OffThePost.org

My prediction is that Ballard will not be benched tonight. Playing the wing on the third line with Gordon and Wies, hopefully he can't screw up defensively enough on the wing to get stapled to the bench. Liking the 2nd line of Schroeder, Raymond and Hansen. Will like it even more when it is the third line again and Kesler, Booth and Higgins are back.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Tanev with the goal. Steps up into the open lane and wrists it in. You know as weak as his shot is his hockey IQ is so good defensively I have to assume as he matures we're going to see more of those in the future. He should be really excellent at stepping up on the rush.

And very nice play by Raymond to get back and disrupt that breakaway. Why did we ever want to trade him? And by we I mean tCL

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Haha are you ghost writing these days?

@FarhanLaljiTSN: Things I thought I'd never say: How can the #canucks possibly move Mason Raymond?

I'd trade him now, I think this is as good as he gets. My feeling last year was he came back way too soon. Lost far too much muscle mass with the broken back and should have spent 8 more weeks putting on weight. He just got knocked around like a little kid. As small as he is he just couldn't afford to play any lighter. He had 8 months to pack on muscle and I expected him to perform well and have the weight to enter the dirty areas and not fall down.

Having said that, players lose a lot of mass over the season, and it's hardest on the little guys, I don't think he'll ever be better than he is now. So now is the time to trade him. If not then who else? The one I'd most hate to see leave would be Hansen as close to untouchable as we have but I'm sure the one most GM's want. The player I most want is Brandon Dubinsky so we have to give something up. It'll be Raymond and a prospect I'd think.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

Speculation is that he won't resign with us so I'm with you.

tied for top scoring Canuck forward. Don't want to see him go.

I still think it's a bit much to pay Burrows $6 million next season, but to each his own. The cap hit is around $4.5 million so I suppose that's in line with what his market value would be.

May-Ray should probably be re-signed, but for how much? He's already making over $2 million. You willing to pay a whole lot more for him?

Here's a PITB entry (don't know whether it's been posted yet) on Raymond:

http://vansunsportsblogs.com/2012/03/19 ... n-raymond/

Looks like it predates his recent resurgence, take it for what it's worth.

One thing's for sure--I don't envy Gillis this offseason. It's times like this when you need some cheap young talent via the draft. He doesn't really have that option. I think it comes down to what he gets in return for Luongo and Ballard.

6 million is a lot for clubs like the Av's but for rich clubs it's all about the cap hit and at $4.5 he's reasonable for what he does. In Burrow's case he's been grossly underpaid for years so front loading it was just a way to reward a loyal employee who been receiving hind tit for a long time. Good organizations find little ways to look after their employee's or in other words they do the exact opposite of what you're used to with the AV's.

I'm thinking $3.5+ mil for MayRay in his next contract which will make it hard if not impossible to sign both him and Higgins even with Ballard as a buyout. Higgins on the other hand is having an off year so he might be the better of the two to resign. Having said that, with all the top teams looking to pare their payroll that may have a deflationary affect on mid tier contracts and keeping both may be possible but doubtful. Nobody will know until the off season what new middlin contracts are really going to look like.

And you're absolutely right about the importance of having farm talent as cheap young labour. We have Schroeder, Jansen, Kassian and I think Connauton will be required whether ready or not as they just will not have cap room to fill with vets. That list is pretty thin, assumes that all four will work out and leaves absolutely nobody else on the farm as a call up. Pretty risky way to run things.

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Shoresy, "It's called a sweater"

I see what you did there. Touche.