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Proposal by former Canucks GM Mike Gillis to become Pens' GM leaks online

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TJ Tucker
January 27, 2021  (8:20 PM)
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If something is posted on the internet, it's never truly gone. Deleting it is an act of futility if someone has already downloaded it or taken a screenshot. Such is the case for former Vancouver Canucks GM Mike Gillis, whose entire proposal to become the next GM of the Pittsburgh Penguins was posted to Twitter by his son. The tweet was deleted pretty fast but, of course, someone grabbed it before it could be taken down.

If you are unfamiliar with Gillis, he played close to 250 games in the NHL before retiring to become an agent. In 2008, he was named general manager of Vancouver, taking over from Dave Nonis, who had been fired. Gillis made major moves such as choosing not to re-sign former client and longtime Canucks captain Markus Näslund, nor forward Brendan Morrison, and making an aggressive pitch to sign free agent Mats Sundin. He eventually landed him in December of 2008 after Sundin sat out part of the season to make a decision. After several other signings, re-signings and trades, Gillis was eventually fired in 2014. His reportedly had an interview with the Minnesota Wild before the team decided in hiring Bill Guerin.

The proposal, which you can see it its entirety below, states quite clearly on the first page that it is a confidential document meant for the Lemieux Ownership group "in anticipation of an in-person meeting." While there's nothing really earth-shattering in it-it's essentially something you would expect from a person looking for a high-level executive position- it's interesting to get a behind the scenes look at how the business side of the hockey world works. Fair warning, it's 27 pages long.

Pittsburgh GM Jim Rutherford resigned his post Wednesday citing personal reasons. Patrik Allvin, the Penguins' assistant general manager, has been promoted to interim GM, and the search for a new one has begun. You can read more about that here.

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