The Sedins hire fan-favorite and former teammate to join Canucks

HockeyNews.se reported Friday that Edler will join the organization in time for summer development camp.

Daniel and Henrik Sedin, now co-presidents of hockey operations, personally recruited their former teammate back to Vancouver.

Edler becomes the fifth member of the 2011 Stanley Cup Final roster now working inside the Canucks organization. The Sedins themselves account for two.

Manny Malhotra is the new AHL head coach in Abbotsford. Mikael Samuelsson has been running development sessions since last summer's camp.

That is not a coincidence. That is an architectural decision.

The Canucks finished dead last in the NHL this season at 25-49-8. The roster needs a complete overhaul and the front office knows it.

But the Sedins are not starting from scratch with this rebuild. They are reaching back to the last time this franchise had a genuine identity and pulling the people who built it into the room.

Edler spent 15 of his 17 NHL seasons in Vancouver. He remains the franchise leader in games played by a defenseman at 925 and goals by a blueliner at 99.

Those numbers carry real weight with young prospects about to walk through development camp doors in July.

You cannot teach organizational culture through a PowerPoint deck or a mission statement printed on a wall.

You teach it through proximity to people who actually lived it.

The Sedins are betting that a prospect sitting across from Edler, Samuelsson, and Malhotra absorbs something a hired-gun consultant never delivers.

That bet is either the smartest thing happening in the NHL right now or the most sentimental.

Vancouver's next two seasons will answer which one.