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Canucks president Jim Rutherford has learned about NHL roster building since 1994. His first trade was 30 years ago Monday, for Glen Wesley
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Published Aug 26, 2024 • Last updated 1 hour ago • 4 minute read
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Vancouver Canucks’ President, Hockey Operations, Jim Rutherford (r) and General Manager Patrik Allvin answer questions from the media at Rogers Arena in Vancouver, , BC., on May 3, 2022. 00067355A [PNG Merlin Archive] Photo by NICK PROCAYLO /PNG
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Aug. 26 is always an important benchmark in Jim Rutherford’s career biography.
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Aug. 26, 1994, to be specific.
That’s the day the now-Canucks president of hockey operations made his first trade in the NHL, flipping three first-round picks to the Boston Bruins for Glen Wesley.
The price was high, but it’s a trade that, to this day, surely counts as one of Rutherford’s best. The price was wild, the kind of price no team would risk paying today, but Wesley proved to be everything the Whalers-turned-Hurricanes wanted him to be.
Now, it’s important to understand that this wasn’t necessarily a trade in the modern sense, since Wesley was what we would now call a restricted free agent and the price for him, had Rutherford tried to outright sign him, would have been three first round picks. Rutherford talked trade with Bruins GM Harry Sinden all summer, but couldn’t work out a deal. Eventually, with Wesley and the Bruins bound for arbitration, Sinden caved and took the restricted free agent price Rutherford had been willing to pay all along.
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Jim Rutherford Photo by Jason Payne /PNG
Rutherford was part of an ownership group that taken over the Whalers just two months before. They were looking to make a splash as part of their plans to turn around a franchise that had mostly floundered in the 15 years it had been in the NHL.
“We were signing a young defenceman from a big market team. We were new ownership. It was about trying to make a statement about where we were going,” Rutherford recalled Monday.
“In the long run, it was very good trade. He stabilized our defence year after year. He played a big role in our cup run in ’02,” he added.
Three decades in, the biggest thing Rutherford has learned is to think of trades as a hedge fund manager would: you aren’t going to nail every deal. Of course you need to win more than you lose, but be ready to accept when they don’t work out.
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“The more you do, the more you know some are going to work and some won’t. It doesn’t make sense if you try something and it doesn’t work, don’t try to keep going,” he said.
Here are four trades that Rutherford sought to highlight from his three decades of player transactions:
The Phil Kessel trade
The rebuilding Maple Leafs flipped Kessel to Pittsburgh in the summer of 2015 in a complicated deal that netted Rutherford’s Penguins another star who ended up being an outstanding depth player on a Stanley Cup champion.
“The Kessel trade really stands out to me,” Rutherford replied when asked about a deal that to this day he thinks about. “We brought him in and he ends playing a really key role on the third line.”
Phil Kessel #8 of the Vegas Golden Knights takes a break during a stop in play in the third period against the Toronto Maple Leafs as he plays in his 989th consecutive NHL game, tying Keith Yandle for the longest “Ironman” streak in league history at T-Mobile Arena on October 24, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Photo by Ethan Miller /Getty Images
The Rod Brind’Amour trade
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Midway through the 1999-200 season, Rutherford shipped big centre Keith Primeau to Philadelphia for Brind’Amour, who remains with Carolina to this day as coach.
“That was a deal that really took the franchise to another level, with his leadership and his play,” Rutherford noted about the second trade that sprung to his mind as notable in his trade history.
Head coach Rod Brind’Amour of the Carolina Hurricanes speaks with the media prior to the game against the New York Islanders in Game Three of the First Round of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs at UBS Arena on April 25, 2024 in Elmont, New York. Photo by Bruce Bennett /Getty Images
The Justin Williams trade
Before he became one of the NHL’s all-time great playoff performers, Williams was a young player struggling for a role with the Flyers. Rutherford wrote him down as a player that intrigued him, not sure he’d ever have the chance to acquire him, but you never know. And then the Flyers ran into an injury crisis on the blue-line midway through the 2003-04 season.
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“I think they had three of their top six (defencemen) out injured. Philly really was in injury trouble. They wanted Danny Markov,” Rutherford recalled. And so he saw a chance to move a veteran defenceman for Williams, who played a key role in Carolina’s cup win in 2006, and then again for Los Angeles’ cup wins in 2012 and 2014.
“In some cases those players are never going to become available, but you still keep note of them.”
Tuukka Rask #40 of the Boston Bruins makes a glove save shot by Justin Williams #14 of the Carolina Hurricanes during the second period in Game Four of the Eastern Conference Finals during the 2019 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at PNC Arena on May 16, 2019 in Raleigh, North Carolina. Photo by Bruce Bennett /Getty Images
The Filip Hronek trade
Finally, Rutherford noted the trade for Hronek in 2023. Being ready to add a player you like but didn’t know if they’d be available, as it was with Williams, is also the story with how the Canucks added Hronek, he said.
“I view that (Williams trade) like the Hronek deal,” Rutherford said. “People asked ‘why did they get him when they did?’ Well he was a young, right-shot defenceman and those are hard to get,” he said.
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Filip Hronek #17 of the Vancouver Canucks stretches during warmup before Game Seven of the Second Round of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs against the Edmonton Oilers at Rogers Arena on May 20, 2024 in Vancouve Photo by Derek Cain /Getty Images
CANUCK CONNECTION: Many Canucks fans still cringe at the mention of Glen Wesley: he was drafted with the first round pick the Canucks shipped to Boston in the trade that sent Cam Neely to Bruins in 1986. And the Wesley move to Hartford is the trade that is the roots of the “Cam Neely Trade Tree,” a tree that is still alive today because Colin Miller is still playing in the NHL. Miller was traded in a package from Los Angeles to Boston in 2015 for Milan Lucic. Lucic was drafted by the Bruins with a second-round pick acquired from Edmonton when the Bruins traded Sergei Samsonov to the Oilers at the 2006 trade deadline. Samsonov was drafted by the Bruins in 1997 using the final first round pick Rutherford had shipped up to Boston for Wesley.
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Carolina Hurricanes’ Glen Wesley. SunMediaArchive
pjohnston@postmedia.com
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Courtesy : https://theprovince.com/sports/hockey/nhl/vancouver-canucks/jim-rutherford-notes-four-top-trades