As was kind of expected, the Canucks sent both Michael Grabner and Cory Schneider down to the Manitoba Moose today, keeping both Sergei Shirokov and Cody Hodgson with the big club for now.  Lawrence Nycholat and Brad Lukowich were both placed on waivers.

It’s not that big of a surprise that Grabner’s going to be starting the season in Winnipeg.  No one was given more of a chance to shine than he was, with appearances in seven of the nine pre-season games.  The problem is, he only picked up one assist.  That ain’t going to keep you here.

Cody Hodgson is another matter.  While no one would claim that he had a stellar pre-season, he may have extended his NHL life for this year by another nine games before being sent back to Brampton.  Unless he sets the world on fire, don’t expect to see him here in November. 

Ed Willes wrote in this morning’s Province that this edition of the Canucks may be the best ever.  Even better than the 2003-04 team, which had extremely high expectations put on it before flaming out.  While that team may have had Todd Bertuzzi, Markus Naslund, and the Sedins, this one has Alex Burrows, Ryan Kesler, and the Sedins – just five years older.  And that much better.  And, oh, yeah.  This guy named Roberto Luongo. 

Is it unfair to place lofty expectations on the Canucks?  Possibly.  The two years that they made it to the Stanley Cup Finals they were hardly expected to do anything in the playoffs.  It almost seems like the more promise they show, the harder they crash.  And the more unlikely they seem to have success, the better they perform.  Who knows why.

Sergei Shirokov played his way on to this team as well.  Is he going to be another Pavel Bure?  Hell, no.  But is he going to help Canucks forget about some of the other Russians that have played here, like Artem Chubarov or Vladamir Krutov?  Hell, yeah.  He’s going to be an exciting player, no doubt.  Not a 50 goal guy, but still exciting, nonetheless.

It’s going to be a fun year, and it all starts in Calgary on Thursday night.  Predictions?

Update: Okay, so what do I know?  According to Canucks.com, Cody Hodgson has been assigned to the Brampton Batillion of the OHL.  This came down about 15 minutes ago.  So, when I posted, he technically was still here.  It just hadn’t been made public yet.  Probably better for Cody in the long run.

An interesting scenario – considering the way that Cody Hodgson has played in the preseason, what would be the best course of action for the Canucks to take? 

Sure, the guy’s had a tougher preseason than most, and hasn’t really stood out (like I thought he did last year) but he played in 120+ games last year and is still coming off of a back injury.  But unfortunately, the best situation to put him in (in my opinion, anyway), isn’t available to them.

Because of his age, Hodgson isn’t eligible to play for the Manitoba Moose on a full time basis.  The AHL’s minimum age for full-time players is 20.  Hodgson won’t be 20 until the Olympics are underway in February.  So they either have to send him back to Brampton, or keep him here.  Both scenarios have disadvantages.

Hodgson was unquestionably one of the best players in the CHL last year.  So what good would it do to send the guy back to Junior?  How much more can he learn by playing another year of Junior?  Maybe enough to keep him here full time NEXT season?  Who knows.

But if the Canucks were to keep him here, and if he’s not getting steady game time, what is he going to gain by sitting in the press box?  Sure, he’ll learn a lot by being around the team, but sitting up in a skybox, removed from teammates, night after night isn’t going to do anything for his game. 

It’s looking more and more like Hodgson will be sent back to play another year in Brampton.  Hopefully it won’t have a negative impact on his game, because when the kid is able to stick here, I think he’ll be a good, solid piece of the Canucks’ future. 

Right now, it just doesn’t look like this is his year.

For the last few years, the mainstream press have been dumping all over the Canucks, claiming that they’ll have a real struggle getting out of the Western Conference basement, let alone making the playoffs.  It’s kind of funny, then that they have Northwest championship banners hanging from the rafters in two of the last three seasons (while missing the playoffs the year before last.  Let’s hope that’s not a pattern…)

The common claim is that the Canucks need to find someone who can score if they’re to do *anything* in the regular season.  And that’s absolutely correct.  But, if the Canucks don’t have anyone who can score, how come they scored 246 goals last year, or an average of 3 goals per game?  Since the lockout, they’ve scored, on average: 3.12 GPP (2005-06, 256 goals, missed playoffs), 2.71 GPP (2006-07, 222 goals, 1st NW), 2.60 GPP (2007-08, 213 goals, missed playoffs), and 3.0 GPP (2008-09, 246 goals, 1st NW). (Source: Wikipedia)

Do they need more scoring?  Sure, what team doesn’t?  But are they incapable of scoring?  Of course not.  But it seems like every year, they have someone step up and contribute in ways that they never have before.  Last year it was Alex Burrows and Ryan Kesler.  Will they continue at the same pace as last year, or will someone else be the surprise of the year?

Where do others think the Canucks will finish?  Let’s take a look:

• Bleacher Report: 6th place.  They may rate the Canucks a little higher now, as this post was written back in the summer, before the signings of Daniel and Henrik Sedin and Roberto Luongo.
• The Hockey News: 3rd place.  They figure that the Canucks won the Northwest title while Luongo only played in 54 games, and that things will be that much easier if he can play even more.  Plus, they’re banking on the Sedins continuing to put up points, and Burrows and Kes continuing to produce, along with Mason Raymond.
• Associated Content: Top half of conference.  Okay, so that one’s a little wishy-washy, but what are you gonna do?  Citing the performance of Luongo and the twins, along with Cody Hodgson, they figure that it’ll be the Canucks and the Flames fighting for the NW title again.  Not a bad prediction.

And those were all of the predictions I was able to find so far.  Admittedly, making predictions when the pre-season isn’t even half over is pretty easy.  You could throw darts and make it sound good.  When I’m able to collect a few more predictions I’ll do a follow-up post, and add my own at that time.

It’s official as of about half an hour ago.  This post on Canucks.com confirms that Roberto Luongo has signed a 12 year contract extension with the Canucks that’ll keep him here until the 2021-22 season.  Think about that.  If you have kids starting Grade 1 in a few days, they’ll be graduating from high school when this deal runs through.  As I mentioned the other day, he most likely won’t play all twelve of those years, but it’s still pretty impressive.

I remember when Luongo first came here in the Todd Bertuzzi trade, and everyone was worried about whether or not Dave Nonis would be able to sign him to a longer term contract, as it was said that that was not what Luongo wanted to get himself in to.

Times sure have changed, huh?

One good thing that the Canucks gain from all of this is the confidence of other players in the NHL.  Which means to say that players might look more favourably on coming to Vancouver knowing that there is a good core that has the potential to win.  And with skaters like Ryan Kesler, Alex Burrows, and eventually Cody Hodgson, things have the potential to get very interesting indeed.

He’s a 5′11″, 183 lb center who scored 40 goals, and had 85 points last year for the Brampton Battilion.  It’ll be interesting to see what he’s able to bring to the table.  Kind of interesting to hear that TSN mentioned that the only thing seperating Hodgson from Steve Stamkos is his speed.

Only time is going to tell on that, but it’s nice to see that Mike Gillis addressed a need that the Canucks have now, rather than picking another defenseman that they’d probably wind up moving anyway.

Welcome to the game Cody.  You made it.