[Calgary4LIfe]

Originally Posted by Barca

Core Pieces: Demko, Hughes, Boeser, Horvat, Pettersson
Support cast: Virtanen, MacEwen, Gaudette, Goldobin
Prospects: Podkolzin, Hoglander, Juolevi, Madden, Rathbone, DiPietro, Karlsson.

the biggest area of weakness is obviously defence which is a work in progress, but the Canucks signed a couple college free agents late last season (Teves, Rafferty and Eliot).

this trade for Miller is to surround the young guys with some veterans that fits the teams age range going forward.

guys like Beartschi (26) Miller (26) Pearson (26) Granlund (25) Spooner (26)

Imo, the Canucks are doing a good rebuild and like JB said, this trade accelerates the process and help develop the core pieces get better.

You cant continue to draft young kids and plug them in the lineup like EDM has done with Puljuarvi and expect to get better. Thats where the Canucks and Oilers differ imo we have a better support cast in place.

if only we could get out of the Eriksson and Sutter contracts

Exactly. Vancouver didn't go out and proclaim their young players as the leaders and just put them in position to fail. They - quite like the Flames actually, and every other team in the NHL that has successfully went through a rebuild process - surrounded their young players with capable veterans that could shoulder that load.


Edmonton is the poster child for poor drafting and development. Vancouver - IMO - took a bit too long to get their act together, but it does seem more likely than not that they are coming out of a rebuild with a sustainably good team. Unless something goes wrong with their defensive development, I don't even think that is THAT glaring of a weakness at the moment. A couple of depth defencemen should be able to help patch up some leaks until those defencemen mature. It isn't like the Oilers' level bad there. It will be interesting to see how these pieces mature over the next couple of seasons, but I would be surprised if the Canucks were bottom 3 in the west this season.