Has Patrik Allvin done a good job in 3.5 years as Vancouver Canucks GM?
It’s been barely a year since Vancouver Canucks general manager Patrik Allvin was runner-up as NHL GM of the Year.
Of course, that’s easy to forget about, because 2024 feels like it was a decade ago for Canucks fans.
Since being hired by the Canucks on January 26, 2022, Allvin’s Canucks have been the definition of mid.
That might sound harsh, but the Canucks have amassed a 148-101-33 record since his hiring date, good for 15th overall in the NHL. More importantly, they’ve racked up seven playoff wins, which is the 14th-best mark in the league since 2022.
Welcome to the mushy middle.
So is Allvin closer to the GM who nearly won GM of the Year, or does his work more closely match the guy who has led the Canucks to being middle of the pack since 2022?
Allvin’s stellar Canucks debut
There’s no doubt that Allvin inherited a mess from former Canucks general manager Jim Benning.
Unlike his predecessor, Allvin’s early moves appeared to be more shrewd and calculated instead of misguided and desperate.
Allvin’s biggest decision in his first year on the job was the choice to re-sign J.T. Miller and trade Bo Horvat, when many believed the opposite would happen.
In hindsight, it’s now fair to question that choice following last season’s aftermath. But it’s hard to argue that Allvin didn’t choose the better player.
Miller has registered the 12th-most points in the NHL since Allvin was hired. Horvat ranks 64th.
Once Horvat got dealt to the New York Islanders and signed a heftier deal than Miller’s, that also painted Allvin in a pretty good light.
Another move that was unpopular at the time was the acquisition of Filip Hronek from the Detroit Red Wings. That was a move that teams towards the bottom of the standings, like the Canucks, don’t usually make. However, the deal paid off the following season, as Quinn Hughes and Hronek formed one of the best defence pairings in the NHL. Hronek has also proven that when Hughes is out of the lineup, he can fill in capably as a top-pair defenceman.
Of course, the 2023-24 season was a dream, and the win-now trades for Elias Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov helped the Canucks push the Edmonton Oilers to the brink of elimination in 2024.
Not all of his moves worked. The Ilya Mikheyev signing was a misstep. So too was the decision to attach a second-round pick to move off of Jason Dickinson’s $2.65-million salary.
Overall, there were far more wins than losses for Allvin early on, even if the big decisions were unpopular at the time. That includes the very unpopular decision to fire Bruce Boudreau in favour of Rick Tocchet, who, of course, won the Jack Adams Award in 2024.
He rebuilt the farm. He made smart value signings in Andrei Kuzmenko, Dakota Joshua, Pius Suter, and Kiefer Sherwood. He re-signed his own players to team-friendly deals (Nils Höglander on a two-year deal at $1.1 million per season was a steal). And, he boldly bought out Oliver Ekman-Larsson, which helped the Canucks build a deeper team for the 2023-24 postseason run.
The Allvin narrative has changed
The Canucks’ massive step back last season was inevitably a stain on Allvin’s reputation.
His tenure will likely be defined by the Miller trade and the decision to both extend and keep Elias Pettersson. While the Pettersson signing was fair value at the time based on his production, it could end up being one of the worst contracts in hockey if he doesn’t bounce back.
While Allvin and Jim Rutherford tried to spin the Miller trade as an inevitability, Canucks fans can point to the handling of another superstar wanting out of Vancouver as reason why the Canucks should have shown more patience.
Former Canucks general manager Brian Burke held onto Pavel Bure for more than a year following his trade request before he was finally dealt.
The decision to both trade Miller for an underwhelming return and then compound that decision by acquiring Marcus Pettersson for a first-round pick and a good prospect showed further impatience for a team that was stuck in the mushy middle and poor in terms of trade assets.
Allvin’s work at the 2025 trade deadline was a bit of a mess as well. Although his decisions look better now that Brock Boeser has been re-signed, the choice not to sell assets at the deadline reeked of desperation. It was clear then that the Canucks were not going to contend in 2025.
His work this offseason has raised further eyebrows, and fans have voiced their frustration.
The Canucks altered their forward makeup by trading for Evander Kane and by letting Suter walk as a free agent. Then, they traded Arturs Silovs and Dakota Joshua for a couple of mid-round picks and a middling prospect.
After Canucks management said their goal was to find another top-six centre (and multiple top-six forwards) this offseason, they remain on the hunt. Their work is likely incomplete following the Joshua trade, in which they freed up cap space, but this team doesn’t look much better on paper compared to last season.
The verdict
It’s easy to get caught up in how frustrating the last 12 months have been, but Allvin’s resume has more wins than losses.
The issue right now is that it’s hard to see the Canucks emerging from the mushy middle. One saving grace is that parity in the NHL is real, aside from the 4-6 teams at the top who consistently go on long playoff runs.
It’s not hard to picture the Canucks as currently constructed being a top-10 team if everything goes right. You can also envision them being a bottom-10 team if everything goes wrong.
Allvin’s moves have often been unpopular, but the ones we’ve had more time to analyze have worked out.
Choosing Miller over Horvat wasn’t popular. Neither was acquiring Hronek nor hiring Tocchet. All of those moves gave the Canucks a chance to win a Stanley Cup in 2024.
Perhaps some of his more recent decisions, including keeping Elias Pettersson, acquiring Marcus Pettersson, Filip Chytil, Kane, hiring Adam Foote as head coach, and freeing up some cap space to find more forward talent, will prove to have a similar effect.