Mark Spector of Sportsnet answered a few Twitter questions today regarding the Vancouver Canucks and this one is about the playoff chances for the Canucks.

Vancouver missed the playoffs last spring for the first time in six seasons. They finished a miserable 12th in the West and 25th overall—down from third and eighth, respectively, the year before. Pick any team in any league that declined that much in one season, and tell me if you would pick them to rebound and make the playoffs the following season.

Exactly. We don’t see the Canucks as heading into a full blown Edmonton- or Calgary-type rebuild, but they do share some traits with teams that have been forced to go that route. Poor drafting. Bad trades. Sketchy free-agent signings. All of those have left Benning with the task of filling in a huge gap in the Canucks pipeline between the ages of 20 and about 28.

The draft-and-develop route takes much time, while changing the NHL roster via trades and free agency is also slow. But those two jobs are the priority in Vancouver, and that means an NHL linesman won’t drop a playoff puck in British Columbia come April. I’ve got the Canucks at 11th in the West.

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