Benning cautious ahead of busy week for Canucks

VANCOUVER — Asked Monday about his team’s salary cap situation, his pending free agents, a potential big-ticket trade and more, Vancouver Canucks general manager Jim Benning was at his most cautious in meeting with the media, a day before the start of the NHL entry draft and four days before the opening of the league’s free-agency window.

Benning, to no one’s surprise, spoke in general terms about his discussions with other GMs when queried about the rumours linking the Canucks and Oliver Ekman-Larsson, the Arizona Coyotes’ captain and defenceman who is on the trading block.

“I have discussions with lots of teams in the league and I don’t know where it’s going to end up going,” he said. “We have to do our due-diligence and find out what’s going on with certain players and certain teams.”

Reportedly, Ekman-Larsson has told Bill Armstrong, the

Coyotes’ newly minted GM, that he would only waive his no-trade clause for a move to the Boston Bruins or the Canucks.

Ekman-Larsson’s talent has obvious appeal to Benning and Canucks coach Travis Green, but his large cap hit remains challenging for Vancouver. That said, Ekman-Larsson has already been paid a $4-million US bonus this summer and is only owed $4 million US more on the season.

Like every NHL club, the Canucks are short on revenue and the structure of Ekman-Larsson’s contract surely has short-term appeal for Canucks ownership if the players sent the other way in trade were owed more in cash for 2020-21, even if Benning did move to play down that notion.

“Doesn’t matter what their cash number is, what their cap number is,” he replied about how much he was weighing how the contracts of potential acquisitions are structured. “If it fits in our cap scenarios that we can make ours work and it makes our team better, we’re going to look to do it.”

Of the Canucks’ three, highprofile unrestricted free agents, goalie Jacob Markstrom clearly remains the priority for Benning to re-sign. He didn’t want to get into specifics of where discussions were at but was willing to comment in general terms.

“We’re going to keep working with his agent and see if we can find common ground,” Benning said.

Both Chris Tanev and Tyler Toffoli are also set for unrestricted free-agency on Friday and Benning has acknowledged in recent weeks that unless he can reshape the team’s cap situation, it would be difficult to retain all three.

NHL teams have until Wednesday to make qualifying offers to restricted free agents (RFAs). Benning said that a number of players have been sent their offers, but that a few were still pending and he wouldn’t reveal the final decisions yet.

Zack MacEwen is believed to be close to signing a new deal, while Tyler Motte is also expected to be sent a qualifying offer at the minimum NHL salary.

The two RFAs who are question marks are Jake Virtanen and Troy Stecher, who both hold the right to go to an arbitrator to determine their salary and would likely earn a raise in that case. Given the tightness of the Canucks’ salary cap, it’s hard to see how Vancouver could absorb raises to either, let alone both.

Benning acknowledged that buyouts aren’t off the table. He has until Thursday to make the final decision. Loui Eriksson, Sven Baertschi and Brandon Sutter all are believed to be possibilities, though none represents an easy solution to the cap situation and each would have an impact on next year’s cap, which Benning and staff are hoping to keep as clean as possible in anticipation of Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes both expected to land big raises for 2021-22.

As ever, Benning said he’s hopeful of finding another draft pick or two in a trade.

“We would like to if possible, but I think it’ll be hard to trade into the first round,” he said.