Few traditions are as time honoured in Vancouver as draft ineptitude. Sometimes it’s not even the scouts fault either.

Take Anton Rödin, for example. There was no arguing with his selection as the 52nd overall pick in the 2009 NHL Entry Draft by the Vancouver Canucks. Scouts fawned over his skill with the puck and lauded his competitiveness, in spite of his smaller stature.

Alas, projecting prospects can be a fickle matter and Rödin proved to be no exception. Playing in the SHL for the two seasons preceding his draft year, Rödin acquitted himself fairly well. Rödin then left for North America, where thing got hairy. The second round pick struggled immensely to adapt and retreated to the Motherland following two very forgettable seasons with the Chicago Wolves.

The Canucks qualified Rödin and have retained his rights to this day. The Swedish winger has taken steps forward, meaning it might be worthwhile to circle this wagon.

When we last checked in on Rödin he was the twelfth ranked prospect (as judged by the writers at Canucks Army) within the Canucks system. He was considered one of the ‘most skilled prospects in the [Canucks] pipeline’ by Nations Overlord, Thomas Drance. All this is to say that there are reasons abound to maintain a glimmer of hope where the player in question is concerned.

These observations are meted well by Rödin’s performance since returning to the SHL with Brynas. In the 101 games comprising his second tour of duty, Rödin is averaging .74 PPG. Rödin also averaged the 14th highest TOI/GP among forwards in the SHL last season – not far behind, of all people, Bill Sweatt. This upward trajectory is reflected in his PCS (Prospect Cohort Success) score, which projects Rödin as having a near 20% chance of NHL success. Some high-profile members of his cohort include Henrik Zetterberg and Branko Radivojevich.

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I’ll take those odds more often than not and it’s hard to not be encouraged by the comparable players within his production and stature based cohort. It’s not without precedent, though. Rödin checks out well by this metric whenever his play in Sweden is taken into account. Wherein lies the problem has been his inability to translate some of this success to North America.

There are any number of mitigating factors which contributed negatively to his trial run though and they bare repeating to place his AHL campaigns in the proper context. Rödin suffers from tendinitis in his left shoulder – an injury aggravated by his tireless work ethic, which doesn’t allow his shoulder the requisite time to heal. Speaking from personal experience with tendinitis (of the knee variety) it doesn’t just go away; at best, one can hope to keep it in check. Reports indicate that Rödin’s was severe enough during his stay on the continent to bar him from taking shots – a relatively important part of his game.

Equally as daunting a circumstance were his surroundings. The Chicago Wolves weren’t a particularly strong offensive force for the majority of Rödin’s stay – that said the head coach of the Wolves, Craig MacTavish, did his best to mitigate this with optimal deployments for Rödin.

If there’s anything to take away from this it’s that there is very little in the way of certainty Rödin could find success in a return to the Canucks organization. All things being relative, very little certainty is about as well as could be hoped for from a prospect who’d all but given up on NHL aspirations not long ago. It’s also considerably more than can be attained from most mid-round selections in the draft though. It would be similar to stumbling upon a second round draft pick, really.

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There is value to be found here and given that Rödin is an old regime quasi-holdover any success here is found money for Jim Benning and co.

This wouldn’t be the first transaction of its kind, either. The St. Louis Blues and Jori Lehtera completed a very similar comeback last season, to overwhelming success. There are five years between the two, but their production is eerily similar – albeit, in two completely different leagues. All in all, that comparison shines fondly on Rödin, who is just entering his physical prime; Lehtera left that quite some time before the Blues took him back.

Where the Canucks might run into some trouble is that Rödin signed a three-year extension with Brynas last March. Historically, these contracts are generally honoured by the player and team. That said, Brynas is rumoured to have agreed to a deal in principle, verbally, with Rödin well before his contract expired with Vancouver. I can’t imagine the Canucks would be overly concerned with the impact this has on Brynas.

I would offer more comprehensive analysis of the dynamics involved in this sort of transaction, but there isn’t any SHL-NHL transfer agreement available for my viewing online- none that I can find, anyway.

The re-acquisition of Rödin is far from an alley oop. We’ve seen any number of prolific players from European leagues return to the NHL with little or no success (Petri Kontiola, Roman Cervenka, etc.). All the same, it’s a move worth making for a club that aims to get younger (Rödin is just 24 years old) and remain competitive in the process.





