Probably time for the Benning/Brackett era to end

One player.
35 picks.

That's the cold, hard reality of what Benning and Brackett have done as draft gurus.

Right?

You can't really argue with that.

Pettersson who can't stay healthy.
Boeser who's so hot and cold it's ridiculous.

They haven't been picking 29th like Mike Gillis.
The comparable is Pat Quinn.

Quinn picked Bure and Mattias Ohlund 5th round and 11th overall.

Just those two players put anything Benning and Brackett have done to shame.
You can't argue with that.

And Gillis was guessing. He got Bo Horvat at 10th. That's pretty good. The rest of the time he was either not picking in the 1st round or out of the top 20.

But at some point you do need to fill in the Top 6 picks with 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th round picks from the NHL draft.

Benning/Brackett got Adam Gaudette, who was picked at the 5th spot, and he has 2 goals now this year and may turn into an NHL player.

But is he Mike Peca? No.
Is he Matt Cooke? No.
Is he Ryan Kesler? No.

I mean, come on folks.

Who are you kidding here?

Ultimately it's the owner of the Vancouver Canucks who has to make a decision on Benning and Brackett. But if it was me - they'd be gone, yesterday.

And I'm not saying they're not good people. I'm not saying they're not decent at their jobs.
But if you're rebuilding a team you have to HIT on 2nd and 3rd round picks and they're just not.

I look at the Utica Comets and it's a joke quite frankly.

Mike Dipietro played goalie for the World Junior Canadian team recently, he's a Benning pick, and he's playing well, but on the other hand, 2018 was the first time Canada hasn't got a medal on home turf in forever, and he was the goalie. Can he play in the NHL ? Who knows ?

Thatcher Demko played in Utica and did what? Exactly? Nothing.
And played one game last year - was lit up at the NHL level.

Is he a NHL player? Who knows ?

The shine has come off Quinn Hughes, the 7th overall pick of Benning/Brackett last year. At the World Junior Championships he was... meh.

He was described as "I don't know what he is..." by most commentators.
TSN analyst says, "He may have some issues with defensive coverage."
Since Hughes is a defenseman that's a pretty big issue.
And offensively he's shown diddly squat.
The college team he's playing on is meh. Meh.
There were reports that Canucks thought about signing Hughes after the WJC to get him in to Vancouver asap - that's a red flag to me. That says, we need to salvage this. That's alarming.
(And by the way the "franchise" 1st overall pick for 2019 Jack Hughes looked pathetic. Whoever gets that 1st overall will probably trade it away because it may not be a pick that can help).

2018 2nd rounder Jet Woo didn't even make the WJC.
The rest of that draft is a toss out.

2017 draft Pettersson and ??? There's no one you could say is a lock for even an AHL spot. In fact Gadjovich who they picked 2nd round can't make the AHL.

2016 draft - that's gone.
NADA
Nothing.
THEY HAVE NOTHING FROM A 2016 NHL DRAFT WHERE THEY PICKED 5TH.

2015 draft - Brock Boeser who I was really high on - then I'm not.
I don't know what the hell to make of Boeser now.
I thought he'd turned the corner - turned into a legitimate NHL scorer.
Then he's not.

2014 draft - Jake Virtanen and ? Demko was in that draft. Mmmm hmmm. So ?
McCann they traded.
Nikita Tryamkin was a player - and they didn't cash up and he walked. $5 million/year he's still here and obviously I wasn't in the room, I don't know for sure, so I'm guessing here, but I'm thinking $5 million/5 years he's still here.

That 2014 draft was actually pretty good.
But that was run by a guy, Eric Crawford - whom was fired.

2013 draft - Bo Horvat - Mike Gillis
2012 draft - Ben Hutton - Mike Gillis
2011 draft onwards they're picking 29th so I'm not criticizing that at all.

You get to the 20th place in a NHL draft first round you're guessing.

And so when I compare Benning / Brackett just to Gillis I can see that Gillis drafted better.

Why?

Gillis was picking outside the Top 9 - he has Hutton and Horvat on the roster.

Benning/Brackett have picked INSIDE the Top 9 5 years in a row - they have Pettersson, Boeser and Virtanen.

I'm sorry but that's a ridiculously bad track record of drafting.

Virtanen is progressing. I like him... but boy oh boy he's leaving a lot to be desired.
Boeser is ... ???
Pettersson is constantly hurt.

And so then what? What have you actually got here? Out of 5 years of high, high NHL picks - a single impact player? That's it?

You add that to the fact that Benning hasn't created a safe working environment for his kids (Pettersson) and for me it's an easy decision to fire Benning and Brackett.

If I have $800 million tied up in a business I NEED TO HIT IN THE NHL DRAFT. I can't have 1 for sure player in 5 years of drafting. I just can't. I NEED IMPACT PLAYERS in those top draft picks.

And while the 1st round picks from Benning/Brackett have been ok - the 2nd round picks and onwards are a black hole. And Boeser, Virtanen, Pettersson is okay. It's not great. It's not abysmal. It's okay. It's average.

But the black hole ...

Hell, at least Gillis had Hutton in the 5th round.

If I'm realistically looking at the Benning/Brackett era it comes down to those 2nd and 3rd round picks and I'm seeing nothing there.

You can't just pick in the Top 5 and hope to rebuild a franchise.

The last 5 games without Elias Pettersson has exposed management for what it is - a bad drafting NHL team because there's nothing there. The cupboards are empty. They STRUGGLE to score goals, thus they've been shutout 3 of last 6 games.

It has to be better than that.

And while I a wrote a book about the fact that you can't rebuild through the NHL draft anymore - the Canucks are taking it to an extreme.

You should be able to pick capable plumbers in the NHL draft to help fill in the roster.

When Benning signed Beagle and Roussel and Schaller to me it was a red flag that management suspected they had nothing in the pipeline.

If they think there's a red flag there - you probably should too - and so should ownership.

Sutter and Roussel and Eriksson and Beagle and Schaller should have been pushed off this roster by now by kids coming from those 2014, 15, 16 drafts.

And they weren't.

And looking at the team without Pettersson and it's bad. It's really bad.

That's Edmonton Oilers bad.