Vancouver Canucks: Grading Jim Benning’s two trade deadline moves

On Monday, Vancouver Canucks general manager Jim Benning made two notable trades. Out go defenceman Erik Gudbranson and prospect Jonathan Dahlen. In come Tanner Pearson and Linus Karlsson. Here’s how Mr. Benning fared.

Just when it looked like Vancouver Canucks general manager Jim Benning was going to stand pat at the trade deadline, it was revealed that he beat the clock and wound up making a pair of deals after all.

The first move was sending out struggling blueliner Erik Gudbranson to the Pittsburgh Penguins in exchange for forward Tanner Pearson, as reported by TSN’s Bob McKenzie. Then, Benning shipped out highly-touted prospect in forward Jonathan Dahlen to the San Jose Sharks, receiving prospect Linus Karlsson in return — per the Canucks’ official Twitter account.

Trading Gudbranson was received well by countless Canucks fans and pundits, as you probably noticed on Twitter. The same cannot be said about the Dahlen trade; the team surprisingly gave up on one of their few blue chip prospects.

But hey, the Markus Granlund-for-Hunter Shinkaruk trade looked iffy at first, but the Canucks wound up the clear winners in that one. Perhaps Benning will wind up with the better player here, though we won’t know for at least a couple of years.

Blueliners Alexander Edler and Chris Tanev — who have been heavily mentioned in trade rumours for a while now — end up staying put. Nonethless, Benning made a couple of big-time moves that sent shockwaves across Canuck nation.

Now, let’s take a look at how he did in the two moves.