The Vancouver Canucks didn’t officially “rebuild” until mid-way through 2016-17, when general manager Jim Benning traded away fan favorites Jannik Hansen and Alexandre Burrows for prospects.
In fact, team president Trevor Linden finally had to come clean about using the “R” word that he so avoided all these years:
“So to get alignment with our fans and our media I used the rebuild word today, which everyone can get their head around. If that word makes everyone happier then I’m more than happy to use it.”
Vancouver tried a rebuild-on-the-fly approach from 2014 to 2016.