Wednesday, July 05, 2006

What If...

Man, I'm addicted to what-if's... I've spent way WAY too much time parusing the canucks forum. That's an even bigger waste of time than frickin' video games!!! GAHH....

That being said, here's my new hope for the Canucks next season:

Nits' (New and Improved!) Projected Canucks 06/07 Roster: [in millions]

Sedin Line:
LW Daniel Sedin $ 3.575
C Henrik Sedin $ 3.575
RW Mattias Weinhandl $ 0.8

Nassy Line:
LW Markus Naslund $ 6
C Brendan Morrison $ 3.2
RW Mark Bell $ 1.0

Kesler Line:
C Ryan Kesler $ 1 (?)
LW Matt Cooke $ 1.5 (?)
RW Trevor Linden $ 0.8 (?)

Interchangeable 4th Line:
C Brandon Reid/Tommi Santala $ 0.5 (?)
LW Alex Burrows/Tyler Bouck $ 0.5 (?)
RW Jason King/Jesse Schultz $ 0.5 (?)

Defensemen:
D Willie Mitchell $ 3.5
D Mattias Ohlund $ 3.5
D Sami Salo $ 1.5
D Luc Bourdon $ 0.8 (?)
D Lukas Krajicek $ 0.65 (?)
D Kevin Bieksa $ 0.45 (?)

Goaltenders:
G Roberto Luongo $ 6.75
G Mika Noronen $ 0.65 (?)

Total Cost: $40.75 million

Heheh, how's this for realistic you guys... at this rate, we could possibly pick up a decent 3rd liner... but anyways, onto my explanations...

G Roberto Luongo --> First off, it's gonna be $6.75m against the cap and not $6. Apparently it's the avg. of the contract that goes into the cap calculation and not what the player actually makes that year. Anyone who read the canucks forum knows this already... and it's all over the place, not just this thread...

RW Mattias Weinhandl --> This guy tore it up in Sweden w/ the Twins, automatic chemistry... gah, just read this... so yeah, I'm thinking a 3rd round pick for this guy, possibly an upgrade to one of the 2nd rounders from the Cloutier trade, or possibly a good prospect or something. VERY doable, and he's super cheap... SO PERFECT.

RW Mark Bell --> Perhaps the new power forward that could help us fill the Bertuzzi void? Many people on the forums are high on this guy, and I'm starting to jump on the Bell bandwagon myself... he performed admirally on a sub-par team with so-so linemates; he could so up his numbers playing with Naslund and Morrison, eh? Plus, the youth/cheapness looks good to boot... perhaps, trade for King + prospects (i.e. Schneider/Ellis-Plante/Vincent, as we don't need many prospect goalies?)

C Tommi Santala --> Apparently Nonis is very high on this guy. Same with Jesse Schultz. I'm too lazy to link to forums where Nonis said this though.

RW Trevor Linden --> Yeah, I know, he's not a 3rd liner, but whatever he's filler at the moment... switch him with King if you want. Our 3rd/4th lines blur anyways. Oh, and RW because we have no friggin' right wings, AT ALL.

Now, this is definately not my superb fantasy roster or whatever, just a realistic sampling of what the future Canucks could look like. I mean, Bell could easily be replaced with Afinogenov, Hartnell, and (if we wanna take chances w/ prospects) Eric Fehr... yeah, the Eric Fehr that topped the WHL a few years ago... plus, he's Washington's property, and apparently they don't have many goaltending prospects after Kolzig's gone... PLUS, Toronto was able to trade Rask for Raycroft, and Fehr is unproven (i.e., not impossible trade)... but man I'm rambling now...

Anyways, yeah. Disagree to your heart's content you guys!

Until next time, I guess...

2 Comments:

Blogger Gautam said...

What about Mike Grabner? The guy has insane speed and skill. I am not sure if he'll be playing in the NHL next year, but if he is, then we definitely need him.

I am not entirely sold on Bieksa being our 6th d-man either. I think he's more of a liability than of anything else.

I'd like to have Weinhandl with the Sedins but I doubt we'll have Mark Bell on our first line or even on our team even though he's good. I think we should spring for someone extremely speedy like Geoff Sanderson or something. Aside from that I think it looks decent unless I can nit-pick on it some more.

12:47 a.m.  
Blogger bj_nitsuj said...

Grabner basically has no defence, and he readily admits that (i.e., the "I know I need to work on my game" quotes). But yeah, in a few years, the 2nd coming of Bure!

Bieksa is another one of those "cheap guy from the Moose", could be any one of 'em...

Bell is highly replaceable in this roster. Now that I think about it, Nonis is probably waiting until Arbitration is over before he starts signing more guys, as it's almost assured some teams will be walking away from the rulings. Or at least that's the vibe I'm feeling on the forums...

12:40 p.m.  

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