The Vancouver Canucks are obviously entering the off-season with many questions regarding the future of the club. The team’s first round playoff exit to the Calgary Flames exposed a number of flaws in their roster, and ones that will have to be fixed soon if they want to remain competitive during this “re-tooling.”
So as year two of the Trevor Linden/Jim Benning regime begins, there are certainly more questions than answers about the direction of the club. While virtually all aspects of the roster have been torn apart and dissected, few have been casting an eye at the future of Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
The Future of the Canucks and the Sedins
Let’s get the obvious out of the way first, the twins proved this past season that while there has been some slippage in their offensive production, especially at five-on-five, both are still elite point producers in the NHL, finishing 9th (Daniel) and 13th (Henrik) in league scoring.
However, whenever that point is brought up, the inevitable and obvious counter-argument concerns their age. They will turn 35 years old before the puck drops on the 2015-16 NHL season, and just how much tread they have left on their tires is a matter of debate.
With three years at $7 million per remaining on each of their contracts, the time might be now to determine the fate of the Sedins, and it seems as though there is a couple of ways this could play out.
They play out the string
This is the possibility that is equal parts blindly sentimental and illogical, though it does have some merit on and off the ice. The Sedins have long made it known that they wish to retire from the NHL as Canucks, before moving on to finish their professional careers with Modo in the Swedish Hockey League (SHL).
Typically, players of this age are on the downside of their careers, and it seems likely that the Sedins’ offensive production should naturally decline over the next three seasons. For both to hover around the top ten in NHL scoring as 38-year-olds would be an impressive feat.
So the question becomes, does it make sense for a Canucks club that is retooling to keep these players on the roster?
It’s actually not a bad idea, as the twins are very cerebral players that have always relied more on positioning and elite-level hockey sense than pure speed and skill, so they should, at the very least, be able to be solid top-six producers for the remainder of their contracts. There is also an expectation that even if the offense goes, Daniel and Henrik in particular can still be elite puck possession players for a few more years.
Plus, it certainly would be a huge boon to the club’s prospects, who will have the luxury of learning from two consummate professionals who can help them transition to the NHL both on and off the ice. We saw how much the Sedins themselves were allowed to find their game under Markus Naslund and how valuable developing in a “winning environment” is, something Benning seems to hold as a core value while he reshapes this roster.
So while their intrinsic value to the club is obvious if they stay, what if they are even more valuable if they go?
They are traded
The parallel here is obvious, so I’ll cut to the chase: How much further along in their rebuild would the Calgary Flames be had they traded Jarome Iginla before his value dropped?
This is the question that should be occupying the minds of Linden and Benning more than anything else during this off-season. Because the Sedins, as wonderful as they are on the ice and as important as they are to the franchise off the ice (just as Iginla was in Calgary), are not going to be part of the next core of the club (again, just like Iginla).
Their trade value is only going to go down from this point, and if the Canucks hope to strengthen their prospect pool, something Benning is fanatical about, then trading the Sedins now might be the way to do it.
Of course, that’s a near impossibility. Twin $7 million contracts won’t be easy to move, particularly with their no-movement clauses, not to mention the fact that they would likely go as a package deal, meaning any potential trade would necessitate a partner with both the cap space and a GM/owner crazy enough to make the deal, but stranger things have happened in hockey. It’s, at the very least, worth exploring.
It may all be moot anyways, as Linden and Benning likely aren’t considering this course of action, but they certainly should be. While a number of core veteran names have been bandied about as trade bait, including Kevin Bieksa, Alex Burrows and Chris Higgins, the two veteran players that would definitely bring in the biggest return aren’t even being considered.
Remaking this Canucks team into a contender again isn’t going to be an easy task for Linden and Benning. It seems certain that management is going to offload at least a couple of veterans in return for picks in the upcoming draft, where Vancouver has just one pick (a first-rounder) in the first three rounds.
However, keeping the Sedins might end up being the most beneficial course of action, because the likes of Bo Horvat, Jake Virtanen, Hunter Shinkaruk, Jared McCann and Cole Cassels being able to ease themselves into the league and learn from the twins is incredibly important. That said, if a deal is out there that can bring a young impact player into the fold, it should be seriously considered.
Main Photo:
