Vancouver Canucks Midseason Awards: The Good, the Bad, the Ugly

First Half MVP, Leading Scorer: Daniel Sedin

• D. Sedin: 41GP, 17 goals, 21 points
• Tied 9th in NHL scoring
• The only Canuck named to the 2015-16 NHL All-Star Team

The old Daniel Sedin is back, almost true to his old Art Ross winning form.

For those who are wondering why Daniel and not Henrik, Daniel outweighs his older brother and captain for playing two more games and scoring four more points. The two are also tied for second in the team in the plus-minus category as plus-11’s, 41 games into the season.

Beyond the simple numbers, the reason that Daniel stands atop as the team’s MVP is his true finishing ability. He is the truest sniper in the Canucks lineup, with Vrbata failing to snipe his way to success this first half. At 35 years of age, both Daniel and Henrik have carried their franchise this season and show no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

The Sedin line has 94 points of the team’s 262. That is 35.9 percent of the offence from a single line, 14.5 percent of which comes from Daniel.

Another reason Daniel tops Henrik… is this.

Another thing that the Sedins have done incredibly well this season is shutting up the “Sedin sisters” joke in the league. With the Sedins closing in on the exclusive 35-35 club, let’s hope they can win the respect of the league and its players as they reach the heights of Teemu Selanne, Daniel Alfredsson, Brendan Shanahan, and Joe Sakic.

Would anyone hit Jaromir Jagr or Shane Doan like this?

Daniel takes the midseason team MVP honours and the scoring leader too, with 17 goals and 21 points after 41 games, the most goals and points of all Canucks this year. Of course, Henrik has Daniel beat on the assists.

Next: Most Exciting Player: Jannik Hansen

Most Exciting Player: Jannik Hansen

When a guy scores your one and only 3-on-3 Overtime winner in franchise history, you have got to give him some honours. Jannik Hansen did it in style, with blood and stitches on his forehead. If that is not exciting in this depressing Vancouver season, I don’t know what is.

Hansen is having a career year, capping a nine-year career marked by speed, a blistering slapshot, and the name “Honey badger”. As one of the NHL’s top skaters, his slap shot is a weapon on its own as evident in the overtime goal, one of 12 goals he has this season alongside 10 assists. His plus-12 is good for the team lead, one above his first-line mates Daniel and Henrik.

Hansen’s 17 percent shooting percentage ties his career-high, and 2.15 points per 60 is ever-so-close to the 2.26 points per 60 he produced in the 2012-13 season when the Canucks won the Northwest Division title. Gaining the right to be the “third Sedin” is also a spectacular feat on its own.

Remember the fourth-line grinder that Hansen used to be? The speed, the shot, the compete level, and the puck-retrieval that is so crucial as the third Sedin — Hansen has it all, and his prime years are certainly looking good. He turns 30 this year, and it would be interesting how his next contract will look after his extremely cap-friendly four-year, $10M contract expires after the 2017-18 season.

Rest assured, he has a modified no-trade clause for the remainder of his contract.

Next: Unsung Hero: Adam Cracknell

Unsung Hero: Adam Cracknell

Do not underestimate the power of Adam Cracknell.

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Do you remember when you first encountered Cracknell’s name as a Vancouver Canuck? He was advertised as a depth signing that could provide leadership for the AHL Utica Comets. I recall commenting how his signing will increase the level of friendly competition in the Comets’ lineup — a good call by Benning as young guys like Brendan Gaunce, Hunter Shinkaruk, and Alex Grenier were filling up the roster.

The next encounter with him might be a rather pleasant one, on a night of Kraft Hockeyville’s preseason matchup against the San Jose Sharks. He had the overtime winner, a sniper’s shot, and gave his Prince Albert fans a terrific hockey story to enjoy for weeks to come.

Now he finds himself a regular in the Canucks lineup and was given the honour of bumping Chris Higgins out of the lineup, Wednesday against the Carolina Hurricanes. Talk about progression for the 30-year-old forward who anchored the fourth line in December that held high the Canucks’ secondary scoring torch.

Now Cracknell finds himself with three goals and five assists, a plus-four, and averaging over 12 minutes a game — all of which are career highs.

His skills are underrated, as seen in the Canucks’ Super-Skills competition. He went four-for-four on the accuracy challenge, quite impressive if you ask me, for a supposed fourth-line grinder. His value goes beyond his play — his $0.575M contract is the cheapest one of all the Canucks, and an extremely valuable one given his defensive goodness.

That assist on Sven Baertschi‘s goal? Perfect execution.

Next: Best Defenceman and Most Promising Player

Best Defenceman: Alex Edler

Alex Edler is another player who is coming back to true form after the “Lost Season” under John Tortorella. He is just second to Chris Tanev in relative Fenwick For percentage, riding a career-high 5.3 percent. Achieving that while starting a career-high 55.9 percent of his shifts in the defensive zone? That is a true feat of beauty. He leads all Vancouver defencemen in that category this year.

He is having a career year in the shot-blocking department, and should he continue blocking shots at the first-half rate, he will have 180+ shots blocked, which eclipses his career-high of 145 blocks by a mile. Those 145 shots were blocked in the 2011-12 season, when the Canucks won the Presidents’ Trophy as the best regular season team.

His offensive abilities are coming back to life as well, as he is on pace for 400 shots this season — the highest since 2011-12 — and a dozen goals — another career high.

Most Promising Player: Sven Baertschi

Sven Baertschi is coming to life as we enter the second half, and his career is coming to life, too.

13 points in 33 games are both career-highs for Baertschi, who is showing chemistry with Bo Horvat. Baertschi has the fourth-highest relative Corsi percentage of all skaters not named Sedin or Vrbata, discounting Linden Vey‘s small sample.

Sven is showing signs of becoming a complete sniping playmaker (or a playmaking sniper, only time will tell) who is knocking off criticism on his physical game. Jim Benning‘s trade with Calgary continues to look better and better as the season rolls on.

Next: Who is the Worst of the Worst?

Least Valuable Player: Yannick Weber

Which defenceman starts the least amount of his shifts in the defensive end? Who has no goals on 50+ shots? Which “offensive defenceman” is set for less than 10 points this season?

Yannick Weber.

What good has Weber done this season for the Canucks? His $1.5 million contract is a cumbersome pay for the cap-straddled Canucks, and is costing the Canucks a valuable roster spot. Perhaps play Andrey Pedan instead — just a simple thought echoed by the rest of British Columbia. When an offensive defenceman is generating just 55 percent of the shots per 60 minutes as he did in two seasons previous, it is time to get rid of him.

Least Exciting Player: Chris Higgins

Chris Higgins, the sniper from Long Island, isn’t quite the same sniper anymore.

When your shooting percentage is at a career-low 5.3 percent and you are generating shots at a career-low rate of 1.5 per game, nothing will go right for you. Wink wink, Chris Higgins. Three points in 24 games. Either Higgins gave up scoring or is playing really injured. As for his defensive prowess, his minus-12 certainly does looks it is from like a guy who got scratched against Carolina in favour of Cracknell.

What happened to all the hype around the Triple-H line of Horvat, Hansen, and Higgins?

Next: Honourable Mentions

Honourable Mentions

Ben Hutton

Ben Hutton has been the best Canucks rookie skater and has claimed the third defenceman slot in Hamhuis’ absence. Although no goals and nine assists are not the gaudiest of numbers, Hutton is doing everything right in his rookie campaign. He got 49.5 percent of his shots on net, the best of all Vancouver defenceman not named Alex Biega.

Although his minus-eight is not a bright spot on his resume, his ability to skate the puck, flank the rush, and slow down the tempo on the break-outs is sublime. Hutton‘s defensive play could be more refined, though. The need to get stronger and tougher on the puck is there.

Alex Biega

I could not believe my eyes when I realized that Biega is averaging 20 more seconds of ice time than Hutton was.

Biega is a late bloomer who is dogged on the puck and never short of physicality. Should he continue his first-half hitting game, Biega would have 195 hits in a full 82-game NHL season, the highest among all Canucks defencemen. For a comparison, Dustin Byfuglien had 203 hits last year.

Biega is also getting shots on net with great success. He got 70.6 percent of his shots through on target, the highest among all Vancouver skaters who have played more than one game for the Canucks. In fact, Biega is the league leader among all defencemen in getting shots through on net (among those who played at least 10 games). No wonder Coach Willie Desjardins likes him.

Next: Most Underrated: Dan Hamhuis?

The first half of the 2015-16 season was painful, a blurry mix of good in mostly sub-par performances from the Canucks. But let us not forget — hockey is a sport. Have fun playing it, have fun watching it, have fun cheering on your team when there is nothing to boo about. It was a horrible stretch of 41 games — the boys know it. Unless you truly believe and understand #tanknation, give them all your support.

The second half will be better —  I guarantee you.

*Stats courtesy of hockey-reference.com and stats.hockeyanalysis.com