Chapter 1: What is the Vancouver Canucks' current coaching search process?
Sportsnet 650, Vancouver.
No idea what this music is, but welcome back to Canucks Talk Sportsnet 650. Jamie Dodd, Thomas Drance. We're live from the Kintec studio. 650, 650 is the Dunbar Lumber text line trusted by contractors and DIY champions across Metro Vancouver for generations. Find them at three convenient locations or visit Dunbar Lumber online today. Dom, it's called Sports International. Okay.
And I was watching NBC on NBA, and they have a very orchestral intro, and I was like, you know what we're missing on Sportsnet 650? More orchestral music. Sounds presidential. Remember the first Canucks hour intro? It was like a new stinger. I do, yes.
I do remember that. Remember those days? Yeah. There's a bit of a throwback here. Remember the NBC NBA theme? Yeah. Well, it's back. We don't have to remember it. They're using it. Round ball rock, Drance, is what you're referring to? Yes.
I am, of course. And have you seen the skit, the Tim Robinson skit?
Basketball. Yeah, exactly.
Gimme, gimme, gimme the ball because I'm so good.
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Chapter 2: Why might the Canucks promote Manny Malhotra directly?
Don't care.
Love that. Yeah.
Should we just talk about Wemby? Should we end the show just talking about Wemby?
Let's talk Knicks.
You guys see that comeback? Yeah, but it's like they're playing for second place, though, so it's not as cool as Wemby.
The alien Wemby versus Chet, who should be the best center in basketball, but For Wemba and Yama.
Although Chet, Chet, my big takeaway from watching game one is Chet does not have that dog in him and he's got to find it in a hurry. I was, I wasn't even guarding Wemby. No. And there was like multiple times where there's a loose ball on the floor and he's just kind of like half, halfheartedly reaching for it. It's like hit the deck, bro. Come on.
playoffs it's the western conference finals i don't think i don't think you have the experience of hitting the deck at seven foot one brother well whatever you gotta do what you gotta do i think it's a little bit different for that dude
Okay, that's fair. He's also in the NBA. Sometimes you got to dive for the ball, buddy. I do think the best thing to come out of that game is Ramona Shelburne at ESPN had the chance to write like one of the greatest sports profiles of all time about tracking down the Shaolin monk that Wemby trained with and interviewing him about that. That's pretty great. That's not bad.
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Chapter 3: How important are trust and familiarity in coaching decisions?
Henry Abbott tweeted this about Jason Kidd, who was recently fired by the Dallas Mavericks. I covered Jason Kidd when he played for the Nets. I know one of his childhood friends. I've been to his house, met his kids, his then wife, and his Pilates instructor. And I have insight from many people who worked with him in his coaching years. This is a great firing quote. It's pretty tough.
It's pretty tough. Truly one of the funniest things I've ever read on Twitter.
Yep.
Like I lost my mind.
That sums it up. I know this person intimately and it was the right call to fire them. Let me tell you.
Truly remarkable stuff.
All right. Enough about the NBA. Let's go to the whiteboard.
All right, fellas, let's focus up.
It is your daily deep dive into what's up with the Canucks for today, May 20th. And we'll start with the headlines. And I guess it is the Canucks search. And I have search and quotation marks in my notes for a new head coach is on.
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Chapter 4: What insights does Trevor Linden provide about the Canucks' front office?
Sure. But like things happen in the course of a negotiation. Right? So by saying it's simply a matter of negotiation doesn't mean it's a lock. It means that we're probably jump-starting or leaping, like fast-forwarding directly to the negotiation process here, at least with Manny Malhotra. And then if that goes off the rails, then the process could expand.
I think that's right. I think that's right and fair and accurate. Yeah.
Yeah, because really, I mean... And look... Go ahead.
I mean... the fit is right, the trust is there. When Ryan Johnson was describing his ideal coach, he might as well have been like, well, I like a coach whose name is Manny and whose last name is Malhotra. And it helps if they have a third overall pick, prospective son, and if they were a former teammate of the Twins, hired to be assigned to be an upgrade over me as a player.
That's really the type of coach that I want.
Even in the presser yesterday, right? First, he's asked about the qualities he wants in a new coach. And it's, you know, well, they have to be able to work with young players and really create a connection. And then later it's like, you know, with Manny Malhotra, he really showed that he can work with young players. He created a connection with that team.
It's like, okay, you're literally checking the boxes off. Like as you speak about Manny Malhotra. And so, I mean, like nothing we've heard over the last 24 hours, I think has pointed us away from that.
Who's your ideal coach? Well, someone named Manny M. No, wait, that's too obvious. M Malhotra.
Yeah. And I was also thinking about this and, you know, we won't, I won't play the clip because I think a lot of our listeners have probably heard it. Right.
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Chapter 5: How does organizational alignment impact coaching choices?
But Trevor Linden, of course, former Canucks president of hockey operations was on Canucks central yesterday with sat and Beck. And, uh, He talked about one of the things he said that he thought would set the Sedins up for success was the ability to present a united front to ownership with the fact that they're on the same page and aligned with Ryan Johnson.
And of course, as Trevor Linden said, he didn't have that. And we all know how things ended. with Trevor Linden and Jim Benning and Linden exiting the organization. He also said he didn't think Patrick Alvin had that. So some very interesting commentary from Trevor Linden. And I think when you think about it in that light of because we've had some people texting in like, hold on a second, right?
You know, the Sedins went with Ryan Johnson because they're familiar with him over Evan Gold. Now they're going to hire Manny Malhotra. at least in part because there's that familiarity. And I understand that perspective. I completely get it, right? Like, you don't want people to necessarily just hire, like, hey, I've known this guy for a long time, so we're going to work together.
But I was actually thinking about it in light of that Trevor Linden quote. In the Canucks organization specifically... knowing that you can trust the guy that you're bringing in is really important. Like it really goes a long way to know we are ride or die with this guy and he will have our back and we are on the same page. And yeah, we might really like outside candidate X, but,
But the fact that we don't know him as intimately as we do Manny Malhotra is actually could be an issue because part of the project here, and this goes back to a conversation we were having earlier, part of the project is the ability to continue to sell the rebuild to ownership. And if everyone's on the same page and no one is getting itchy, it becomes a lot easier to do that.
I do wonder how much that's factoring into the decision-making process here of let's go get RJ because we know him. And now maybe let's go get Manny Malhotra because we know him.
Yeah, I mean, you know, familiarity is easy to roll your eyes at, but you know, you are truly in Vancouver, not just because of internal organizational dynamics, but because of the situation they inherit and how grim it is. Like you're inviting a guy into the foxhole with you. Like flat out, that's what's up, right? Like, hey, come join us in risking our legacy. Like that's what's up.
There's nothing negative with accurately describing the size of the task, the enormity of what this group of gentlemen is taking on.
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Chapter 6: What are the implications of the Canucks' draft strategy?
Right? I mean, the chances of success here are very small. And the chances of criticism are very high.
They've been pretty upfront about describing it.
Yeah. I think they've been extremely upfront.
Yeah.
you gotta be clear eyed right now. Like that's, this is the time to be clear eyed and like really think through what you've taken on here, what you've bitten off, because it's a lot. I mean, it's a lot. And yeah, Yeah. So, I mean, I think familiarity is a perfectly reasonable thing to prioritize in this situation. And then you get to the internal dynamics factor and how much that matters.
And, you know, at the end of the day, familiarity always plays a role in hiring, no matter what. If you are familiar with someone's work and you know and trust them, like trust is one of the most important currencies we've got.
Yep.
you know, like as people, like as a species, trust is kind of everything. And so I don't have a problem with that being a very, very influential factor. I also don't have a problem with this team, not casting a wide net in identifying their next head coach. You know, for me, the truth is, is that like considering a Craig Berube or a Bruce Cassidy, like no, it doesn't really make a ton of sense.
It doesn't make any sense. You know, that's, No, this team should be, I think, looking for an American League head coach with, you know, a guy who's had success at the American League and is young and can grow with an emerging team. That's Manny Malhotra.
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Chapter 7: What trade-back offer from Calgary could benefit the Canucks?
I agree. And also, just in general, like, I'm... I'm way more proponent of the big search for the GM than I am for the coach. Like, in certain situations, it's totally fine to do the search for the coach, but it's also totally fine to promote your AHL coach. Like, that's a very normal part of the NHL for a reason, right? You have an upfront view of how they're doing their job,
There's continuity. You like them. Put them in place. That zero issue whatsoever with going about it that way. Now, we heard from Ryan Johnson yesterday and we played his presser on our show in the final segment. Didn't have a ton of time to react to it after the fact. Part of his messaging was, you know, Tammy Granato, Emily Castonguay. Nothing's changed with them. Todd Harvey.
Big vote of confidence for him as the director of amateur scouting. You know, some recognition that they'd like to bring in more voices, but by and large, a lot of the same faces are going to be here in the front office for the Vancouver Canucks. How do you interpret that, Drance? Because on the one hand, I think...
you know, I would love to see some more outside voices brought in and that could still absolutely happen. I also wonder, you know, to get back to Rick Dollywall's favorite hobby horse and the dead money, if part of the calculation here is we've kind of used our paying people not to work bullets right now and maybe we'll Go with this front office for a year and reassess in a year.
And somebody texted in, I don't have it in front of me, but basically, you know, rebuilding the front office and rebuilding the organizational infrastructure, that could be more of a long-term project as well, as opposed to something that gets done in the next six weeks here.
We need like a dead money true crime podcast for the Vancouver Canucks.
I mean, look, Rick has been all over that beat for a long time.
No, I'm not even talking about Dollywall. I'm just talking about, like, we should do, like, segments where we, like, highlight the dead money. The dead money. Yeah, like, dead money. Like, they were on their way home from a frat party.
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Chapter 8: How can the Canucks leverage their draft picks for rebuilding?
When? Anyway. Okay. Sorry, I lost my train of thought. I was too excited about the dead money.
You were thinking of the Ilya Mikheyev retention.
Well, I was wondering. 100%.
I was wondering, like, The whole people have. Here's the question. Is part of this as part of the fewer changes than may be expected in the front office is part of the calculation. The fact that they've already used so many of their we're already paying people not to work for us bullets. Right.
Like, let's let's keep our power remaining powder dry and maybe we'll explore more changes down the road.
Maybe, maybe, I don't know yet. I don't have a really good sense of that yet. Or maybe, you know, is it, I mean, Adam Foote, 1.5 million USD, like that's a pretty significant salary. He got a good payday for a first time head coach when the Canucks gave him that job. So yeah, I mean, I'm not sure. Like I'm not exactly sure how the internal budget might sort of factor into this.
I guess what I'd feel more comfortable suggesting to you at this juncture, is i am at least a little bit concerned that the rate of change here is insufficient you know especially the amateur scouting and you know it didn't help that the defense of the amateur scouting staff to me was like the seventh rounder who they picked when their list ran out you know ty mueller
who's basically got the same statistical profile as Danila Klimovic, right? Like he's 23.61 points per game as a 22 and 23 year old in the American league. Like Klimovic is a .57 and we all talk about him as this tremendous bust. It's identical. It's an identical profile. Now they're not identical players.
Like Mueller's obviously doing a variety of other things that the staff likes and he can play center and, you know, the odds of a 0.61 score 22 and 23 in the American league becoming an NHL regular is 5%. Right. I mean, and then Elias Pettersson, like with the way his season went, you know, you know how high I am on Elias Pettersson.
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