Canucks: Comparing this year’s expansion list to 2017

For the second time in four years, the Vancouver Canucks will be losing a player to an expansion team.

On Saturday afternoon, General Manager Jim Benning, along with 29 other teams, submitted the final draft of their player protection lists for the upcoming Seattle Kraken Expansion Draft. Most clubs, like the Canucks, opted for protecting seven forwards, three defenceman and one goalie, but a few went with the eight-player approach instead. The Vegas Golden Knights, the league’s 31st and most-recent team, were exempt from the process altogether.

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Some teams also tinkered with their lists down to the wire, with a handful of clubs pulling the trigger on last-minute transactions in order to change the landscape of their lists and to not lose a player for nothing.

This included the Canucks, who finalized a deal with the Dallas Stars to acquire third-line centre Jason Dickinson in exchange for a third round draft pick. Dickinson, who is set to become an RFA this offseason, snagged one of the last spots on the team’s protected list.

Of course, most people don’t focus on which players are protected; rather, the spotlight immediately shifted to which players were exposed to the Kraken. Fortunately, for Vancouver, there weren’t too many big-ticket names on that list, which includes the likes of veteran netminder Braden Holtby, as well as forwards Zack MacEwen, Jonah Gadjovich and Kole Lind.

Once the lists were submitted, the Kraken were given just under 96 hours to make their selection from each team. The picks were scheduled to be announced on Wednesday night during the Expansion Draft broadcast but, as expected, the surprise party was ruined ahead of time.

Just before 9am PST on Wednesday night, former TSN insider Frank Seravalli took to the streets of Twitter and started announcing which players would be Seattle-bound for next season. Based on Seravalli’s reports, as well as according to The Athletic, only four teams have been able to keep their player under wraps at the time of this article being published (Red Wings, Rangers, Penguins and Lightning), and it appears that the Canucks aren’t one of those teams.

As it goes in this league, these are just reports, and could very well change prior to the Expansion Draft broadcast. However, based on the credibility of these well-known insiders, and given that the Kraken were required to finalize their selections by 7am PST on Wednesday morning, 10 hours before the actual draft, it shouldn’t be considered a stretch that many names are starting to be leaked.

However, regardless of who the Kraken end up snagging from Vancouver, even if it does end up being Lind, it’s important to take a deeper dive into the crop of players that they were able to choose from, and how it compares to Vancouver’s list from 2017.

In addition to Holtby, Lind, MacEwen and Gadjovich, the Canucks also exposed veterans Jay Beagle, Antoine Roussel and Loui Eriksson, as well as Matthew Highmore, Jake Virtanen and Madison Bowey. The Kraken were also allowed to look at pending UFAs, such as Alex Edler, Travis Hamonic and Brandon Sutter.

All in all, not a very overwhelming list.

Let’s start with the older players. There was no chance that Seattle would be interested in the likes of Beagle, Roussel or Eriksson. The trio are all on the wrong side of 30, have battled with numerous injuries over the past few seasons, and have ultimately proven that they can’t keep up with today’s fast-paced NHL. Each player only has one year left on their deal, but it’s definitely not a cap hit that Seattle will want to take on, especially if a sweetener isn’t included.

At only 25 years old, Highmore is a bit more of an intriguing piece, but definitely still fits the “underwhelming” bill. The undrafted forward has only played in 91 NHL games over the past four seasons, registering seven goals and eights assists during that span, and appears destined to be no more than a fourth-line centre moving forward.

Similar story applies for Bowey. The 26-year-old, who clocks in at 6’2″ and 202 pounds, does have over 150 games under his belt, as well as a Stanley Cup championship to his name, but was only acquired by the Canucks to meet the exposed player requirements. The jury is still out on whether or not he’ll actually make an impact in Vancouver, but don’t hold your breath.

And we definitely don’t need to talk about Virtanen’s contributions to the organization so far.

So, how does this compare to 2017? In short, not much better.

Again, the protected list shouldn’t have too many surprises. Franchise forwards Daniel and Henrik Sedin led the pack, followed by future captain Bo Horvat, veteran defencemen Edler and Chris Tanev and netminder Jacob Markstrom. Eriksson and Sutter rounded out the list thanks to the NMC and NTC in their contracts.

The exposed list? “Oof” is right.

Leading up to the Vegas Expansion Draft, 11 players on that list hadn’t cracked 100 NHL games on their resume. Goaltender Ryan Miller, who was 37-years-old at the time, had just wrapped up the last year of his contract in Vancouver. Derek Dorsett only played in 14 games during the 2016-17 campaign due to injury, and Alex Biega was on a two-year goalless drought heading into the offseason.

In reality, Vegas really only had two viable options to choose from in forward Brendan Gaunce and defenceman Luca Sbisa, with Reid Boucher sliding into the third spot as a possible dark horse pick.

Gaunce had shown random bursts of potential and offence here and there but was never able to play with enough consistency to land a full-time NHL gig. Sbisa, on the other hand, had already racked up over 400 NHL games, including the full 82-game season in 2016-17, but was known for poor defensive fundamentals that made the analytics crowd cringe.

As we know, the Golden Knights ended up choosing Sbisa. They were able to get 30 regular season games out him, where he registered two goals and 12 assists from the backend. However, he didn’t play well during his 12 playoff appearances, which were rounded out by not one, but two giveaways in game five of the Stanley Cup Finals that led to the game-tying and game-winning goals.

Sbisa didn’t return to Sin City the next year.

Compared to other teams in the league, Vancouver luckily didn’t have to give up much to Vegas in 2017, and it appears they’ll be following the same path with Seattle this year. Some fans might consider this a win, particularly based on what other teams have had to give up for nothing, but, in reality, it’s far from a victory for the franchise.

In the four years since Vegas’s inaugural season, Benning has done very little to improve this team’s roster, whether it be through trades, free agency or drafting, and it’s quite evident based on the two lists that he and his front office team submitted. Add in poor asset management and the inability to hold onto key players long-term, and you can see why this organization is at the same place, if not even worse off, than where they were in 2017.

Benning has stated multiple times that he plans on being aggressive this offseason in order to turn this team into one that contend for the playoffs, and only time will tell if he’s able to deliver. No matter what ends up happening, we’re all hoping that this organization can turn things around before the NHL adds its 33rd team to the mix, whenever that may be.

Canucks fans will officially find out which player will be on his way to Seattle during the Expansion Draft broadcast on Wednesday night, starting at 5pm PST.

What are your thoughts on the Canucks’ lists from the last two expansion drafts? Make sure to drop a comment below!