Vancouver Hockey Daily has no direct affiliation to the Vancouver Canucks, NHL or NHLPA
Vancouver Canucks' Elias Pettersson Not Being Given Grace Period to Find His Game This Season
Photo credit: Bob Frid - Imagn Images.
The co-hosts of The Peoples Show on Sportsnet 650 radio believe that Elias Pettersson shouldn't be given a grace period to find his groove this season.
As we close in on the beginning of training camp for the Vancouver Canucks, all eyes are on Swedish forward Elias Pettersson to see how he's able to bounce back after a disastrous 2024-25 campaign.
Last season, Pettersson dealt with an injury and a feud with now-former teammate, J.T. Miller, who was named captain of the New York Rangers this morning, but after a summer training hard all summer long, the Sundsvall native is ready to turn things around.
Reporters believe Elias Pettersson shouldn't be given grace period to find his groove
During a recent edition of The People's Show, Bik Nizzar and Jamie Todd shared their thoughts on Elias Pettersson's upcoming season and believe that he needs to have a good start and that there shouldn't be a grace period for him to find his groove.
"If Elias Pettersson was coming off a 100-point season and he struggled for the first ten games, I would be the first one saying 'hey guys, don't worry, this is a blip, he's gonna be fine.' But the problem is, he's already had the runway. He's used the runway and then some. The runway has been since, what, February 2024? That's the runway." Todd said.
Nizzar chimed in by saying, "The runway is meant to take off, you can't just endlessly run away, you take the plane off."
Meanwhile, Todd added, "If this was just a fresh, normal season, then yeah of course you can't freak out early in the season. But it's not that. You're wondering if it's going to be different than, what are we on here, 120 games? I guess he was injured last year but we're probably talking 100 regular season games of wildly substandard performance. Last year you can say 'well, the injury kept him from being prepared for the season and snowballed.' but as we heard from Elias Pettersson, that does not exist this year. So there's no reason why it shouldn't look good right out of the gate."
Nizzar chimed in by saying, "The runway is meant to take off, you can't just endlessly run away, you take the plane off."
Meanwhile, Todd added, "If this was just a fresh, normal season, then yeah of course you can't freak out early in the season. But it's not that. You're wondering if it's going to be different than, what are we on here, 120 games? I guess he was injured last year but we're probably talking 100 regular season games of wildly substandard performance. Last year you can say 'well, the injury kept him from being prepared for the season and snowballed.' but as we heard from Elias Pettersson, that does not exist this year. So there's no reason why it shouldn't look good right out of the gate."
Pettersson is motivated to prove everyone wrong this season, something that the Vancouver Canucks are probably happy to hear and it should excite fans as well.
We might not get the 100-point Elias Pettersson that we saw during the 2022-23 season, but it's able to hover around 80-85 points and look engaged in every single game and every battle on the ice, that'll be a big positive for the Vancouver Canucks and will help them as they push for a spot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Hopefully for Elias Pettersson's sake, he'll be able to have a hot start to the new season, perhaps even register 8-10 point in the month of October in order to drown out the outside noise.
Previously on Vancouver Hockey Daily
| POLL | ||
SEPTEMBRE 16 | 1229 ANSWERS Vancouver Canucks' Elias Pettersson Not Being Given Grace Period to Find His Game This Season Do you believe that Elias Pettersson shouldn't be given a grace period to start the 2025-26 season? | ||
| Yes | 746 | 60.7 % |
| No | 483 | 39.3 % |
| List of polls | ||