Mike Gillis.. Worst GM in hockey today?

[Shiva Blaster]

Getting rid of that contract? They are paying $800,000 a year. Not to mention the recapture penalties if Lu retires before the deal is up. Lu makes basically 3.5 Million in salary in the last three years (2019-20 to 2021-22). If he walks away on those years, the Canucks are stuck with dead cap space of $2.8 million for 3 years.

Not to mention they could have moved him a year sooner, gotten a lot more back with having to pay less of Lou's salary and then moving forward with Schneider. He literally ****ed this one up as bad as one could, he essentially gave both away and still has to pay one of them. Wow, just wow.

[austeane]

Wow.
What vitriol.

He is not a terrible GM, far from it. How did that change from when he won GM of the year?

He planned this team to peak a couple of years ago, and it did. He helped get them within a game of the Stanley Cup. No, he is not a miraculous GM that manages to keep their team in contention forever... But few are: Detroit and NJ from yesteryear, Chicago now (possibly Pitt or Boston if you feel especially generous).

He inherited a team with terrible terrible prospects, and after a couple of years of bad drafting has formed quite the reasonable pipeline. He has three cheap young goalies competing for the number one spot. Markstrom was once the most hyped goalie prospect since Price, and it is certainly too early to give up on him when there are only 4 NHL starters under 26. Lack has done exceptionally well this year in a small sample size, and did well in the AHL and SEL. Eriksson put up ridiculous numbers in the SEL, and has been one of the better goalies in the AHL since the new year.

Getting out of that contract (especially if it was mandated by ownership) is something to commend. Especially when shoring up your team's centre depth and securing a prospect like Markstrom. Luongo has been a league average goalie over the past couple of years and this gives them a lot more flexibility in the years to come.
I don't see how trading a league average goaltender pushing 35 with a cap hit over 5 million (Vancouver doesn't care about actual salary near as much as it does about Cap) for that type of return is atrocious. The process to get there was not pretty, but the result wasn't bad. For those questioning the process, we have no idea what actually happened in any of these scenarios, or how much the ownership pulled the strings.

Even the Schneider trade wasn't bad. Horvat is a great prospect, and will serve the Canucks well in the future. I actually think one of his worse moves was signing the Sedin's to their extensions early this year during a hot steak.

Overall, this is a team that was built to peak in 2011-2013. They were smart enough to realize that, and now their prospects for 2015 looks pretty good. A terrible GM (ahem, Calgary, ahem) would have added rentals and ignored the need to rebuild. A terrible GM wouldn't have gotten good value for current players or restocked through the draft or just bunged up all the draft picks (ahem, Edmonton, ahem) leading to a decade of rebuilding. All signs point to a better future than that, even if Gillis won't be there for it. Give him Kudos for not falling into the trap of self-preservation and blindness that usually hits GMs in his spot.

Please do tell me how he ranks in the bottom third of GMs. How many in his company took a good core and guided it to Stanley Cup finals. If they had some success, how many of those other terrible GMs were able to restock the team's young talent like Gillis has (Lack, Eriksson, Tanev, Corrado, Stanton were all steals or young UFA signings and he has the first round talent of Jensen, Shinkaruk, Horvat, Markstrom as well).

Is he a great, top 5 GM? No, probably not.
Is he in the bottom third? No, I don't think so.

[Axeman33]

You all seem to forget, it was Gillis who signed Lou to that albatros of a contract so the pie still falls in his face. You can say "good for him" for ridding the franchise of that crappy contract, but it was Gillis who put them in that position in the first place by signing Lou to that deal.

[Dakkster]

Question should be whether or not he's reached Milbury territory yet.

Wow, exactly what are you smoking? He's not even close to Milbury territory. How jaded are you?

[austeane]

It seems that ownership forced his hand.

[islefan31]

Question should be whether or not he's reached Milbury territory yet.

Milbury and Snow territory. But Milbury did destroy this franchise.

- - - Updated - - -

Nobody is.

[reeveta]

I think you can question Gillis' stratagy but the once the new CBA came around getting rid of that contract is something I thought impossible. Getting anything back for it, even flawed pieces, is icing on the cake.

[STONE.]

You all seem to forget, it was Gillis who signed Lou to that albatros of a contract so the pie still falls in his face. You can say "good for him" for ridding the franchise of that crappy contract, but it was Gillis who put them in that position in the first place by signing Lou to that deal.

That contract didn't seem nearly as bad under the old CBA. The length was a loophole that'll now kick them in the ass, but that's not something Gillis could've foreseen.

[coldsquad2002]

Mike Gillis G.M. (Generally Mental).

[#1Sakic]

I really hate the way Lu got treated at Vancouver. This team was going nowhere until he arrived. He gave them a gold medal in their own town (!) and a dam good playoff run for the Stanley Cup final (!!) ... and still he was treated like SH*T.
It's make at least two seasons that they are going nowhere into the playoffs because of the none production of the twin'zzzzzzz ! What a shame ! Gillis is looking so stupid right now. Big contract for Lou, cant trade him... get ride of a top goalie prospect into Schneider and finally get ride of Lu ... for nothing.

A real shame ... a huge shame, if I was a Vancouver fan I will just burn my jersey right away in my stove.

[Shiva Blaster]

I think the way they handles the whole Luongo mess reflects extremely poorly on the Canucks. He was nothing but the consummate professional throughout all the drama, and they did nothing but jerk him around. I think this is going to have some long term effects on the organization in that a a lot of FA's (especially goalies) are going to avoid Vancouver like the plague with Torts running the show and how they've handled personnel.

[#1Sakic]

I think the way they handles the whole Luongo mess reflects extremely poorly on the Canucks. He was nothing but the consummate professional throughout all the drama, and they did nothing but jerk him around. I think this is going to have some long term effects on the organization in that a a lot of FA's (especially goalies) are going to avoid Vancouver like the plague with Torts running the show and how they've handled personnel.

Fully agree

Hope the fans of Vancouver are patient .... cloudy days ahead.

[Loch]

Fully agree

Hope the fans of Vancouver are patient .... cloudy days ahead.

Well it is the 'wet coast' so at least we are used to clouds.

[als_revenge]

Crying to the media like a lil b!tch every time you don't get a start is being a consummate professional?

[Spec7ral]

Gillis is a piece of work. No matter what he is planning he will not be around to see it come to fruition. Even with the morons that support the Canucks (life long Vancouverite, I experience the idiocy daily) and the Rose tinted glasses they wear (evidenced by posts in this thread), this city will not put up with a crappy hockey team for an extended period of time. It's the only ticket in town outside of soccer (!) and WHL. On the positive side, at least all the 1 percenters will be scalping their seasons tickets for the next couple seasons, so I can go see real hockey teams for cheap, as long as I don't mind paying 10 bucks for a dixieland Cup of beer and getting spat on and sworn at my Bridge&tunnel warriors from the burbs. #VancityLife

Gillis has gone from doing a commendable job, to managing people like cattle. No one likes working for someone as cold as him. It's going to get a lot worse before it gets any better and you can take a lot of NTC players out of the equation while him and torts are the tandem here. Good luck!