Every year, the pundits analyze the winners and losers of the NHL trade deadline, reflecting on the moves made and pointing to organizations that got stronger or weaker, as a result. This convention is valuable, to an extent, but it ignores the smaller effects these trades have on individual dressing rooms. Here in Vancouver, for example, we had a brief look at the impact Maxim Lapierre won't have as a member of the Vancouver Canucks, but the impact he will have remains to be examined. Even within the locker room, these small moves have created winners and losers.
But who, exactly, are they? We ask you (rhetorically, as we already have an answer ready), who's the winner?
Tanner Glass.
Glass deserves a win too (especially after his recent public defeat at the hands of a blogger who will remain nameless... and sexy). All year long, Glass has been the only regular on the 4th line, a line that's shuffled young, inexperienced players in and out, with a focus on development. Its been good for the prospects, but the lack of consistent linemates has foisted leadership and defensive responsibilities onto Glass that, while welcome, have mitigated his individual game and his icetime.
Sure, he continues to get penalty kill time, but when your coach doesn't really trust your linemates in tight game situations, you're not jumping the boards too often at even-strength unless it's a blowout. Glass recently admitted playing with the inexperienced Cody Hodgson could be nerve-wracking, and you have to think that, if he felt this way, coach Vigneault felt similarly. As a result, the 4th line saw sheltered and sparing minutes during Hodgson's brief stint with the big club.
Things changed at the deadline, however, when Gillis went out and, effectively, bought Glass a complete line. The acquisitions of Chris Higgins and Maxim Lapierre give Glass two NHL-calibre players to play with. They push the Canucks to 12 deep at the forward spot, and allow them the option to roll four lines. That should mean more minutes for Glass and less time covering for inexperienced linemates.
The evidence is already showing. In Lapierre's second game with the Canucks, Glass skated for over ten minutes, nearly double what he got during Cody Hodgson's three-game pre-deadline stint.
Glass would never say it, but I suspect he's pumped.
Plus, if Lapierre's as big a douche as some say he is, Glass is going to have to fight for him. Said Glass, "Hopefully, he chirps a bunch and I can get in more fights." More fights with humans? This can only be a plus. I have to imagine recreational bare-knuckle bear boxing is probably not a Canuck-approved activity.
Without Yannick Tremblay's one goal, the Canucks would still sit at 9999.
In case you missed it, Daniel Sedin's third period goal Wednesday against the Calgary Flames was the 10,000th regular-season goal in Canucks' history. These 10,000 goals were scored by 354 different players over the Canucks' forty-year history, and I'm sure we can name more than a few of the guys. Markus Naslund. Trevor Linden. Stan Smyl. Thomas Gradin. You know, the stars.
But any stat sheet, let alone a list of goalscorers, is incomplete without a perusal of the cellar-dwellers. In this case, the one-goal guys. Some might say they're not important, but that's crazy talk. Without the one-goal guys, the Canucks would be sitting at 9,957.
That's right. Of the 10,000 goals, 43 have been scored by guys who only got one. Today we honour them. It's not exactly a who's who (more of a "who?"), but there are some interesting names on this list. Some remain active NHLers. Some are memorable. Some are long forgotten. Some will surprise you. Here they are, the one-goal guys, in alphabetical order:
Shawn Antoski
Kris Beech
Alexandre Bolduc
Mario Bliznak
Mike Brown
Colin Campbell
Michael Christie
Larry Courville
Troy Crowder
Jim Dowd
Neil Eisenhut
Rory Fitzpatrick
Robert Flockhart
David Fortier
Lee Goren
Randall Gregg
Martin Grenier
Jim Hargreaves
Ed Hatoum
Stewart Holt
Sheldon Kannegiesser
Zenith Komarniski
Jason Krog
Frantisek Kucera
Mike Lampman
Tim Lenardon
David Logan
Brad Lukowich
Len Lunde
Brad Maxwell
Aaron Miller
Stephane Morin
Martin Rucinsky
Tommi Santala
Dan Seguin
Brad Smith
Fred Speck
Mike Stapleton
Yannick Tremblay
Lubomir Vaic
Claude Vilgrain
Aaron Volpatti
Jim Wiste
Do any of the names on this list surprise you? I'm a bit taken aback to see Colin Campbell's name on there. Sometimes I forget he was a Vancouver Canuck. That said, Campbell did score two very valuable playoff goals for the Canucks during their 1982 Stanley Cup Finals run.
It's interesting to note that the players from the Gillis era are guys that will likely get another before things are all said and done. Some of the names from the Nonis era make me sad. Kris Beech. Yannik Tremblay. Aaron Miller. Martin Rucinsky. Tommi Santala. I guess I shouldn't be surprise Lee "No-Scorin" Goren made the list. His inclusion here is explained by his nickname. Rory Fitzpatrick gets a pass because he was an All-Star defenseman.
I remember Shawn Antoski well. The Canucks drafted him 18th overall in 1990, just ahead of Keith Tkachuk and Martin Brodeur. And this is where he ended up. And you wonder why Canuck fans can be pessimistic.
What do you have to say for yourselves, Canuck fans?
Here are a few ridiculous superstitions in which I firmly believe: If you suck out on someone in poker, you will be rightly punished with bad card luck for a while; Hiccups can be cured by asking the person if they own a white horse, and their answering "no," but only if they know that doing so is a cure for the hiccups; The Goo Goo Dolls cover of the song "Give a Little Bit," when played in the car loudly, dispels traffic jams; and, all NHL teams have a historical character that, if honored, will bring success, and if abused, will act as a curse. This last, I credit with much of the recent success of Mike Gillis's Vancouver Canucks.
The idea of historical recognition being important to success seems silly, but like most superstitions, it can be justified with what Dogbert called the best evidence of all -- anecdotal evidence. The Pittsburgh Penguins -- the team of Lemieux and Jagr -- weren't successful again until they brought in some flashy superstars in Crosby and Malkin. The Flyers of late weren't a force until they became the Broad Street Bullies again. Recall that they were the most oft-suspended team in their comeback season. The Devils' adding Kovalchuk shouldn't have hurt the team at all on paper. Even in the worst-case scenario of his being a horrible player spending all his time on the fourth line, the team is still deep enough that they should be in playoff contention. Still, they've got a strong belief in New Jersey that the team is bigger than the individual, and Kovalchuk's contract and lazy defensive play fly so in the face of that idea that the team doesn't have an identity anymore. The same thing happened with the Dallas Stars when they signed Sean Avery. The same thing, honestly, happened to the Canucks when they brought in some guys who were more about themselves than they were about Vancouver.
It's weird to talk about Canucks history, when I've experienced so little of it. During the '94 run to the Finals, I was seven, and all I remember is my drunk uncles yelling at the television. I'd imagine it was also weird for Henrik Sedin hanging out with Orland Kurtenbach for all those photo shoots and talking about what he meant to the franchise. The Sedin twins were born six years after Kurtenbach retired. Still, from the interviews you could tell Henrik knew his stuff, and that's good, because respecting the team's history is important.
This 40th Canucks season has brought intermission segments about the inaugural season of the team, and they've been a real treat. I know I'm not the only one who's enjoyed hearing talk about how the team was originally built with players who believed strongly in being competitive, who really hated to lose. The character of that first Canucks team set the tone for the franchise. From season one, the team's been all about competitiveness and character. The great Canucks haven't all been flashy, but they've all had heart.
What excites me most about this team is that they fit that model so well. As I noted earlier, there are no prima donnas on the team. No one puts himself before the team, everyone buys into the Canucks' game plan. That's a good model on any team, but it's more important for the Canucks than it is for the Thrashers, the Capitals, the Rangers, and others. Some rules in New York are understood not to apply to Sean Avery, for instance. The Canucks simply could not handle that as a team.
The 2010 playoffs were an eye-opener for Mike Gillis. It's doubtful he's as superstitious as I am, but give Gillis credit for learning more quickly from his mistakes than any other GM out there. His first season, he said while the playoff ouster by the Blackhawks was tough, he could see that speed from the back end was what the Canucks needed, and he's definitely brought that in. The 2010 ouster was less easy to pinpoint, but mostly it seemed the Canucks imploded because they just couldn't stay disciplined. Discipline was a problem against L.A. and it was death against the Hawks. The moves Gillis made in the off-season were mostly character moves. They went from just being a tough team to being a competitive one.
The Canucks of this season care a lot less about being hard to play against and a lot more about being hard to win against. Gone are the players who, for whatever reason, couldn't seem to think of the team first. This has its clear advantages in the reduction of stupid penalties, in renewed focus and all that. But it also has its advantage in being what the Canucks are supposed to be about. Offense, defense, grit and whatever else are second to the strength of the group as a team.
Again, this is the 40th season of the Canucks organization. The city's gone 40 years without a Cup, and that sucks. There are so many guys in Canuck history who, in their dedication to the team, and to the city, deserved to win the Cup. It wouldn't feel right if the Vancouver acquired some flashy superstar glory-seeker and won the Cup on his shoulders by doing things his way. It would suck because it doesn't respect the great tradition set by Kurtenbach, Smyl, Linden, Naslund, and other Canuck greats. That wouldn't happen, though, because the Canucks aren't a team that can win like that. That's not what Vancouver's about.
What convinces me most that the team could win it all this year is that it feels like they should. The theme for the 40th season has been honoring the past, and that's been far more than a marketing scheme. Moreso than some teams in the past, this feels like a Canucks team. If a team's going to win one for Linden, for Smyl, for Naslund and those guys, I'll be glad if it's this one. That way, it won't just be their year, it'll be Vancouver's year, from this season all the way back to the first.
