Why the Canucks should make a trade and give young forwards more opportunity
SOURCE:The Athletic|BY:Harman Dayal
The Canucks have a logjam of forwards that deserve playing time, and there aren't enough lineup spots to go around.
Jake DeBrusk watched the Vancouver Canucks’ 3-2 shootout win on Monday against the Seattle Kraken from the press box as a healthy scratch. There’s always buzz when an established player gets scratched, but this was far from a controversial call.
DeBrusk, who’s scored nine goals and 17 points in 37 games, has had a disappointing season. The speedy 29-year-old left winger has just one goal at five-on-five this year. His underlying defensive numbers have also declined, as colleague Thomas Drance pointed out. DeBrusk’s shift-to-shift impact has been quiet — he hasn’t been disruptive on the forecheck, hasn’t been physical and hasn’t driven play in a meaningful, consistent capacity.
Adam Foote had every reason to park DeBrusk in the press box for a game as a reset. But this decision wasn’t just about DeBrusk; it was also influenced by the team’s need to get Nils Höglander back into the lineup.
Höglander, who has played six games this season due to a lower-body injury, had sat out three consecutive games before Monday night. Yes, the scrappy, pint-sized Swedish winger’s impact was muted in his first five games, but he wasn’t a liability either. More importantly, any player who missed all of October and November deserves slack to shake off the rust and get back up to speed. Höglander, especially, deserves an extended opportunity because he was one of the club’s best wingers in the second half of last season.
Foote probably felt he needed to reinsert Höglander against Seattle, and there weren’t obvious answers for who to take out. Linus Karlsson and Liam Öhgren have performed well. Drew O’Connor is having a productive campaign and scored recently against the Sharks. Kiefer Sherwood and Conor Garland are two of the team’s top scoring players. Some fans wanted to see Evander Kane scratched, but he’s played noticeably better lately.
Foote can sit DeBrusk as a one-off. Maybe Brock Boeser could be next at some point if he doesn’t pick it up. Long-term, though, the Canucks can’t make a regular habit of scratching high-paid veterans with significant contract term remaining.
This brings us to a broader situation that Vancouver’s front office needs to address soon: The Canucks have a logjam of forwards that deserve playing time, and there aren’t enough lineup spots to go around. It may sound silly to suggest that the 30th-place team in the league has surplus NHL-calibre forwards, but it’s true nonetheless. There’s zero doubt that Vancouver has a desperate shortage of high-end forwards that would be top-six players on contending teams, but the organization is overflowing with credible third- and fourth-line players.
By my count, there are 13-14 healthy forwards on this team who have a case to be regular NHL forwards. This surplus has resulted from a combination of early-season acquisitions (David Kämpf, Öhgren and Marco Rossi) and internal improvements (Linus Karlsson and Max Sasson). And it doesn’t even factor in the possibility that Filip Chytil, who skated with the team in a non-contact jersey last weekend, could return to the lineup within the coming weeks.
Red denotes players not on the active roster, either because they’re injured or in the AHL.
An essential task for any rebuilding or retooling team is to identify which players in their early-to-mid-20s should be part of the club’s long-term future and which ones are expendable. It’s imperative that the Canucks gather as much information as possible about these players so they can make the most informed decisions about their respective futures. This forward crunch needs to be addressed because a few players stand out as deserving more minutes and a more consistent look.
Let’s start with Höglander. The 25-year-old is fast, tenacious and skilled. He’s had stretches where he’s shown legitimate top-nine impact, such as the 2023-24 campaign, where he scored 24 goals. He also scored the most five-on-five points of all Canucks players from Jan. 1 until the end of last season. He had stellar play-driving numbers, too, with Vancouver controlling nearly 58 percent of expected goals and outscoring opponents 22-9 during his five-on-five shifts in that stretch. But it’s also true that Höglander’s defensive lapses can frustrate coaches, as he ended up in both Bruce Boudreau’s and Rick Tocchet’s doghouses.
At some point, the Canucks need to either commit to Höglander as a long-term fit in the top nine or trade him and recoup assets, as Columbus did with Yegor Chinakhov, which netted them a second- and a third-round pick. Even if the Canucks have hypothetically soured on Höglander and don’t view him as a long-term fit, wouldn’t it be best to staple him in the top six and juice his trade value?
The wrong approach would be for the Canucks to keep yo-yoing him in and out of the lineup and play him limited bottom-six minutes. That scenario doesn’t provide the Canucks with any clarity on whether Höglander should be part of the team’s future, and it reduces his trade value if the club ever decides to move on from him.
Vancouver needs to figure out exactly what Aatu Räty means to the franchise’s big picture as well.
The 23-year-old Finnish centre is already an elite faceoff man (he’s won nearly 61 percent of draws this season), is two points back of the Canucks five-on-five scoring lead and his underlying two-way metrics are sturdy. Does Räty have some defensive warts? No doubt. However, he shouldn’t be averaging fewer than 12 minutes of ice time per game and was a frequent healthy scratch in December, before returning to the lineup against Seattle. This lack of opportunity is especially concerning because Vancouver’s centre depth should deepen significantly with Rossi’s arrival, Elias Pettersson’s return from injury and Chytil’s possible return.
Now is the time for the Canucks to test Räty’s game with meaningful ice time and gather as much information as possible. An everyday role with slightly elevated minutes would help the team assess whether he could develop into a low-end third-line centre in a potential best-case scenario. Hypothetically, even if the team isn’t sold on him as a long-term fourth-liner, a bigger role would at least help him showcase his game to the rest of the league, allowing the Canucks to maintain his trade value and flip him elsewhere. Leaving Räty in the press box as often as the Canucks did in December accomplishes none of those things and risks taking the shine off his reputation and upside to the rest of the league.
The obvious solution is to limit Kämpf’s minutes (he sat out against Seattle). Maybe the Canucks feel it’d be wrong to trade Kämpf only a month and a half after signing him. It’s also possible that there wouldn’t be much leaguewide interest for a player who’s made a marginal impact anyway. But even if there isn’t a feasible trade opportunity, the Canucks shouldn’t hesitate to sit Kämpf out as a healthy scratch for long stretches. Kämpf, who’s days away from turning 31, has been a replacement-level player and is meaningless to the Canucks’ long-term plans.
Karlsson is 26, so he isn’t exactly young, but he’s another player who deserves more ice time over the remainder of the season. Karlsson is on pace for 20 goals despite averaging just 10:20 per game. He leads the Canucks in five-on-five points and has posted sterling two-way numbers. Karlsson’s ceiling probably isn’t that high because of his limited foot speed and age, but his net-front scoring touch, small area skill, board work and intelligence are probably worth a look further up the lineup.
At the bare minimum, Karlsson shouldn’t be consistently dropping below 11 minutes of ice time. He’s played fewer than 11 minutes in three consecutive games despite scoring six points in his last six games. Karlsson needs a new contract this offseason; it’d behoove the Canucks to test him in an expanded role and be more certain about his upside/value heading into those negotiations.
Öhgren, who’s shown some interesting flashes, was promoted up the lineup and played 13:13 against the Kraken. Previously, his ice times had ranged from seven to 12 minutes. It’d be great if the Canucks could give him a long runway in the 13-14 minute range to see if there’s more offensive growth.
Vancouver also needs to eventually create an opening for Jonathan Lekkerimäki, who has scored six goals in nine AHL games. He’s currently injured, but the Canucks would likely prefer to carve out an everyday NHL role for him at some point in the second half.
To be clear, I’m not suggesting the Canucks should trade all their veterans and that every single one of Höglander, Karlsson, Öhgren and Räty should be in the top six playing 16-17 minutes per game. However, all four of the aforementioned players should be in the lineup every game and play more than 10-11 minutes, which isn’t the case right now. I’d argue that the solution is for the Canucks to trade an expiring forward or two soon rather than wait until closer to the trade deadline.
After the March 6 trade deadline, the Canucks will only have 20 games remaining in the regular season. That isn’t a large enough sample to evaluate Räty, Karlsson, Öhgren and Höglander effectively, especially since many of those games will be meaningless in the regular season’s garbage time.
It’s easy to draw the wrong conclusions about players’ future value if you’re judging them based on small samples late in the season. Remember how excited the fan base got about players like Jack Rathbone and Akito Hirose, who showed flashes in small samples late in seasons, only for them to flame out? If the Canucks make a move or two now, they can leverage the entire second half of the season to experiment with, develop and evaluate their internal talent.
A Sherwood trade is the no-brainer move that the club should consider making sooner rather than later. Sherwood will command a massive raise in his next contract, and as a soon-to-be 31-year-old, he doesn’t align with the Canucks’ timeline. He should have a ton of trade value because his profile (scoring at a 25-goal-per-82-games pace since last season, a physical, high-energy playing style and a dirt-cheap $1.5 million cap hit) is universally appealing.
Holding onto Sherwood until closer to the deadline introduces some risks. Because the standings are so compressed right now, teams are still somewhat reluctant to wave the white flag and become clear sellers. As the deadline nears, some of those teams will begin to fall out and start selling, making new players available to buyers. This would give teams interested in a middle-six winger options beyond Sherwood. There’s also the worst-case fear that a player as belligerent and aggressive as Sherwood could get hurt.
The Canucks would also be wise to consider expediting a trade to move on from Kane, Vancouver’s other notable pending unrestricted free agent. Moving Kane early might be challenging; he’s a more polarizing player and locker room fit, has some contractual trade protection and may end up being a team’s plan B or C option closer to March rather than its first-choice target. It’d be helpful to trade at least one of Sherwood or Kane early, though.
With Phillip Danault, Mason Marchment and Chinakhov all traded within the last two weeks, the NHL’s forward trade market is beginning to defrost. Hopefully, the Canucks can find an appealing opportunity to trade one of their older forwards for a solid return and begin giving less-experienced players with upside greater opportunities to develop and prove their worth.
Elias Pettersson
Conor Garland
Brock Boeser
Jake DeBrusk
Marco Rossi
Kiefer Sherwood
Evander Kane
Drew O'Connor
Linus Karlsson
Nils Höglander
Max Sasson
Aatu Räty
Liam Öhgren
David Kämpf
Filip Chytil
Teddy Blueger
Jonathan Lekkerimäki