Rasmussen’s WHL days may be over
Detroit’s decision to keep the centre for now provides a cautionary tale for Vancouver Giants
If you’re a Vancouver Giants fan, you’re interested to see how things play out for the Tri-City Americans with Michael Rasmussen starting his NHL life early.
The Detroit Red Wings have kept Rasmussen, a rangy 19-year-old centre from Surrey who they selected ninth overall in the 2017 NHL Draft, for the time being instead of sending him back to the Americans.
The Giants could find themselves in a similar spot over the next two or three seasons, with the way they’re trending with a roster that includes the likes of defenceman Bowen Byram, a projected early pick in the 2019 NHL Draft that takes place next June at Rogers Arena.
Giants general manager Barclay Parneta says his team’s brain trust is already going over various scenarios regarding losing players like a Byram early to the NHL.
And Parneta has had an up-close look at the Rasmussen situation, since he was Tri-City’s assistant GM when the Giants hired him over the summer.
“You need to think about it. You need to have ideas. You can’t wait around and figure that you’ll just fix it when it happens, because you’ll be too late then,” explained Parneta, a one-time Giants scout who spent eight seasons in the Americans’ front office before returning to Vancouver this year.
Part of making sure the Giants could handle the departure at 18 or 19 years of age of Byram would be bringing in another 2001-born defenceman via trade or a free-agent signing somewhere down the road, Parneta explained.
“You’re never going to replace a player like a Rasmussen directly with another player,” he said, using TriCity’s current storyline as an example. “But you can do your best to shore-up things.”
Parneta says that NHL clubs are forever evaluating their situations, so they usually can’t offer-up a long-term guarantee on their plans when they take an 18- or 19-year-old player.
Some teams are good with updates, he says. Some aren’t. Much of that is networking based. For instance, Parneta and Calgary Flames GM Brad Treliving were teammates with the old Bellingham Ice Hawks of the BCHL. Parneta would get timely reports out of the Flames, one would think.
When it comes to figuring out if a player has a chance to stick for the long haul in the NHL as a teen, Parneta believes that trusting your own instincts is key.
“You’ve been around the game. You’ll have some inkling that this particular guy looks really good. Sometimes you get surprised, but most of the time you don’t,” he said
A player on an entry-level contract has the first season of the deal kick in once he plays 10 games in the NHL. That will prompt some teams to send a player back to junior after a nine-game stint, with the Edmonton Oilers reassigning Kailer Yamamoto to the Spokane Chiefs last fall as a perfect example.
It’s not a rule, though. Giants fans might remember the Tampa Bay Lightning sending James Wright back to Vancouver in 2009-10 after 48 games with the big club.
“I don’t think all teams think about the nine games that much,” Parneta said. “It’s a bit of a phoney number.”
There were 24 teens playing NHL regular-season games last season, and 12 of them suited-up for at least 45 games. That included four defencemen. There were 33 teens in the league at some point in 2016-17, and 15 of them saw duty in 45 or more games. Four of those were rearguards.
The only 18-year-old defencemen to be a regular in the NHL the past two seasons was Jakob Chychrun, the No. 16 selection in the 2016 NHL Draft who got into 68 games in 2016-17 with a struggling Arizona Coyotes team.
Blue-liner Noah Hanifin was one of two 18-year-old regulars in 2015-16, along with Edmonton Oilers phenom Connor McDavid. Hanifin saw action in 79 games that campaign with the Carolina Hurricanes, who picked him fifth overall in the 2015 draft.
That’s something for Giants fans to keep in mind regarding Byram.
They should also remember that coach Michael Dyck has some background in these situations as well. He was the bench boss of the Lethbridge Hurricanes in 2008-09 when the Philadelphia Flyers decided to keep 18-year-old defenceman Luca Sbisa for 39 games before sending him back to the WHL.
Sbisa was the 19th overall pick in the 2008 draft. The Flyers traded Sbisa that June to the Anaheim Ducks as part of the Chris Pronger deal, and the Ducks kept him for eight games as a 19-year-old before reassigning him to Lethbridge. The Hurricanes ended up swapping him to the Portland Winterhawks at the Jan. 10 trade deadline.
Defenceman Juuso Valimaki can also technically return to the Americans this season. He is on the opening-day roster of the Flames, the team that picked him 16th overall in the 2017 draft. Valimaki, a Finn, turns 20 on Saturday, meaning he’s also permitted to play in the American Hockey League.
Rasmussen, as a 19-yearold, must return to junior if he doesn’t stick with the Red Wings. For what it’s worth, the Americans are still listing Rasmussen on their roster, but they aren’t listing Valimaki. Tri-City is already one over the three 20-year-old maximum and they already are at the two maximum imports in Czech centre Krystof Hrabik, 19, and Russian defenceman Roman Kalinichenko, 18.