Canucks Make HUGE Move... - This Has MAJOR Implications | Canucks News

The Vancouver Canucks make a huge move by extending Kevin Lankanen to a multi-year extension and this has big implications for the Vancouver Canucks future. We're going to break all this down and more later on this episode. Before we get into it, if you're enjoying this daily Canucks content and you want to keep up to date on the team, go down and hit that subscribe button. It's completely free and we'll keep you up to date on everything to do around the Canucks. But with that, Griffin, we get off straight into this today where we do see from Chris Johnson Kevin Lankanen signs a five-year extension with the Canucks, carrying a 4.5 AAV. Cute piece of security for a guy who had to wait all last summer to get a job. Now, the biggest thing with this is we know it took quite a while, and Kevin Lankanen signs. The biggest thing, like Chris Johnson says here, Kevin Lankanen is currently on an 875K contract. He almost went to the end of the summer. Before signing with the Canucks, and it does seem like a saving grace from both teams. I mean, looking at Kevin Lankan and stats, he's been incredible for this team. You can pause, you can read through the stats. But overall, Griffin, looking at this extension, what's your initial thoughts on the Canucks inking him to this multi-year extension? I feel like I can finally breathe a little bit. After yesterday, seeing that report that came out that Lankanen had rejected a $3 million a year offer in January, and then this comes out literally hours later or a day later, and now we can finally breathe a little bit. This is one less contract that we have to worry about heading into the offseason, having to avoid things that we went through last offseason where you and I were on this show almost every single day talking about millions of different moves and different signings and different free agent acquisitions that the Canucks could go out and make. And now this is one less person we have to worry about. We can kind of just ease our way through. And like I said in our video yesterday, this now stops Kevin Lankanen's price from rising astronomically if he continues to play the way he's played this season. They got him at four and a half, lower than a lot of the other market value like we covered yesterday, where a lot of them were in the five to 5.5 range. There was actually someone in the comments of yesterday's video saying 4.2 would be perfect for Lankanen. And then this comes out of being at 4.5. It just makes it all the more better. So yes, it's nice that the Canucks not only locked Lankanen down, Before that price tag inevitably goes up, because frankly, he's been one of the best goalies in the league this year, and he is showing it. He's top three in shutouts, he's firing on all cylinders there, and he's not even the number one starting goalie. On any other team he would be, but on the Canucks, he's a 1B, who really will be the 1A by the end of the season if Patrick Demko continues on the stretch that he's on right now, unfortunately. I hate saying that, but the way it's looking right now, Kevin Lankan seems like he is going to be the franchise goalie for the future. in Vancouver and I couldn't be happier. I think Vancouver fans are going to be very happy because now this is someone who can keep us in games. And like I said, now that he has the contract, now it's a matter of, okay, does he continue to play the way he does? Does or does he go the other route where a lot of people are saying about a certain $11.6 million player where as soon as he got the contract, he didn't start playing as much. Hopefully that's not the case with Lincoln in here and we can continue to win games with him. I mean, look at Lincoln. He had some great years with Chicago. He signed with the Canucks, having a 19-8-7 record, a 9.05 save percentage. The biggest thing with Lincoln is the security on this form. As I said, 875K cap in, a one-year deal he signed this summer to join the Canucks team. It is just incredible to see him build up to get to this. Five-year extension at 4.5. Lankanen will be 35 at the end of this deal. But the biggest thing is, a lot of goaltenders don't really peak until their 30s. So I'm not too worried about someone that hasn't really been dealing with an injury issue. Signing until this term. Looking at the contract from Dave Pagano of the fourth period, we do see Lankanen's deal includes a no-movement clause in the first two years of his extension. And a 15 no-trade clause in the last three years. Griffin, I'll kind of throw it to you. Listen, the biggest thing with Kevin Lankin is, yes, he has not been a starting goaltender. Won a goaltender in the league. He's had some stints with the Chicago Blackhawks. But looking at this deal and at the fact that he has a no-trade list, do you think maybe it was more of a premature signing where they haven't really experienced him as the starting goaltender for the full time? Or do you think maybe he just wasn't given the chance to take that reign and he's proving that he is that number one goalie? There's definitely no Jim Levenstein situation here, and I definitely think it's the latter, where Kevin Lankan has been waiting for the right time to be that starting goaltender for a team. It just took him a while to find the right team to do it with, and now he's found it with the Vancouver Canucks. Just look at the numbers he's been doing this year. I know a lot of people are saying in the comments, or even online just all around, saying this could be a fluke here, not too sure what he can do when he's given that money or if he's given that one in a situation. But the thing to remember here is that we have him for a few years. No trade clause for the first two. 15 teams he can't go to after three years. And we still have Thatcher Demko. Thatcher Demko is still there. He's not going anywhere unless there's something that we trade him or there's an injury that forced him into early retirement. Other than that, Kevin Lankanen still hasn't been thrust into the 1A spot, so to speak, for this team because he still is our 1B. We're paying him a lot. We're paying him almost like a number one guy. However, with Thatcher Demko's recent injury history and just his whole career, It makes sense for the Canucks to want to have this insurance policy and to make sure this insurance policy doesn't get more expensive as the season goes on, like we kept saying. So yeah, having him locked down, this goes a great way towards making sure that not only do you ensure that you have a number one B backup goalie that can be a number one starter anywhere else, but you also have a goalie that is reliable where if Thatcher Demko is hurt or Thatcher Demko leaves, that would be very unfortunate. I know because he's a fantastic goaltender when he's fully healthy, but if he can't stay At least we don't have to go down to Archer Shelovs, who we were super high on last season. He did struggle a little bit coming out of this season. He isn't really that number one reliable guy to have as a backup. And even then, with Ty Young and Tolopilo and Patera, those guys aren't necessarily the ones that are reliable enough to be a backup goaltender, let alone a 1B. So having Lankan locked down for this, I feel really good about it. I'm excited to see what he does coming back from this Four Nations faceoff, having that extension under his belt. He's going to be getting a string of starts with Patrick Demko being week to week as well. So this is going to be awesome for Vancouver Canucks fans to see what he does given this extension coming out of the break. And I mean, the biggest thing is looking at this, we also seen Patrick Alvin speak out on the extension saying Kevin has done a great job for us in the net this season. Right from the start, he has shown a strong desire of competing and willingness to do whatever it takes to win hockey games. A good leader and teammate, we wouldn't want to be in a position where we're in right now without his strong play. I mean, looking at this, like I said, we've seen the strong play from Lincoln. We've seen the numbers he's put up. He's had a positive record throughout the year, coming in, stealing the job from Shelops. When he was set to almost be the starter with Demko out after his performance in playoffs, obviously that didn't work out too well. We do see him get a lot of time in outs. He's currently on the Canucks roster, but not to play games unless Thatcher is out. But looking at the big thing with Lincoln, and we kind of just kind of pass up on after it happening. He actually set a NHL record this season for the longest road win streak to start a season in NHL history. Previous held by Cam Talbot, but there's some massive names. I mean, Marty Brodeur, debatably the best goaltender in NHL history. And we see Lincoln in the head of them on a record. I mean, listen, this record isn't going to show that he's a Stanley Cup champion yet. But looking at the extension, I mean, looking at this Griffin. Is there a realm where we see Kevin and Lankanen almost take over the 1A spot for the rest of the season, maybe? Absolutely. I think that he's definitely put himself in a perfect position to do that. Not only with where he sits as far as statistically, but now that he has that contract as well, it goes to show the Canucks have the confidence in him now. They trust him. We saw what Patrick Levine was saying there. He has kept us in a lot of games this season, and he's why we have been somewhat successful this year, and why we are still in a playoff spot. We're not nearly at the level we were last year, but we are still able to be somewhat of a fraction of what that team was. Because of the reliable goaltending play, we haven't had to go to the Casey to Smith type of games where we're expected to lose and we just have a low five record with our backup goaltender. Now we have that reliable guy in that spot. And not only that, he's a guy that is hungry. He was hungry for that contract to prove it. He knew he was getting paid a lot less than a lot of other guys. And the Canucks wanted to show, hey, here we go. Bring you on this one year deal. Prove your worth. And he definitely did. And he has for this entire season. Again, he's not a Stanley Cup winning goaltender yet. But I think he has the intangibles to pull that off. And if the Canucks do go on a playoff run here, I think you're in a very interesting spot where we can see Kevin Lankan and get more starts than Patrick Demko if the juice is right. And I mean, looking at the goaltending with this team, you have Shelovs called up right now with the Patrick Demko injury. Kevin and Lankan extended. Even in the AHL, Yuri Patera, I spoke on before, I completely forgot he's even on the team. But Ty Young, only 20 years old. And he's actually number two in save percentage in the ECHL. We've seen him promoted to Abbotsford. He's had great stretches with Abbotsford. I believe it was five games having a great record during that. But the Canucks goaltending is just slowly getting better day after day. And it's quite exciting and shows the implications on the future of this team between the pipes. What were your guys' thoughts on this Kevin Lankinen extension? What's your thoughts on him coming in on a five-year extension? 4.5 million. Do you think he takes over the starting job? Let us know down below because we want to hear your opinions on this signing as well. But that'd be it for this episode. If you enjoyed it, make sure to go down and hit the like, subscribe, share this with your friends. We'll be back tomorrow with another episode, so keep your eye out for that. But I've been your host, Mark, with my co-host, Griffin, and take care.