It’s so (frank)ing stupid. Why do they even have bag skates? Is it the early 90’s 🤷‍♂️
- CanuckDon

Green

It’s so (frank)ing stupid. Why do they even have bag skates? Is it the early 90’s 🤷‍♂️
- CanuckDon

its just the old school meat and potatoes coaching mentality I guess. I agree, its so dumb and pointless. Not only is the concept dumb, but with the media and fan access, Green has to know that the media are going to pick apart who does well and scrutinize who does poorly. We hear about who does well and who does awful and who barfs every year and its so dumb.

A guy my wife works with, his entire family caught Covid. They were treated medically, but were not offered any other services unless they signed a waiver they'd get vaccinated once eligible.

The 20 year old was sick for two weeks, about a week of it pretty badly. Same with his sibling. The parents still aren't back to work and they got ill mid-August.

A guy my wife works with, his entire family caught Covid. They were treated medically, but were not offered any other services unless they signed a waiver they'd get vaccinated once eligible.

The 20 year old was sick for two weeks, about a week of it pretty badly. Same with his sibling. The parents still aren't back to work and they got ill mid-August.
- golfingsince

wishing them all a good recovery though.

Toronto Blue Jays

Sounds like Hamonic getting vaccinated isn’t a done deal. Could be in the market for another RD still.

Sounds like Hamonic getting vaccinated isn’t a done deal. Could be in the market for another RD still.
- 1970vintage

Canucks will need the extra capspace to sign Elias and his buddy to identical 11 million contracts😉

Canucks will need the extra capspace to sign Elias and his buddy to identical 11 million contracts😉
- Reubenkincade

Two players on 8 year $88m deals would be very lucky, that’s a lot of 8’s.

It’s so (frank)ing stupid. Why do they even have bag skates? Is it the early 90’s 🤷‍♂️
- CanuckDon

Just wait for the groin injury reports to start.

- VANTEL

Your new Avatar?

OJ puts OEL to shame in bag skate and not in a good way.

I think players whose first names start with the letter O should be exempt from bag skates

https://twitter.com/i/status/1441136863071277061





- VANTEL

its just the old school meat and potatoes coaching mentality I guess. I agree, its so dumb and pointless. Not only is the concept dumb, but with the media and fan access, Green has to know that the media are going to pick apart who does well and scrutinize who does poorly. We hear about who does well and who does awful and who barfs every year and its so dumb.
- Codes1087

Disagree, by now everyone knows what to expect, even the new guys. If they struggle as much as OEL or JoeLevi did they deserve to be called out by media, fans, coaches and teammates. This poop builds accountability among your teammates and I guarantee OJ is on thin ice because he was both unprepared and then acted like a female dog on the ice. I don't think it means they are done or bad players but I think it is a good move by Green.

Disagree, by now everyone knows what to expect, even the new guys. If they struggle as much as OEL or JoeLevi did they deserve to be called out by media, fans, coaches and teammates. This poop builds accountability among your teammates and I guarantee OJ is on thin ice because he was both unprepared and then acted like a female dog on the ice. I don't think it means they are done or bad players but I think it is a good move by Green.
- belcherbd

Ya I agree. I see it more as a litmus test to how you prepared over the summer and if you took the job seriously versus what you're actually capable of/where your conditioning will get to.

Disagree, by now everyone knows what to expect, even the new guys. If they struggle as much as OEL or JoeLevi did they deserve to be called out by media, fans, coaches and teammates. This poop builds accountability among your teammates and I guarantee OJ is on thin ice because he was both unprepared and then acted like a female dog on the ice. I don't think it means they are done or bad players but I think it is a good move by Green.
- belcherbd

Just listening to a couple of different media clips from 650 and they had first hand account of OEL's bag skate. They are claiming it's not as bad as fans are saying. Quote "out of context" because he was at the very end of his skate and others still had more laps to go when these pics/clips were selected. Twitter warriors lost their poop anyways. OJ on the other hand...


Garland puked behind the net apparently...

Just listening to a couple of different media clips from 650 and they had first hand account of OEL's bag skate. They are claiming it's not as bad as fans are saying. Quote "out of context" because he was at the very end of his skate and others still had more laps to go when these pics/clips were selected. Twitter warriors lost their poop anyways. OJ on the other hand...


Garland puked behind the net apparently...
- boonerbuck

Just read an article on SN about Garland puking said he used to run cross country a lot so is used to it... can either barf and feel better or hold it in a feel like poop.

Ya Faber posted another clip of OEL – said that bad one was his last bag skate, the other videos of his earlier one he's just in the pack of players.

Green
- VANTEL

Its a motivational tool like doing the grouse grind. Plus he likes his players to be in top condition to run and gun or chase the puck.

Its a motivational tool like doing the grouse grind. Plus he likes his players to be in top condition to run and gun or chase the puck.
- NuckUp

Just read an article on SN about Garland puking said he used to run cross country a lot so is used to it... can either barf and feel better or hold it in a feel like poop.

Ya Faber posted another clip of OEL – said that bad one was his last bag skate, the other videos of his earlier one he's just in the pack of players.
- NewYorkNuck

People are so quick to jump to conclusions based on so little.

Sounds like Hamonic getting vaccinated isn’t a done deal. Could be in the market for another RD still.
- 1970vintage

That is interesting . Canucks signed Schenn in case they didn't get Hamonic and a day later he signed or the other way around I forget. Both similar players and Schenn looked very good with Rathbone yesterday.

I am not sure there is a 2 mil gap in the style of play between Hamonic and Schenn.

Myers looked okay yesterday but his contract is a lot.

Its a motivational tool like doing the grouse grind. Plus he likes his players to be in top condition to run and gun or chase the puck.
- NuckUp

I find the bag skate entertaining as hell. It is fun to see who will lose their cookies and who will pull an OJ. Aside from that who cares. As someone said everyone knows it is going to be there and if you are not prepared then it is on you.

Poolman and OEL looked like a good pairing yesterday and the bag skate was just for our deprived enjoyment.

That is interesting . Canucks signed Schenn in case they didn't get Hamonic and a day later he signed or the other way around I forget. Both similar players and Schenn looked very good with Rathbone yesterday.

I am not sure there is a 2 mil gap in the style of play between Hamonic and Schenn.

Myers looked okay yesterday but his contract is a lot.
- VANTEL

Myers gets more then Schenn, Poolman, and Hamonic because he also brings RSD offence. But agree at an overpay.

Myers gets more then Schenn, Poolman, and Hamonic because he also brings RSD offence. But agree at an overpay.
- NuckUp

He had a nice top corner shot yesterday .

He had a nice top corner shot yesterday .
- VANTEL

post a clip

(Trigger Warning) From Shmomas Shmrance at the Shmathletic with good quotes about the bag skate:

After 100 or so minutes of fast-paced practice time, with a 10-minute break or so for a scrape of the ice, it begins. Players wearing blue in one end, players wearing white in the other. Canucks head coach Travis Green skates down to the blue end to kick off the drill, barking out some final instructions for the uninitiated.

Canucks players train all summer for this moment. It’s a separator, an opportunity for the fittest, fastest players to show off what they’re capable of. They have 40 seconds to skate four lengths of the ice, up and back, which is why the bag skate drill is called “The 40s skate” by Green and his coaching staff. They complete this task on four occasions.

Some players shine in the event, particularly the very strong skaters who have done the drill previously. Philip Di Giuseppe, Nils Höglander and William Lockwood were among the standouts who absolutely crushed their groups.

“I take a lot of pride in that,” said Lockwood. “Part of my game is being a good skater, I know the staff wants me to be in good shape, so I did a few of those over the summer and it made it easier today.”

Other intelligent veteran players, who have done the drill for many years now, know exactly how to game the skate. And that process begins earlier in the day, when they put it in cruise control through the lengthy Day 1 training camp practice that precedes the infamous bag skate drill. These players — Tanner Pearson, Bo Horvat, Tyler Myers, J.T. Miller — have the 40s skate down to a science.

Green weights the performance of the skate heavily in evaluating the fitness level of his players, but he also grades on a bit of a curve.

“It’s a tough skate, but a lot of them have done it a lot of times,” Green said Thursday. “New players probably struggle with it a little bit more because they haven’t done it. Guys that have been here, they know what’s coming. Again, I’ve seen the skate done a lot of times, so you learn a lot about what a guy has done over the summer to get ready particularly if they know it’s coming.”

For the new guys, the skate can be a slog. Aside from Di Giuseppe and perhaps Luke Schenn — surprisingly enough — none of Vancouver’s new faces covered themselves in glory during the 40s skate Thursday at the Abbotsford Centre.

That’s no surprise to those that know the skate best, like Henrik Sedin — who did the skate as a player and is now in his first season as a special adviser in Vancouver’s hockey operations department.

“It’s so tough, there’s a lot of talk about who didn’t skate well, but it’s all the new guys,” Sedin told The Athletic on Thursday. “If you’ve never done the skate before, you’re in trouble, it doesn’t matter what shape you’re in. If you’ve done it before, you know how to pace yourself a bit better during practice. For me, it was no surprise, you saw the guys who had a tough time and it was the new guys.”

To a man, the new guys struggled most.

“Enlightening,” was Jason Richardinson’s surprisingly thoughtful response when asked to summarize the 40s skate experience in a word.

“I don’t know that the preparation in the summer can exactly get you ready,” he said. “You do an hour and a half, an hour and 45 minutes with a lot of pace and a lot of intensity. In the summer you try and replicate it as best you can, but the lactic acid that builds up, until you do it, you don’t really understand how it feels in real time.”

Conor Garland, after the skate meanwhile, was talking to teammates casually when, out of seemingly nowhere, he rushed to the back of the net and proceeded to vomit.

“If you ever feel it, a lot of people try to hold it in,” Garland said of losing his lunch. “I just let it go because then you feel better 20 minutes later instead of feeling like crap all day.”

Garland has the reputation of an absolute workaholic in the offseason, but at the end of the day, he made just about every mistake Thursday that the veteran Canucks players know to avoid.

“It’s definitely a hard skate especially for somebody with my speed and short, stocky legs,” Garland said. “It was hard, but I got through it, more mental through the last half of the third one and then it was all mental in the fourth one.

“You just gotta get down (the ice) another time, you lie to yourself. The two guys to my right were real fast. I’d never done it before in a group so I was trying to keep pace with them and that’s not really what you should do so I kind of tired myself out on the first one.”

As for Oliver Ekman-Larsson, well, his struggles in the 40s skate went viral, as he began to drag in a major way for his final two lengths after he kept up with his group through most of the drill:

To fade late, even this dramatically, isn’t something the organization or any veteran players that know the skate well will be concerned about. If anything it’s a reminder for Ekman-Larsson that he’s not in the desert anymore, but that’s about it.

Even if you’re concerned about Ekman-Larsson’s mobility, which has been in decline in recent seasons, this isn’t cause for concern.

“He did three ones really easily and then the fourth one, he didn’t, but he’s a new guy, he’s never skated it before, you saw all the other guys that are new and they were struggling too,” said Sedin. “I know fans and media are going to pick up on it and talk about it for a week, but there’s really nothing to talk about.”