Desperate Canucks should look for value and potential in trades this summer
There’s no pending unrestricted free agent that fits what the Vancouver Canucks need more than Sam Bennett.
Bringing a unique blend of talent and toughness to the centre-ice position, the 28-year-old would be a perfect complement to Elias Pettersson. Bennett is a beast in the playoffs and is coming off winning the Conn Smythe Trophy, not to mention helping the Florida Panthers win back-to-back Stanley Cups.
Translation: good luck getting him.
Every team wants a player like Bennett, so the cost to sign him in free agency will be outrageous. If he gets to July 1 unsigned, the Canucks will have to outbid 31 other teams, and likely by a lot, because Vancouver isn’t exactly a desirable free-agent destination right now.
If the Canucks wanted a player like Bennett, they should have acquired him in 2021 when the Calgary Flames traded him.
Back then, nobody thought he would become the player he turned into. But that’s sort of the point.
If you wait until players have established themselves, waiting until they become sure things, they become too expensive or unattainable.
The real test of a general manager is finding stars before they become stars.
Bennett was on the trade block in 2021, and as some of our readers recently pointed out, we had a Canucks trade proposal for him at the time.
Virtanen for Bennett, who says no? https://t.co/p9hx91Jw9m #Canucks #Flames pic.twitter.com/JpnsO5JiIN
— Rob Williams (@RobTheHockeyGuy) February 2, 2021
Imagine how the course of history could have been altered had the Canucks swapped Jake Virtanen for Bennett back in 2021.
It seems ludicrous now, but the value of both players had sunk quite low in February 2021. Bennett, who had requested a trade, was coming off a 12-point season in 52 games with the Flames in 2019-20. He was in the midst of scoring 12 points in 38 games in Calgary in 2020-21.
Virtanen, by contrast, was coming off a season that saw him score 36 points in 69 games in 2019-20. He would have likely scored 20 goals had the pandemic not interrupted the season.
Maybe a one-for-one swap was unrealistic, but Bennett wound up being traded for pennies on the dollar — the equivalent of two second-round picks. Would Calgary have gone for a package from Vancouver of Virtanen and a second-rounder instead?
We’ll probably never know, but there’s a lesson here.
The Canucks can try to overspend in free agency or mortgage the future to fix their problems, or they can look for high-ceiling, buy-low candidates instead.
Think Alexis Lafreniere, the first-overall draft pick from 2020, who has had an underwhelming start to his NHL career. Still just 23 years old, Lafreniere is coming off a 45-point season with the New York Rangers, but isn’t far removed from a 28-goal, 57-point season in 2023-24.
If the Rangers want to move him, the Canucks should be first in line for his services.
He won’t come as cheap as Bennett did four years ago, but that’s the type of player who is worth giving up assets for. You might be acquiring a future All-Star at a rock-bottom price.
Marco Rossi is another. It’s not every day you see a 23-year-old centre coming off a 60-point season become available through trade, but that’s where the Minnesota Wild are at with the 5-foot-9 player.
Is he too small? Maybe. But what if he’s not?
What about players who are coming off an off-year like Pierre-Luc Dubois? The Washington Capitals cashed in after Dubois’ disastrous one-year stint with the Los Angeles Kings.
Maybe Jonathan Marchessault (Nashville) or Vladimir Tarasenko (Detroit) are devalued similarly after underwhelming seasons with new teams.
The real key here is finding potential and value.
With the Stanley Cup awarded, and the draft and free agency around the corner, we are now in trade season. We know Patrik Allvin isn’t shy about picking up the phone, and what he decides to do in the next few weeks should shape the future of the organization for years to come.