Je viens de voir un article dans lequel Markstrom était sur Spittin’ Chiclets et il leur a raconté une histoire à propos de lui et de Jet Black Jim. Markstrom a joué la moitié d’un match à San Jose et c’était un match incroyable. Après cela, Benning est allé le voir et lui a simplement dit : « Nous allons te renvoyer, tu es trop bon si nous te gardons maintenant. »
Il a ensuite été placé sur la liste de renonciation pour le faire descendre et heureusement, il n’a pas été réclamé et a passé le reste de la saison avec les Comets d’Utica.
Quand j’ai lu ça, j’ai pensé que c’était typiquement Benning, mais ! Y a-t-il une raison logique pour laquelle c’était une bonne idée ? Ou était-ce le cas de Benning étant Benning ?
Acclamations.
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g_tan
8 Comments
I’m old enough to remember the uproar from fans every time the Canucks made any move that’s wasn’t tanking.
Maybe Bim Jenning was on team tank afterall?
It gave us a free development year for him, not sure why you’re hating on him for one of his few good moves
Man, I am bursting with salt for Benning, but this was actually a good move. We couldn’t have kept him up that year, and if we had sent him down much later, he would’ve gotten claimed. JB also purposely kept cameras away from his games so that he wouldn’t be on other teams’ radars.
This, along with Vanek, were IMO the only objectively smart things Benning did in 8 years.
They sent him down with the first big wave of cuts across the League that year. It basically forced opposing teams to decide if they wanted to blindly take a flier on Markstrom with limited game footage. Most teams likely wouldn’t have done so since 3 goalies at that point in time was unheard of, and if Markstrom didn’t excel in their Training Camp it would have just been a waste of everyone’s time when they would put him back on Waivers.
Essentially if the Canucks kept him around and played him more, it increased the chances of us losing him to someone else.
Probably important to note too that his stock as a prospect was up in the air. Whatever they were doing in Florida at the time was not a good match for him. That year in the AHL with us helped rebuild his game.
If the team had kept him up that year he wasn’t ready for the NHL and you’d have ruined his development and we’d be talking about how Benning ruined Markstrom’s career (see: DiPietro, Rick). It was a risky move done right that paid off.
it was a gamble but it paid off in the end. markstrom got an extra year to work out the kinks that were keeping him from being a full-time starter. the canucks didnt want to lose him and felt nobody would actually put a claim in and they were right. it worked out well for everyone including markstrom.
thing about markstrom is he always had talent and at one point was considered one of the best goalies not in the NHL as a young goalie. he didnt dominate right away and struggled a bit when he came over. by the time we had traded for him a lot of the luster surrounding him and worn off. he still had the talent and with work he could maybe become something, but it wasn’t a guarantee at the time. really hard to argue that waiving him was the wrong call given that markstrom ended up becoming a great starter and we got some really good years out of him.
Even back in florida at least one guy thought he was better than Brodeur or Price.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjoCVe8Ijb8
I’ll take a flyer on what Benning was thinking. Marky was the clear third stringer. He is too good to not be playing, meaning ice time, and he wasn’t going to get that if he stayed in the NHL.