical, grinding manner, and when other teams adjust and the system breaks down we look lost and confused out there. Like Tiranis said, nobody really 'dynamic' enough who can create offense all by themselves. Outside of Kesler or Daniel and maybe Burrows we don't even have any real finishers who can actually elevate the puck over an outstretched pad.
This is the NHL we are talking about, how many guys are there in the league that can create offense all on their own? And of the ones there are, probably half are guys who only play at one end of the ice, and even then only when they feel like it.
Saying we need to add more guys that can create offense on their own is like saying we should add more Norris level d-men...a lot easier typed on a message board than brought to fruition.
That's why I agree with those that say we needed to add some size and grind to our line-up. We had one of the most dominant regular seasons in NHL history--cap or no cap--but we couldn't handle the grind and our dynamic offense got turned to powder. Part of that is bad luck on the injury front, but part of it is also not having enough guys that can have an impact wearing down the other team.
Remember when we played CHI their cup year and Toews came into the series more banged up than he left it? Anyone think Boston let Kesler or Ehrhoff heal up in the SCFs? Other than Horton, who did we grind down in the Finals? Exactly.
This is the NHL we are talking about, how many guys are there in the league that can create offense all on their own? And of the ones there are, probably half are guys who only play at one end of the ice, and even then only when they feel like it.
Saying we need to add more guys that can create offense on their own is like saying we should add more Norris level d-men...a lot easier typed on a message board than brought to fruition.
That's an absolutely ridiculous statement. Guys that can create offense on their own = skilled players with good (or great) hockey iq, they come in all shapes and sizes. That includes guys like Recchi, Marchand, Peverley, etc. Those are the guys that can make things happen for themselves and their linemates. By comparison, guys like Torres, Higgins, and Raymond are complimentary players.
