The Vancouver Canuck Essentials

So over at Yahoo Puck Daddy, he is having this ...submission thing i guess... where bloggers submit a factoid list/blog of their favourite NHL team called 'The Essentials'.  I like the idea and have decided that although i am a bit late to this party, and might not be considered in yahoosphere, I'd give it a shot if for no other reason than to entertain my hockey pool friends (those that can read, so that leaves out everyone whose name starts with the letters L through T).
I don't really know how Puck Daddy picks his contributors but it did give me a chance to work a bit on creating my own list of opinions of my love/hate relationship with the Vancouver Canucks.  So here it is;

Ogie's Canuck Essentials

note the packed lower bowl of the Pacific Coliseum as per
a usual Vancouver crowd in the 80's. 

Player  Stan Smyl.  A strong case could be made for Trevor Linden and even perhaps Markus Naslund, two players that have since passed ‘The Steamer’ in various team records but let’s face it; in their 40 year history, the franchise can be divided into two distinct time periods (let’s call them ‘then’ and ‘now’), divided by the worst signing in history since the Versailles Treaty (more on that later).  Stan Smyl is the one who escorted the old style out and brought the new style in.  He inherited the captaincy just days before the 1982 playoff run when then-captain, Kevin McCarthy fractured his ankle.  He helped push and punch the underdog Canucks to their first final against the mid-dynasty New York Islanders.  He endured the lean years, the numerous uniform changes, Quinngate, ownership changes and never pushed for a trade.  In his final season he took a young Trevor Linden under his (right) wing which indirectly resulted in the great Cup run of 1994.  After retiring as a player he became an assistant coach with the team and then head coach for their farm team.  He is still with the organization in the player development department.  Of note is that he is the last player to lead his team in goals, assists, points and penalty minutes all in the same year.  He also fought a total of 52 times, not bad for a guy listed as only 5’9.

Season  Talking regular season and not playoffs, it’s hard to argue that any season before this one was better; it was the second of back-to-back President’s Trophies; they had played more games in the last two years than any other team except the Bruins (who again didn't finish 1st in the league) and still managed to win it all a second time around, albeit with only three less wins than the previoius year.  That’s team dynasty territory.  Granted, the realignment has been nice to the Canucks, allowing them to play a few more games against non-threatening teams such as the oilers, flames, avalanche, wild; all in their division but still, that's a lot of days on ice.

Meanwhile...in Bizarro World...

I don't know what to say here. 

perhaps it's a portal to another dimension and this is the only way we will get to glimpse a Canuck actually hoisting the Stanley Cup.

I think i know who uploaded this to Youtube.  You probably do too.  But there are some serious questions that this footage brings up.  Like is it actually possible that there is some AI world out there where the Maple Leafs don't suck?  That they are actually good enough to push a 7 game Stanley Cup series with the President's Trophy winners?  That Kaberle is still with the team? 
And in an eerie premonition, that is Willie Mitchell holding the Cup and wearing the C for the Canucks.  Wait...oh ya, he wasn't re-signed.  Well, at least one part of that story became true. 

And Roberto winning the Conn Smythe. And Mats Sundin is there, and Pavol Demetra and Christian Erhoff and everbody pooped out happy rainbows in the dressing room.  They then went out and watched the Dark Knight Rises which turned out to be an excellent movie and the price of gas was only 25 cents a liter.

Seriously...F^^# That Guy

Mark doing what he does best.

Mark Messier, the man who crushed many a Canuck fans dreams has once again placed his boot on the face of the Canuck franchise, this time to the tune of $6 million.  A New York (go figure) arbitrator awarded the sum to Messier after he brought a lawsuit against the Canucks for...if i understand this right...not paying him a percentage of the value the Canuck franchise increased from the time Messier joined the Canucks in 1997 to the time he finished demolishing it in 2000.   

Say what you will, but this man knows how to write a contract.  I heard that when he signed with the Rangers the first time, there was a clause that he had to be in the top 3 highest earning players.  That means he admitted that he did not deserve more than Gretzky or Lemieux but basically, he was more valuable than anyone else.  So when Jaromir Jagr received a pay raise, making him 3rd highest paid in the league, Messier's contract automatically called for a raise to leapfrog him back into 3rd. 

And i think he was his own agent too.  Talk about the balls on this guy.  So when his contract expired with the NYR and the beginning of the new era of NHL 'super' stars; Bure, Lindros, Mogilny, Jagr emerged, he felt slighted that the Rangers would not again resign him to be the 3rd highest paid player in the league and so for some deep-seated hatred, decided to offer his services to whichever team would allow him to destroy Trevor Linden the most.  That team? The Vancouver Canucks. 

1. Anatomy of the '82 Canuck Drive

Once Upon A Time in Bizarro World

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.  Although it may seem laughable now but once many, many years ago, the NHL was ruled by two teams for a decade; the New York Islanders and the Edmonton Oilers.  Yes, it's true.  Karma does have a sense of humour. 

During the run and gun eighties, these two teams epitomized that winning the Cup took only determination and a great mixture of skill, toughness and access to cocaine.  The Islanders owned the early eighties, the Oilers the later half.  If you were lucky enough to be alive in the mid-late eighties, you were treated to two Stanley Cup Finals; the Battle of Alberta and then the other one against whatever poor team hobbled out of the Eastern Conference to  lose to either Edmonton or Calgary. 



I said "one of..."

It was different times then.  Vancouver, with their 'Flying V' uniforms were considered one of the ugliest uniforms in North American sports.  Their all-star selection was picked via lottery and their most boisterous fans could afford to pay for tickets and pretty much all rode the bus to the games.
However, right on the cusp of the Oilers transforming the game of hockey into ...this... the 1982 Vancouver Canucks became the Champions of the West; true underdogs that had the unfortunate task to try and beat the last great dynasty; the New York Islanders.  It was Vancouver's first modern-day quest of the Cup and was due to five factors;