Canucks Making Questionable Decisions On Futures Of Players

The Vancouver Canucks are in dead last in the NHL and aren't making the playoffs this season. Many believe that they won't be able to bounce back and come close again next season, and given their roster, that's easy to get on board with.

Vancouver has to look at dealing what they can and go into a rebuild, but that's tough when they are reportedly not that keen on moving players outside of those on expiring contracts. According to Thomas Drance, "Perhaps the Canucks surprise us and deal a veteran player with term remaining...although as we reported earlier prior to the trade freeze, the club isn't proactively looking to shed those commitments, even as they're listening on everybody."

While it doesn't make sense with where the Canucks are in terms of their roster, future, and place in the standings, this likely means they aren't looking to trade Elias Pettersson, Brock Boeser, Jake DeBrusk, Conor Garland, Filip Hronek, and maybe even Tyler Myers yet, although he would be on the fence given that he has one year remaining at $3 million AAV and right-shot defensemen are a little harder to come by.

All those players have trade protection, but there's also a feeling that it might not get much better. Two of the players, Quinn Hughes and Kiefer Sherwood, who both did good work in Vancouver, were traded. Hughes was under contract for next season and the Canucks got back Marco Rossi, Liam Ohgren, and Zeev Buium, but that fits better into a future a couple of years away when they're more developed and closer to their primes, not coming back and winning next season.

While the core of those veteran players could be considered solid, but not necessarily playoff worthy, when they're having good seasons, a lot more than just those players playing at their peaks is going to do it for Vancouver. Considering the term for all of them, the Canucks could be trying to close the gap with the young acquisitions and hoping they step up and the veterans bounce back, but Myers is still one player that should be traded as he's older and closer to his contract expiring. It'll open up a spot in the lineup for a younger player that should get a look at the stage the Canucks are at this season.