Is Joe Sakic the worst GM in the league?

[LGA]

The Avs main issue is that they kept building towards Roy's image of a big heavy team. The reason the Avs have had any success in the last few years is because they were a speedy team that could put pressure on other teams, and also take advantage every now and again, as well as ridiculous periods of goaltending. Now, they have a big, slow, and soft team. They basically anchor MacKinnon and Duchene with considerably slower players. If you watch any Avs games, you'll see teams just zone in on Duchene and MacKinnon because they are the only players really capable of that instant offense. Even when MacK and Duchene get into the zone, they are so far ahead of their teammates that they are forced to button hook, or delay until a passing option finally appears.

They have a decent chance this summer to get rid of a lot of the dead weight. My fear as an Avs fan is that Sakic will continue to be impatient and add another aging vet that used to be good.

[cannon7]

Still would take a flyer on Landeskog, if could be had for cheap.

[dissentowner]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Garth Snow still has a job. John Tavares is going to waste his career playing for that man. Calvin Johnson style.

I don't think Tavares will sign there when his contract is up. There has been lots of rumblings he is unhappy with pretty much everything to do with that organization right now.

[GirlySports]

the ottawa GM is the worst

[Erick Estrada]

I think that the entire management structure from the owner down has been horrible. I'm not defending Sakic but I don't feel he's 100% running the show. That organization mirrors the Canucks for ineptitude.

[calgaryblood]

He has to be. This roster is just terrible.

[MrMike]

Remember it was rumourer that Roy wanted to get Radulov signed this offseason and it was only a few days later he "resigned" where we figured Roy wanted more of a say and the owners/Sakic said no.

But in hindsight, woulnt we all rather Colbourne and cap space than that lazy russian Radulov?

[DeluxeMoustache]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

If not for Carey Price, Marc Bergevin would get more rocks thrown his way.

Shea Weber disagrees

[N-E-B]

I could be wrong but does Colorado not do things completely differently than other teams? I mean Sakic is the GM but IIRC he doesn't have the same roles and responsibilities as other GM's? Unless they've changed it. But I would say yes, the Avalanche management group as a whole is dead last.

Chiarelli I think gets picked on a bit too much because he's an Oiler. That team is finally making progress and that's really all they can ask for right now. Outside of the Lucic deal I don't have a lot of criticism for him. Probably should have squeezed out a bit more for Hall but whatever.

Benning is up there but I think the owners meddle a lot there. Benning doesn't come off as the smartest guy ever but if his hands are tied does that really matter?

John Chayka in Arizona doesn't seem overly competent to me this far. I'd put him up there as well.

[FireGilbert]

Definitely the worst. The only one close is the new guy in Arizona but he at least gets a year or two leeway.

[Oling_Roachinen]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

As for Jim Benning, his incompetence may be over-blown. A 2nd for Baertschi? At the very least, he got a 3rd line LW. Shinkaruk for Granlund? At this point, Granlund is out-playing Shinkaruk. Juolevi over Tkatchuk? Sure, Tkatchuk looks fantastic already, but you can't evaluate a decision like this until atleast 5yrs down the road, IMO.

Benning did make a fantastic trade in moving McCann for Gudbranson.

Benning turned Jason Garisson into Linden Vey. Jason Garisson went onto immediately play 20 minutes a night for the Stanley Cup Finalists that year. Linden Vey got waived and eventually signed with the Flames.

Traded a third round pick for Derek Dorsett. The same Dorsett that had never more than 20 points before heading to Vancouver. The same Dorsett making 2.7M a year for the next 3 years.

Traded Kesler for Bonino and Sbisa. Kesler, unfortuantely, is having a great season and is probably going to be a Selke finalist again. Sbisa is trash at best. Bonino was a great player on one of the best lines in the playoffs last year....which brings us to:

Trades Bonino and a 2nd for Sutter. Immediately signs Sutter to 4.4M. With a NTC. Sutter is on pace for a career year 41 points...but Bonino's strong playoffs and 1.9M cap hit (although UFA next year) doesn't point to that being a particular strong move.

Signs Loui Eriksson to a 6M/year deal until 2050. With a NTC

Signed Miller to an 18M contract. With a NTC. Miller was outplayed by Lack first year and has been no better than Markstrom the next two.

Right now Eriksson, Dorsett and Sutter's combined 42 points this year and 13M+ cap hit isn't looking too great. Throw in another 6M for their 1A goaltender, and that's a lot of cap for not much improvement on their team.

Virtanen isn't looking great this year, and it doesn't appear they are really developing him properly. Leaving him out of the loop on what's happening, being sent back down, recalled, sat, benched. On top of that, they drafted him ahead of Nylander (26 points in 36 games this year) and Ehlers (35 points in 41 games this year).


Got to give him full marks for getting a 2nd for Bieksa. No idea how he got that, maybe Anaheim just wanted to throw him a bone.

[Calgary4LIfe]

I think he has been pretty terrible. How much of that was Roy? I don't know how much of Roy's fingerprints were on that team. How much say did Roy have? How much did Sakic allow? I guess it all falls at his feet in the end.

As for the Avs, they're problem is that they lost a lot of their 'heavy lifting' guys with a lot of compete. Duchene and MacKinnon are stars, but they are the type of players that are 'elite gamebreakers'. Those are definitely needed, and they have (so far) been retained, but the only guy with legs left that does heavy lifting is Landeskog.

The two most important guys on the team that played strong 200ft games and were also really good along the boards were Stastny and ROR. They had (and still have) a porous defence, but those guys did a lot of the heavy lifting, including along the boards.

Now you have a couple of high-end gamebreakers with speed, one guy (Landeskog) left who plays a solid 200ft game and has the legs to do it, and a bunch of older complimentary (at best) vets, and a defence that can't defend well or move the puck well as a unit.

Oh, and they have great goalies, but even Dominik Hasek couldn't pull that team out of where they are at.

They lost a lot of what made that team click. They don't have an identity. They don't skate well. They don't move the puck well. They have 2 lines that can generate some offence, and no lines that are effective at checking. They are easy to shut down, and with their lack of capable defencemen, are a team that is easy to pressure and contain.

What they should have done is realized how important Statsny and RoR were, and made sure to retain them. Instead they let Statsny walk for nothing, and made a relatively poor trade with RoR. They had ONE good defencemen in Johnson.

Flames are really lucky in a way comparatively. When they started their rebuild, they had a Backlund who was breaking out as a guy who could do that heavy lifting, a top-pairing Defencemen in Giordano and a guy who was breaking out as a top-pairing defencemen in Brodie. Wideman was left over from 'trying to compete' still, and he put up HUGE minutes and kept this team afloat, and rather unheralded trade (and one that was mocked at the time from people not knowing the particulars) in obtaining Russell solidified a very good top 4 that was the envy of any rebuilding team in the NHL.

Meanwhile, the Avs decide to sign has-beens to try and solidify a terrible defensive core. Roy was also using Hartley's system. Great for Johnson's and Barrie's numbers, but probably not a good system to use when you don't have at least a top 4 that are capable of playing both ends like Calgary's was.

Calgary managed to identify and retain enough talent to see them through the rebuild. Avs - for some strange and idiotic reason - gutted their puck-possession and defensive-minded guys.

Sakic is rumored to be stepping down after this season apparently. Read somewhere that he stated if the Avs don't make the playoffs this year, that he will voluntarily step down.

[Cali Panthers Fan]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

Benning did make a fantastic trade in moving McCann for Gudbranson.

This point brings up something that nobody has mentioned yet. I have to nominate Tom Rowe and the two advanced stats chuckleheads the Panthers have named as AGMs as the worst group in the league.

Tallon built a 1st place club (division) trending in the right direction with a good coach.

The new group made a lot of moves just to make them, and while I thought they were ok moves at the times, the team has been just terrible this year. Then they go and fire the one guy who was doing his job well in Gallant, and guess what?! Even worse now.

The Avs were bad last year and got a little worse. The Panthers were great last year and are probably in the running for a top 10 pick this year. Inexcusable.

[Erick Estrada]

Gudbranson hasn't been very good for the Canucks this season so IMO that trade is kind of a wash at the moment. Panthers last season were similar to the Flames a couple of years back where a lot of things went right for them. I think few people are surprised they have regressed as the roster is good but not great.

I look at that Avalanche and they have a small group of good young forwards but then I see Bourque, Comeau, Iginla, and Colborne employed in prominent roles and I ask myself what exactly are they trying to build there. I will say Roy put them in a really bad position in the offseason quitting when they did as they were forced to go with an unproven head coach and to date he's struggled. Maybe a better head coach would have them playing more competitive but that's not a very good overall roster there. I do like that Pickard kid in net. The team in front of him is crap but he's really battled and made a lot of saves in the games I have seen him play.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by sureLoss

He has had the title since 2014

http://blogs.denverpost.com/avs/2014...tant-gm/19401/

Although I think Roy has put a lot of his fingerprints on the team and only resigned once it became clear the rest of management was starting to tune him out

The problem is: who is actually in control? For a while, they had something of a three-headed monster with Sakic, Sherman and Roy. That front office was clearly a mess, which also points to ownership being an issue. Sherman and Roy are now gone, so for Sakic, this might well be his true year 1.

At this point though, the Avs almost need to go nuclear with that roster. I can hardly believe they've won 12 games.

[ComixZone]

I think the Avs have one of the worst ownership groups in the league. They had a team policy where they effectively wouldn't pay out big 2nd contracts - and that ruined the relationship with Ryan O'Reilly and strained it with Matt Duchene before finally resulting in big money for Duchene and ROR via a matched offer-sheet.

[GullFoss]

I like to poop on the oilers as much as the next guy, but the Lucic signing makes a lot of sense if you think about more like a Engelland signing. It was an integral part of culture shift when you look at the roster. It should be obvious that he is a calming force and leader in that room.

“The great thing is you have all these young guys with all these special talents willing to kind of change their ways and change the culture and move it in the right direction so it becomes more of a winning atmosphere.A lot of young guys learning how to play the right way night in and night out.” - Milan Lucic


Is the signing expensive? Absolutely. But given the state of the franchise, it was as necessary as shipping out Taylor Hall.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by ComixZone

I think the Avs have one of the worst ownership groups in the league. They had a team policy where they effectively wouldn't pay out big 2nd contracts - and that ruined the relationship with Ryan O'Reilly and strained it with Matt Duchene before finally resulting in big money for Duchene and ROR via a matched offer-sheet.

The thing is that Stan Kroenke is filthy rich. The Rams are a train wreck but not because they are penny pinching. Is this something the Kroenke is mandating or is it the people he's entrusted to run the organization? Nuggets also aren't very good so it seem the common theme is that the teams he owns all suck. I can't comment on the Nuggets because I don't care about the NBA but poor management/coaching is the reason the Rams and Avs suck.

[saillias]

Originally Posted by GullFoss

I like to poop on the oilers as much as the next guy, but the Lucic signing makes a lot of sense if you think about more like a Engelland signing. It was an integral part of culture shift when you look at the roster. It should be obvious that he is a calming force and leader in that room.

“The great thing is you have all these young guys with all these special talents willing to kind of change their ways and change the culture and move it in the right direction so it becomes more of a winning atmosphere.A lot of young guys learning how to play the right way night in and night out.” - Milan Lucic


Is the signing expensive? Absolutely. But given the state of the franchise, it was as necessary as shipping out Taylor Hall.

So it was unnecessary and stupid then?

[Geeoff]

You'd think that Edmonton would've shown the Avs that hiring management solely because they played on your cup winning squad is a really bad idea. Not only are they inexperienced at the position but it becomes awkward to fire them when they inevitably suck at it.