Vancouver Canucks: Can Jim Benning take the Canucks to the next level?

The Vancouver Canucks have signed general manager Jim Benning to an extension. How does this affect the Canucks, who are looking to improve this season?

For the first time in a while, the Vancouver Canucks have hope for the future. They’ve got a young team filled with budding young players and they’ve got one of the best prospect pipelines in the NHL. A lot of this is due to general manager Jim Benning. On Friday, Elliotte Friedman reported the Canucks have rewarded him with an extension.

The team has yet to confirm this and there’s no word yet on how long the extension is. Benning’s deal was going to expire at the end of the 2019-20 season, so it makes sense to extend him rather than let him go through the season as a lame duck.

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Benning has served as the Canucks general manager since the summer of 2014. After the team made the Stanley Cup Playoffs in his first year as the GM, they have yet to make it back to the postseason since.

Why It’s Good For The Canucks

The Canucks haven’t been good under Benning. But to be fair, they were rebuilding. Benning has undeniably done a terrific job drafting. He has added players such as Jake Virtanen, Elias Pettersson, Brock Boeser, Thatcher Demko, Adam Gaudette, and Quinn Hughes via the draft.

On top of that, Benning has added other prospects, including Michael Dipietro, Guillaume Brisebois, Olli Juolevi, Jett Woo, Tyler Madden, and Kole Lind. The Canucks needed to rebuild and he’s certainly set them up well for future success by drafting.

Why It’s Bad For The Canucks

However, it’s fair to ask if Benning is the right general manager for Vancouver moving forward. Despite having a rebuilding team, he has spent money on free agents like Loui Eriksson, Tim Schaller, Antonie Roussel, and Jay Beagle.

The Canucks are committing a cap hit of $13.9 million between those four players. If you include Tyler Myers, that’s $19.9 million. Schaller, Eriksson, Roussel, and Beagle are bottom-six forwards at best. Two of them are likely going to be sent to the minors. Before this offseason, it wasn’t really hurting them too much. But now it is.

Currently, the Canucks have about $5 million of cap space, according to CapFriendly. However, that’s with 14 forwards and eight defensemen. Sending down Tim Schaller and Loui Eriksson will save them $2.15 million. If Alex Biega gets sent down, that saves them an additional $825,000 giving them a shade over $8 million.

However, the Canucks still haven’t signed restricted free agents Brock Boeser or Nikolay Goldobin. $8 million might not be enough to sign both. And even if it is, it will be extremely close to $8 million. There are other moves they could do to create a little bit more, but the savings would be tiny.

Frankly, this is an indictment of Benning. There’s no reason the Canucks should be in this kind of salary cap predicament. They are far from the only team with cap issues, but most of the teams with cap issues are legitimate Stanley Cup contenders. The Canucks are a team who haven’t made the postseason in the past four seasons.

Benning has done a lot of good things for the Canucks. Their prospect pool was barren when he took over in 2014. Now the Canucks have one of the best prospect pools in the NHL, even after graduating guys like Pettersson, Demko, and Hughes.

However, Benning hasn’t shown he can make the necessary moves to turn the Canucks from a promising young team into Stanley Cup contenders. If anything, his recent moves in free agency have hurt their chances.

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Usually, teams take advantage of when guys like Pettersson and Hughes are on their entry-level deals. They’ll surround them with talent and try to win while their stars are cheap. The Canucks don’t have that option thanks to Benning.

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