J.T. Miller

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Previewing the 2019-20 Vancouver Canucks

By Adam GretzSep 21, 2019, 4:52 PM EDT

(The 2019-20 NHL season is almost here so it’s time to look at all 31 teams. We’ll be breaking down strengths and weaknesses, looking at whether teams are better or worse this season and more!)

For more 2019-20 PHT season previews, click here.

Better or worse: They are definitely better, it is just a question of how much better and if it is enough to matter. Hopefully a full season from Brock Boeser, Elias Pettersson having a year of experience under his belt, the arrival of Quinn Hughes, and the offseason additions of J.T. Miller and Tyler Myers all add something to the team. Trading a future first-round pick for Miller is a risk, and Myers’ deal is yet another bizarre long-term contract for a veteran that isn’t a core player, but they are short-term upgrades. Whether that gets them closer to being a playoff team remains to be seen, and it all kind of makes you question what the long-term plan actually is.

Strengths: For all of their flaws, the Canucks do have a lot of young talent they should be able to build around assuming they don’t screw it up. They have had Calder Trophy contenders in each of the past two seasons (Boeser and Pettersson, the latter of which won it) and could have another one this season (Hughes).

Weaknesses: They lack quality depth at forward, they have holes on defense, the goaltending is probably average, and for a team that has been one of the worst in the league for the past four years and does not have a single player making more than $6 million per season they are somehow completely capped out and have no wiggle room to work with financially. They invested too much money and too many years in veteran, declining depth players and just don’t have enough around their top young players to seriously compete for a playoff spot. That all points to their biggest overall weakness: The front office.

[MORE: 2018-19 Summary | X-Factor | Under Pressure | Three Questions]

Coach Hot Seat Rating (1-10, 10 being red hot): Travis Green has been the Canucks’ coach for two non-playoff seasons, but what does that mean? Do we know what kind of coach he is? What exactly has he had to work with here? Still, any time a coach is looking at the potential for a third consecutive non-playoff season you have to think their seat is at least a little warm. We will put him at a 7 out of 10.

Three most fascinating players: Pettersson, Hughes, and Thatcher Demko.

Pettersson is fascinating simply because he is the team’s best, and most exciting player and it is going to be interesting to see what he does in year two. His rookie season was great, but he cooled off considerably after the first month of the season when it came to scoring goals, and a lot of his goal-scoring success was the result of an incredibly high shooting percentage. Can he sustain that?

Hughes is an important player for the Canucks because they really need him to be an impact player simply due to the position he plays. They need someone on defense that can be a young, top-pairing defender and he definitely has that sort of potential. There are certainly going to be growing pains for him as a rookie, but the potential for stardom is absolutely there.

Jacob Markstrom has been pretty solid the past two years as the team’s starting goalie under less than ideal circumstances, but is he a long-term solution in net? He is an unrestricted free agent after this season and an already cap-strapped team has a big decision to make. That is where Demko comes in because he could be a long-term solution. Markstrom has earned the right to open the season as the starter, but Demko’s play when he gets his opportunities could create an opportunity for the Canucks to move Markstrom and turn the net over to their potential long-term goalie.

Playoffs or lottery: Even with their impressive young talent this is still not a playoff team. They are also not a team that is going to be bad enough to be one of the worst teams in the league. That leaves them in that messy middle ground that is really difficult to get out of.

MORE:
• Boeser gets three-year bridge deal with Canucks
• ProHockeyTalk’s 2019 NHL free agency tracker
• Your 2019-20 NHL on NBC TV schedule

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Adam Gretz is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @AGretz.

Could Luongo’s retirement, cap penalty actually help Canucks?

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By Scott BilleckJun 29, 2019, 12:59 PM EDT

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Hear me out here.

Prior to Roberto Luongo’s retirement announcement earlier this week, the Vancouver Canucks were readying, reportedly, a very large (and very ridiculous) offer to free agent defenseman Tyler Myers.

Then the Luongo announcement came. And with him not going on long-term injured reserve, a deal that saves the Panthers several million dollars, it instead is going to cost the Canucks just over $3 million per season in what’s called a cap recapture penalty for the next three seasons, thanks to the agreement in the last Collective Bargaining Agreement on back-diving contracts.

Now, Luongo owns the 11th highest AAV on the Canucks and general manager Jim Benning has $17.6 million to play with, per CapFriendly (and after Saturday’s buyout of Ryan Spooner), and some restricted free agents left to sign, including a big one in Brock Boeser.

[ProHockeyTalk’s 2019 NHL free agency tracker]

While some may think Luongo screwed the Canucks here, planting a $3 million cap hit over the next three seasons as one final dig at the team after a tumultuous end to his tenure in the city, it might be a bit of a blessing in disguise.

Now, it’s not a literal blessing. The move still sucks for the Canucks, who would rather have that cap flexibility, but if it prices Benning out of a move to bring in Myers, that could save the team a lot more in the long run.

Myers may be a serviceable third-pairing defenseman, but $7 million or more for him is top-pairing money that would be better set on fire as it would at least provide some warmth in that dark hour.

Benning appears to want to have his cake and eat it, too. The Canucks seem to be putting together a nice little rebuild, but he’s already traded a first-round pick to take J.T. Miller off the hands of the cash-strapped Tampa Bay Lightning.

Miller is a great get, but the price is what is puzzling. First round picks are gold in today’s NHL, the cornerstone of re-building a franchise. Seeing as other teams are getting quality players from cap-crunched teams and not having to spend first-rounders to do so, it would seem like that trade was less than ideal.

Further hurting the future would be adding Myers for seven years in the $50 million range. Similar defensemen, at least statistically speaking, could be found for a fraction of the price.

Rebuilds hardly have shortcuts, and cutting corners only adds unnecessary risk.

If Luongo prevented, inadvertently, the signing of Myers, his final parting gift didn’t just come in a newspaper ad.

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Scott Billeck is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @scottbilleck.

Winners and losers of the 2019 NHL Draft

By Sean LeahyJun 22, 2019, 8:37 PM EDT

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VANCOUVER — The 2019 NHL Draft is complete. Jack Hughes went first and Jeremy Michel was chosen with the 217th and final pick. A quiet first day was followed by a loud second day that saw a handful of big trades and a number of teams swapping draft picks.

A lot happened, so let’s take a look at some winners and losers from draft weekend.

WINNER: USA Hockey

There were 59 Americans were selected in Vancouver this weekend, led by Hughes, who went first overall to the New Jersey Devils. Hughes is the eighth American to be chosen with the first pick and only the second since 2007. For the first time in draft history, seven of the first 15 picks were from the U.S., with a record eight coming directly from the United States National Team Development Program. (Hughes, Alex Turcotte, Trevor Zegras, Matthew Boldy, Spencer Knight, Cameron York, Cole Caufield, who makes the Canadiens a winner, and John Beecher.)

LOSER: Ontario Hockey League

For the first time in 33 years no players from the OHL went in the top 10 picks. They ended up with 25 players going in the seven rounds, down from 35 a year ago.

WINNER: Colorado Avalanche

A team that is on the rise had two first-round picks and are positioning themselves as big players over the next few seasons. Thanks to the Senators, the Avalanche had the No. 4 pick and used that on defenseman Bowen Byram. With Cale Makar and Sam Girard excelling already, Byram, a quality puck mover, will only strengthen the blue line.

At No. 16 they picked center Alex Newhook, who became the sixth Newfoundland native to be a first-round selection.

WINNER: Yukon hockey

Yukon-born Dylan Cozens became the first player selected in the first round when was picked by the Buffalo Sabres seventh overall. He’s the third Whitehorse native to be drafted following Peter Sturgeon (1974, Boston) and Bobby House (1991, Chicago).

LOSER: Day 1 trades

Usually the lead up to the draft and then Round 1 gives us some interesting trades. This year? Nope. There was no fun to be had Friday night as teams continued discussing moves, but there was no player moves consummated.

WINNER: Day 2 trades

Before Round 2 even began we had news that Patrick Marleau and P.K. Subban had been traded, along with the initial details of J.T. Miller being sent to the Canucks. There was talk of there being a ton of chatter among general managers this week compared to previous off-season. Maybe now that we know the salary cap range for next season the deals will continue into the week leading into free agency?

LOSER: The J.T. Miller price

The Canucks were part of that active Saturday morning adding Miller from the Tampa Bay Lightning for a conditional 2020 or 2021 first-round pick, a 2019 third-round selection, and goaltender Marek Mazanec. The versatile 26-year-old forward still has four years left on his deal that carries a $5.25M cap hit. Tampa gets cap relief while the Canucks gets a top-six forward coming off a year where he shot four percent. GM Jim Benning gave up a bit of the future — a potential lottery pick — in an attempt to fix problems now.

WINNER: Walk-up songs

The 31 first round draft picks were able to choose their own walk-up song this year as they made their way to the stage at Rogers Arena. Sadly, Arthur Kaliyev went early in Round 2, robbing us of hearing “Old Town Road.”

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LOSER: Slovakia

While countries like the U.S. (57) and Finland (22) saw increases in the number of players drafted from last year, Slovakia saw a drop from five in 2018 to one in 2019. Meanwhile, Belarus had three players drafted this year, tying the record from 2004.

WINNER: The Foote family

Two year after the Tampa Bay Lightning selected Cal Foote with the 14th pick in 2017, Julien BriseBois added another member of the Foote family to the franchise by choosing Nolan 27th overall. The Footes are now the fourth set of brothers to be drafted by the same team, joining Dave and Mark Hunter (Montreal), Daniel and Henrik Sedin (Vancouver), and Duane and Brent Sutter (New York Islanders).

WINNER: Ray Shero

In the span of about 16 hours, the New Jersey Devils Jack Hughes first overall and then acquired Subban. He had the salary cap space to work with and took full advantage of it, knowing some teams may have shied away until they learned what the 2019-20 cap range would look like..

So if you’re keeping track, Shero has acquired Subban and Taylor Hall — how will this affect his extension talks? — for a package of Adam Larsson, Steven Santini, Jeremy Davies, and two second-round picks. Pretty, pretty good.

LOSER: The return for Subban

While moving Subban’s contract and not retaining any salary in the deal will help in his pursuit of an impact forward (Matt Duchene, hello!) this summer, the return for the defenseman was underwhelming.

“We had to make a business decision,” Poile said in a statement. “With an aim at strengthening our forward corps this offseason, and the continued strength of our defensive group, we felt it was necessary to clear up salary cap space this way.”

It was a straight salary dump and now freeing up the cap space ups the pressure to land a big fish in free agency, especially if Duchene is the No. 1 target.

WINNER: Devils-Rangers rivalry

P.K. Subban. Jacob Trouba (if he signs!). Jack Hughes. Kaapo Kakko. There was an injection of juice into the Metropolitan Division rivalry this weekend. Both teams are in the midst of changing their futures, and the additions on draft weekend will certainly go a long way to doing that. Add in the New York Islanders to the mix and the Metropolitan Division and hockey in the New York metropolitan area just got more interesting.

MORE 2019 NHL DRAFT COVERAGE:
• Shero on Subban trade, Hall’s future with Devils
• Round 1 draft tracker
• Rounds 2-7 draft tracker

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Sean Leahy is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @Sean_Leahy.

Trade: Lightning free up cap space by sending Miller to Canucks

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By Scott BilleckJun 22, 2019, 1:45 PM EDT

18 Comments

Saturday seems all right for freeing up cap space.

It’s no Elton John classic, but it seems to be a popular hit among National Hockey League general managers on the second day of the 2019 NHL Draft as the Tampa Bay Lightning followed the Nashville Predators and loosened their cap belt by trading J.T. Miller to the Vancouver Canucks for prospect goalie Marek Mazanec, a 2019 third-round pick and a conditional first rounder in 2020.

The Canucks are set to take on the full of Miller’s $5.25 million cap hit over the next four years, which is key for the Lightning.

Tampa had just $5.876 million to play with before the trading of Miller and they’ve yet to sign restricted free agent Brayden Point, who could be in the $9 million range per season.

This is not to mention some of other issues they’re going to have in the future, including a big-money extension for Vezina winner Andrei Vasilevskiy, who will be a restricted free agent after next season.

The Lightning already shed $5.8 million by moving Ryan Callahan to the long-term injured-reserve list earlier this week.

For the Canucks, the trade is good in the sense they get a solid player in Miller, but not so great that they had to give up a conditional first-round pick for him. The Canucks are rebuilding and rebuilding teams shouldn’t be trading opening round picks. See: Ottawa.

“J.T. Miller is an experienced and versatile offensive contributor,” Canucks GM Jim Benning said in a release from the club. “This deal is about acquiring a player who can have an immediate impact on our top six forward group for term. The pick we’ve given is conditional meaning if we’re involved in the 2020 draft lottery, it moves to 2021 as a 1st round selection.”

So there are the terms of the conditional pick. It takes away some immediate risk for the Canucks. The 2021 pick, however, is not lottery protected.

MORE:
• Predators send P.K. Subban to Devils
• Hurricanes acquire Marleau, set to buy him out
• New Jersey Devils take Jack Hughes with No. 1 overall pick
• Rangers select Kaapo Kakko with second overall pick
• USA Hockey big winner of Round 1
• 2019 NHL Draft tracker — Round 1

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Scott Billeck is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @scottbilleck.

Lightning bounce Bruins from playoffs in five games

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By Scott BilleckMay 6, 2018, 6:24 PM EDT

41 Comments

The Tampa Bay Lightning will play for a spot in the Stanley Cup Final.

The Lightning earned a 3-1 decision in Game 5 on Sunday afternoon against the Boston Bruins, sending the Bruins into hibernation mode after taking the series 4-1.

The series will be largely defined by what the line of Brayden Point, Ondrej Palat and Tyler Johnson were able to accomplish after Tampa’s top line of Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov and J.T. Miller took a back seat.

Point scored his third goal of the series to erase David Krejci‘s first-period tally, slotting home after making a patient play around Tuukka Rask.

Point, who finished with seven points in the series, helped the Lightning rebound from their 6-2 Game 1 defeat with a four-point night, a performance that one could argue was a turning point in the series. The Lightning cruised from there, allowing eight goals during their four-game winning streak.

Point’s time-on-ice jumped by over two minutes from Game 1 to Game 5, and it was well-deserved.

Contributions from Tampa’s top line weren’t as relevant as they were against the New Jersey Devils. Kucherov had 10 points in that series but just two points in the second round. Stamkos had a pivotal goal in Game 4 to force overtime, but had only an empty-netter otherwise.

Miller made his presence felt in Game 5, first by knocking David Backes out of the game with a crushing hit in the second period, and then minutes later, offering up the go-ahead goal that stood as the game-winner.

Boston, meanwhile, couldn’t find much in the way of scoring outside of Game 1.

Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak combined four just four goals over the final four games of the series and secondary scoring from the Bruins was virtually non-existent, ultimately spelling the end to Boston’s season.

The Lightning now waits for the winner between the Washington Capitals and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Washington leads the series 3-2 after a 6-3 win on Saturday.

Scott Billeck is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @scottbilleck