The Vancouver Canucks have a less than 5 percent chance of making the playoffs this season, so it is expected that General Manager Jim Benning will be selling a lot in the upcoming days. While there were already rumors of Radim Vrbata and Dan Hamhuis being on the outs, TSN's Bob McKenzie posted that Benning has let the rest of the league know that he is selling much more than the 34-year-old Czech and the 33-year-old defenseman.
VAN has let other 29 teams know they are open for business on: Vey, Bartkowski, Kenins, Cracknell, Higgins, Prust and Weber.
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) February 24, 2016
Linden Vey and Ronalds Kenins are both set to become restricted free agents at the end of the season, and Matt Bartkowski, Adam Cracknell, Brandon Prust and Yannick Weber are all pending unrestricted free agents. Chris Higgins has a year left on his deal, but the Canucks stated earlier in the month they were attempting to trade him, according to McKenzie.
While the recent trade of Hunter Shinkaruk to the Flames for Markus Granlund was a surprise, and makes it seem like the team is trying to become more competitive, it is important to remember that the Canucks are very much focused on the future.
"We're not going to sacrifice pieces of our future to augment the team at this point," said Trevor Linden, the Canucks president of operations, earlier this month, according to Sportsnet's Thomas Drance. "If we can get younger and get faster then that's what we want to be."
The Canucks are most likely not looking to get a bevy of draft picks from selling, as this "generally hasn't been the organization's style during the Benning era," according to Drance. They will most likely want to add a young defenseman.
"If there was a young defenseman that fit, that had some development time, that could be able to step into our lineup sooner than later that could be an option as well," Linden said in mid-February, according to Drance.
Benning tried to do this with the Shinkaruk trade, but it did not work the way he planned.
"We tried [to get a defender for Shinkaruk]," Benning said Monday. "We identified throughout the league some good young defensemen who we would trade him for. I made the calls. The general managers there didn't want to part with these defensemen so we decided that this was the next best road for us to go."
With their focus on young defensemen, it is not surprising Benning's list of available players are all over 25 years old or forwards. While Hamhuis or Vrbata are not on the list, with no talks for an extension, they will also most likely be traded.
