It’s been a good few months for Jim Benning: he had an excellent trade deadline, fired an unpopular head coach, avoided a long-term contract with Erik Gudbranson, and came out of the NHL Entry Draft with some promising prospects. Whatever communication issues he’s had, his actions, for the most part, have signified a movement towards properly rebuilding the Canucks rather than the half-hearted retooling of the past few years.
Benning has earned some goodwill from many of his detractors with these moves, but it could all come undone in a hurry in free agency. Now is not the time for a long-term, big-money contract. Heck, last summer was not the time for a long-term, big-money contract.
The Canucks have reportedly contacted player agent J.P. Barry about Karl Alzner and Jordan Weal. Alzner is exactly the type of player the Canucks should avoid: a 28-year-old, one-dimensional and overrated defenceman likely looking for a lucrative long-term contract.
Weal, on the other hand, is exactly the type of player the Canucks should target in free agency: he’s young, he has a limited NHL track record that will keep him cheap, and he has the potential to become a legitimate part of the Canucks future.
Weal will be visiting Vancouver as he makes the rounds of the free agency negotiating period and Jim Benning may have a leg up on other GMs: Weal is a native of North Vancouver and can likely see a clear path to a roster spot on the rebuilding Canucks.
He’s a smart, playmaking forward capable of playing at both centre and on the wing. He’s a strong skater, has great vision, and possesses an accurate wristshot with a quick release. He’s got a high-end hockey mind, but his hockey body isn’t quite so high: he’s listed as 5’10”, but is closer to 5’9”.
If the Philadelphia Flyers wanted Weal to be a restricted free agent at the end of his contract, they needed to play him in 66 NHL games last season. Players 25 and up who have played three professional seasons without playing at least 80 NHL games become Group IV unrestricted free agents.
Instead, the Flyers didn’t even get him into an NHL game until February and he played just 23 games.
In that limited action, however, he made an impression, scoring 8 goals and 12 points, a 29-goal, 43-point pace over a full 82-game season. That kind of production would have been good enough for fourth on the Canucks last season behind Bo Horvat and the Sedins.
There’s no guarantee, of course, that Weal could keep up that scoring pace over a full season or would be able to put up the same kind of points for a lower-scoring team like the Canucks. But there are several reasons to be optimistic about Weal’s chances.
The first is that Weal has been outstanding in the AHL, scoring at just short of a point-per-game pace over the last three seasons. Last year for the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, he scored 47 points in 43 games. In the 2014-15 season, he was the Calder Cup MVP, leading the AHL playoffs in scoring with 10 goals and 22 points in 19 games.
That on its own doesn’t prove anything — there are plenty of players who put up points in the AHL, but can’t cut it in the NHL — but Weal’s performance with the Philadelphia Flyers suggests he is a legitimate NHL player.
Weal put up his points while averaging just 14:18 in ice time per game and 11 of his 12 points were at even-strength. That production in limited minutes gave him the best points-per-60-minutes of any Flyer at even-strength.
It wasn’t just points for Weal, as his underlying stats were also superb. He led the Flyers in corsi percentage, fenwick percentage, shot percentage, and goal percentage. Whenever Weal was on the ice, more often than not the puck was in the opposition end of the rink and frequently ended up in the opposition net.
The bulk of his excellent 55.8% corsi comes from his offensive numbers, a team-leading 63.77 shot attempts for per 60 minutes of ice time, but his defensive numbers are nearly as sparkling. His possession statistics paint a picture of an offence-driving forward who doesn’t hurt you on defence.
There are some pretty big caveats here, before you get too excited. First, this is all coming from a pretty small sample size. He’s got a long track record in the AHL and a very short one in the NHL; there’s no guarantee that his strong back half of the season with the Flyers will continue.
Second, Weal spent most of his time last season on a line with Claude Giroux and Wayne Simmonds, where he played on the wing. Those are two very good forwards and, while it’s a good sign that Weal is capable of playing with that kind of talent, it suggests that he may not be the one driving those high possession numbers.
Third, while he improves the possession numbers of everyone he plays with, he was also sheltered, getting a high rate of offensive zone starts. You can see that in two ways: you could say they put him in a position to succeed and take advantage of his offensive skillset, or you could say they protected him from disaster because they didn’t trust his defensive ability.
And finally, he had a 16.3% shooting percentage, which ranks as one of the highest in the NHL. Very few NHL players can maintain a shooting percentage that high and it is, perhaps, a sign that his point production was influenced by some good fortune. At least one of his 8 goals came absolutely gift-wrapped from Craig Anderson, for instance
Even with those caveats in mind, Weal is an excellent free agent to target: a relatively young player with high potential, yet low risk as he’s unlikely to command an exorbitant contract. At worst, he’s the equivalent of Linden Vey without trading away a second-round draft pick to acquire him. At best, he’s a 25-year-old, top-six winger that helps the Canucks get a jump start on their rebuild.
