Dropping like flies

As the Canucks push towards the playoffs, one thread has remained relatively constant in recent years; they seem to go through defencemen more quickly than Don Cherry changes suits. It’s not that the Canucks tend to suffer an abnormally high rate of injuries overall; as this post James Mirtle wrote last year shows, they ranked 14th overall over the last four years in man-games lost to injury. It just seems those injuries all tend to come on defence, and that pattern’s repeating again this year, where they’re actually tied for third in man-games lost.

Some of that’s certainly due to the players the Canucks have. For example, Sami Salo has never played a full 82-game season and hasn’t even hit the 70-game mark since the 2003-2004 season. No one was really expecting that to change this year, which was one big reason I was in favour of acquiring Christian Ehrhoff and Brad Lukowich this summer.*

*As an aside, that trade’s looking pretty good for Vancouver at the moment. They sent former first-round pick Patrick White and former third-round pick Daniel Rahimi to San Jose for Lukowich and Ehrhoff. Rahimi’s never put up a lot of points in the AHL or shown a ton of promise; he’s playing in the Swedish Elite League this year and has a respectable six assists in 42 games, but has taken a lot of penalties and doesn’t seem to be doing anything that will get him into the NHL any time soon. White may be a bigger loss, but he was a late first-round pick (25th overall), and it’s not like he’s got incredible offensive talents. He’s got 12 points in 26 NCAA games with the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers this year, which is about in line with what he did last season. He looks more likely to wind up in the NHL than Rahimi at this point, but he doesn’t like he’s going to turn into a superstar any time soon.

Meanwhile, Ehrhoff has quietly been one of the Canucks’ best defencemen this year. He’s put up 10 goals and 15 assists, and is tied for first in scoring among Vancouver defencemen with Alex Edler. He’s also been good without the puck, as the advanced numbers from Behind The Net show; he has a GFON/60 of 2.85 and a GAON/60 of 1.32, while his GFOFF/60 is 2.75 and his GAOFF/60 is 2.54. That means the Canucks score .10 goals more per 60 minutes of five-on-five hockey when Ehrhoff is playing, but allow a whopping 1.22 less goals per 60 minutes when he’s on the ice, a considerable improvement. Lukowich has spent most of this season in the AHL, recording a respectable three goals and 15 assists in 28 games with the Texas Stars. He was called up to the Canucks on Jan. 8 when the wave of defensive injuries started, and has played pretty well in the seven games since then. It’s certainly nice to have someone with his experience around to fill in, and that’s making this trade look even better for the Canucks.*

However, it’s the injuries to unexpected players that have really hurt the Canucks. They have enough depth to anticipate and overcome the loss of Salo, but the loss of other key defencemen hurts them more. Willie Mitchell completed 72 and 82 games in his last two seasons with the Canucks, but he recently suffered a concussion and will be out for a while. Kevin Bieksa’s been remarkably durable in some seasons, but has missed significant time in others thanks to freak injuries and is recovering with ankle surgery at the moment.

It speaks to the foresight of general manager Mike Gillis that the Canucks still aren’t in crisis mode despite the loss of three of their top defencemen. The team has a surprising amount of depth, as was shown in Saturday’s win over the Blackhawks, and their lineup for tonight’s game against Buffalo still looks reasonably solid. The Canucks’ defence pairings will be Ehrhoff and Shane O’Brien, Alex Edler and Nolan Baumgartner and Lukowich and Aaron Rome. All have significant NHL experience and have proven to be capable. It’s not clear why the Canucks always suffer these extensive injuries on defence, but at least they seem to be prepared for it this time, even though their regulars are still dropping like flies.