The Vancouver Canucks get back into game action on Saturday after their five-day break, but holiday time is already winding down.
The Mexico contingent—which included Alex Edler, Loui Eriksson and (I think) Erik Gudbranson as well as Sam Gagner and Jacob Markstrom, headed back to Vancouver on Wednesday night.
Meanwhile, Derrick Pouliot made it down to Portland to take in a Winterhawks game on Wednesday...
...and Chris Tanev probably had the most uncomfortable holiday of all...
The Canucks will get back on the ice on Friday for practice—and will welcome back another injured player.
Horvat has now been absent for just over six weeks, so he's trending on the positive side of his timeline for recovery from his fractured ankle. It was expected that he wouldn't be back in action until after the All-Star Break but based on this update, maybe we'll see him in at least one of the three games over the next week.
While the players have been off the ice, the big topic this week has been the possibility that Ken Holland could come into Vancouver as the team's next general manager.
The spark that lit the fire was this Ed Willes column, which posted on Monday:
Willes fires up the discussion when he says "barring a dramatic turnaround in the next couple of months, it appears the status quo is no longer an option for the Canucks." He suggests that Holland would be an appealing choice for ownership because he's a B.C. native (from Vernon) and has championship experience (three Stanley Cups as GM with the Detroit Red Wings and one more as Assistant General Manager).
I have my doubts that this is a viable scenario. The Red Wings are currently sitting eight points out of a playoff spot, in serious danger of missing the playoffs for a second-straight year after their 25-season-run, so I can buy the idea that Holland's not a shoe-in to get another contract extension in his current position in Detroit. BUT...he's now in his 35th year with the team, starting as a Western Canadian scout after his playing days were over before moving up to become goaltending coach, assistant general manager and eventually GM during the 1997-98 season.
Holland's now 62 years old and has presided over what has largely been a period of great success for the Red Wings organization. Listening to some chatter out of Detroit, I've heard talk that he's expected to be moved to another position within the organization at the end of the season, where he won't be quite so hands-on.
That makes sense to me. I would expect that there would still be plenty of loyalty between Holland and the organization—even as the Red Wings wrestle with their rebuild as they're pushed right up to the salary cap ceiling under the weight of the NHL's longest list of contracts with no-trade and no move clauses.
Click here for the reminder of how that's looking, from CapFriendly.
Mike Green is one Red Wings name that's featuring heavily in trade deadline scenarios. The 32-year-old right-shot defenseman has 25 points in 44 games this year and has dialled his minus-20 from last season back to an even plus-minus this year. He'd be a valuable deadline acquisition, but he has a full no-trade clause to go along with his expiring $6 million-a-year contract. He'll be able to choose his landing spot.
So the idea of Holland coming to Vancouver is a two-pronged "No" from me. I don't think he'll be available, and I don't think an executive who has backed his team into its current roster pickle would be the best choice to shepherd the Canucks through the next stage of their evolution.
For now, all we get is this sort of non-news to keep stoking the flames:
I hadn't been sold on the idea that the Canucks are definitely looking for an experienced GM with a championship pedigree, but Willes sounds pretty sure on that front (unless, of course, Horvat's return spurs a Colorado Avalanche-like sprint up the standings over the next two months...).
If that is, indeed, the case, Dean Lombardi could be a more plausible target than Holland. Since being relieved of his duties with the Los Angeles Kings last summer, he has been working with the Philadelphia Flyers organization. He also spent time as a scout with the Flyers more than a decade ago, in between the time that he was fired as GM of the San Jose Sharks in 2003 and hired by the Los Angeles Kings in 2006.
But Lombardi sounded reluctant to get back into the GM's game when he spoke to
Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic back in November.
"I don’t even think about (a GM job) right now. … I can’t look at that, it’s not fair to Philadelphia in any way to think about those lines," he told LeBrun. "...There were a number of teams that called me (last summer) and these are guys I really like, but I had to look at the organization as a whole. I said to myself it had to be an organization that is totally committed to each other, totally committed to team from top to bottom and is passionate about that one thing. There’s no better place for that than Philadelphia."
As they approach retirement age, would a long-time exec like Lombardi or Holland be content to finish out his hockey years in a lower-stress role? Or would he be tempted by another kick at the can with a franchise like Vancouver?
When it's in their blood, it can be hard to walk away. Jim Rutherford had made the move upstairs after 20 years running the Hartford Whalers/Carolina Hurricanes at age 65 but didn't even make it through the summer of 2014 before he decided to give the GM role another go in Pittsburgh—then won two Stanley Cups in three years.
As we watch and wait, all we can do for now is loop back to Rick Dhaliwal's assessment:
"The story won't go away until the #Canucks provide some sort of clarity about Jim Benning's future."
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