CRUNCH TIME NEARS
TRADE DEADLINE The Canucks have some roster issues to ponder PATRICK JOHNSTON,
There are 25 days left until the NHL trade deadline.
The Canucks, who return to action this weekend, are in a playoff race. They also have some big-picture decisions to make.
There’s a team in the recent past that has a story to tell: the 2013 San Jose Sharks. In the lockout-shortened season, they stood 17-11-6 as March came to a close. The trade deadline that year was April 3.
The Sharks were in a much stronger position than the Canucks and they still made moves that kept the future in mind. In the days before the deadline, they traded Douglas Murray, Ryane Clowe and Michal Handzus and picked up six draft picks in return.
They then made two trades on deadline day, shedding two draft picks for Scott Hannan and Raffi Torres. At the end of the day they shed some veterans and came out of it with four draft picks and were still in the playoff hunt.
Now, the Canucks aren’t like those Sharks, but the point is you can make trades with an eye to the future and still be creative in maintaining the competitiveness of your club.
The Canucks have three big decisions to consider in the days ahead. Let’s dive in: 1. WHAT DO THEY DO WITH ALEX EDLER?
If you’re serious about your playoff hopes for this season, it seems foolish to trade your top defenceman.
Alex Edler is doing just about everything for the Canucks, who as we know don’t have a terribly deep or good defence corps. They’re better than they were last year but, Ben Hutton aside, much of that is about an improved defensive system and not so much about some mutation of their defence corps.
Edler is playing the best defensive hockey of his career. He’s killing penalties well and, for now, is the leading option for the point on the power play.
On the other hand, a player playing that well should draw plenty of trade interest.
If the focus in Vancouver is to build for the future, moving Edler out and bringing in draft picks, or perhaps a prospect — and you can never have too many of either — seems prudent.
Edler turns 33 in April and he’s slated to become an unrestricted free agent this summer. Both are challenges: the first, because defencemen usually hit a wall by the time they’re 35, the second because you know his agent knows the first and is going to be angling for a solid deal, covering more than just a year or two.
That’s a danger for a team like the Canucks. Yes, they need quality players like Edler, but how long will he stay that good? And, is it worth passing up a chance to bring in younger talent who could help for years beyond the sunset of Edler’s career?
2.
HOW WILL THEY GET ADAM GAUDETTE IN NEXT YEAR’S LINEUP?
This is a good question, but it does have short-term importance.
Adam Gaudette has played plenty in the NHL this year. The coaches say they’ve been fine with his progress. A dive into the numbers reveals he needs to improve in the offensive end — the eye test suggests his shot could be better — but also that he’s been pretty solid defensively.
He played mostly as a fourth-line centre, with wingers like Darren Archibald and Tyler Motte much of the time. They weren’t looked to to supply offence and they didn’t create much.
That said, Gaudette showed enough when he was placed with more dynamic wingers like Jake Virtanen and Loui Eriksson. You can see him pressing for a full-time role as soon as next season.
But there’s one problem with that: Brandon Sutter and Jay Beagle are blocking the way as third- and fourth-line centres.
Neither player has much offensive upside and while Sutter has struggled with injury, Beagle has had some strong defensive moments.
If Gaudette is going to stay
and play, he’s going to have to find a way to leapfrog one of those two.
And since the Canucks have a long-term vision for Gaudette, one assumes they have a long-term plan for what they’ll do with the other two defensive centres.
It seems unlikely, but they must consider the idea of trading one at this year’s deadline. Surely a team out there would be interested in either Beagle or Sutter’s penalty-killing prowess.
And the Canucks are in a strong salary-cap position for the time being, so they could handle retaining half of one of the salaries.
Granted they could wait until summer to deal, but the prices are better at the trade deadline.
3.
HOW CAN THEY SOLVE THE SCORING-WINGER ISSUE?
It’s clear the Canucks want to find another scoring winger, one to play with either Elias Pettersson or Bo Horvat.
They don’t have to solve this issue before the trade deadline, and indeed it probably would be wise to wait until summer, but what the team clearly lacks in the prospect department is a high-end scoring winger.
Sure, there are hopes for current Utica Comets’ wingers Jonathan Dahlen or Kole Lind, but Dahlen has been so-so in his first season in North America while Lind has only just started landing a regular spot in the Comets’ AHL lineup.
It seems like the Canucks will look elsewhere for such a player. They had hoped Loui Eriksson was going to be such a winger, but he’s fizzled into his 30s and is now basically a solid, though pricey, checking winger.