Player Discussion Loui Eriksson, Pt. II

[BROCK HUGHES]

Since we're already paying Eriksson and nobody in their right mind would trade for the guy, why not give him a crack at GM? Can't do any worse.

well because he would suck at that also.Best thing for us,is to just boo the crap.out of him when he is on the ice.,so something gets done sooner
then later...never liked the player or contract...

 

[iFan]

"I know this player"

- Jim Benning, on Eriksson

Just as good at judging character as he is hockey talent.

And yeah, he was a guy who had 3 extremely underachieving seasons prior to his fluke 30 goals in a contract year with tons of PP time, and was talked about by Bruin fans as a cap dump they'd love to be rid of in the summers of 2015 and 2014.

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

 

[settinguptheplay]

Exactly.

And how can a player have only 3 recorded hits in an entire season of hockey? He could not possibly be softer on the puck or more disengaged floating around out there for a pay cheque.

Daniel Sedin recorded 2 hits in his final season. 21 hits is the highest season total of his career (31 for Eriksson). Not saying Eriksson wasn't a floater. Just that low hit totals does not always reflect on the quality of a player. In Erikssons case I think it summed of his season pretty accurately.

 

[Megaterio Llamas]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

That's a surprise to me. Did people really expect that roster to rebound from that awful season they just had? It was pretty obviously time to tear it down and rebuild then and signing was definitely a big step in the wrong direction.

Of course who could have expected Eriksson would quit playing altogether when he got here.

 

[Diamonddog01]

Many thought we'd never scratch this clown, eventually we did. Next up will be sending him to Utica and I can't wait for that day. I suspect a trade or retirement will be much more likely a year from now.

 

[orcatown]

I've been completely down on Eriksson for a long while. Terrible work effort, seemingly terrible attitude and, of course, terrible contract. An on-going pain in the ass for the team.

I'd like to beat on Loui as much as the next guy but some of the solutions being suggested really don't improve anything.

Buy him out: Get so little in cap relief that it's not worth it. Moreover, would have to bring in some sort of replacement and that'll cost something.

Send him to Utica: Might make you feel better to punish Eriksson but Canucks have enough problems attracting players and this black eye won't help. Also, you've now got a festering problems in the minors that the Comets don't need.

Press box him in Vancouver: Probably less destructive than sending him to Utica but you wonder about the effect on his teammates and does nothing to remediate the situation. - just leaves the team in a holding pattern that could get quite negative.

Trade him elsewhere: Easy to say, near impossible to do. Get back something equally atrocious like the Lucic nightmare or have to include real asset or assets and then retain a good chuck of the contract.

The only way forward I see is to play Eriksson and pray you get something out of him. At the end of last year (admittedly during time garbage when the Canucks were regrettably lowering their draft choice), Eriksson looked not great but marginally passable on a line with Horvat and Pearson. That seems to me the best case scenario moving ahead. Let him try to get some chemistry there and maybe you get some production. It's a "put up or shut" proposition for Eriksson and at least puts him in a position to succeed. Beyond that, we don't have great options for the 2nd line anyways. Baertschi hasn't shown much and could go down at any time. And its unlikely Levio is a legit second line NHLer.

Ultimately, there is probably no real satisfactory solution with Eriksson but IMO this is the best way forward.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Booing Eriksson would be such a classless thing to do and I hope our fans are better than that. Keep the politics off the ice. Booing players might also deter UFA’s from wanting to sign here.

Let the Canucks send Eriksson to Utica, let Eriksson play one year in the minors, and then let Eriksson retire after July 1st 2020 when he will only be owed 5 million dollars in real money (retirement would be a far more likelier option next season than this season).

 

[BROCK HUGHES]

Booing Eriksson would be such a classless thing to do and I hope our fans are better than that. Keep the politics off the ice. Booing players might also deter UFA’s from wanting to sign here.

Let the Canucks send Eriksson to Utica, let Eriksson play one year in the minors, and then let Eriksson retire after July 1st 2020 when he will only be owed 5 million dollars in real money (retirement would be a far more likelier option next season than this season).

ok so no booing,,can we hissss.

 

[Horse McHindu]

ok so no booing,,can we hissss.

Lol.

Fans can do whatever they want obviously, but I don’t see how booing a guy helps in any way. All it does is create a more toxic environment and makes it even LESS likely that said player can rediscover his game. Keep the politics off the ice.

Let Benning send Eriksson to Utica if necessary. If Eriksson is up with the big club, cheer the guy in hopes that he can increase his value so that we can move him.

Booing a player that represents your team is beyond classless.

 

[rypper]

If loui actually looked like he gave a shit and wasn't just floating around collecting his retirement money, I'd agree with you.

His play hasn't nearly come close to matching his salary. The media rarely calls him out or even speaks to him. He dresses for almost every game. He's not facing any kind of repercussion or consequence for his play, what motivation does he have to change? Boo him all you want, he's earned it.

 

[VanJack]

Lol.

Fans can do whatever they want obviously, but I don’t see how booing a guy helps in any way. All it does is create a more toxic environment and makes it even LESS likely that said player can rediscover his game. Keep the politics off the ice.

Let Benning send Eriksson to Utica if necessary. If Eriksson is up with the big club, cheer the guy in hopes that he can increase his value so that we can move him.

Booing a player that represents your team is beyond classless.

Have to agree. Have to guard against becoming like Leafs Nation. They booed Jake Gardiner who was trying to play through a back injury because his team needed him.

Better to boo the GM who signed Eriksson in the first place.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Have to agree. Have to guard against becoming like Leafs Nation. They booed Jake Gardiner who was trying to play through a back injury because his team needed him.

Better to boo the GM who signed Eriksson in the first place.

Exactly. The Gardiner example is a good one.

Keep the politics off the ice and let people enjoy the game.

 

[Sergei Shirokov]

Lol.

Fans can do whatever they want obviously, but I don’t see how booing a guy helps in any way. All it does is create a more toxic environment and makes it even LESS likely that said player can rediscover his game. Keep the politics off the ice.

Let Benning send Eriksson to Utica if necessary. If Eriksson is up with the big club, cheer the guy in hopes that he can increase his value so that we can move him.

Booing a player that represents your team is beyond classless.

Yup, booing him does nothing. Blame ownership & management.

While Loui is on the ice we want him to help us, end of story.

 

[forget]

Gardiner and Louie aren’t even comparable in the slightest. Gardiner is booed because he makes mistakes occasionally and has had bad games in clutch situations. Louie has had about two good games in the whole time he’s been here.

 

[Horse McHindu]

Gardiner and Louie aren’t even comparable in the slightest. Gardiner is booed because he makes mistakes occasionally and has had bad games in clutch situations. Louie has had about two good games in the whole time he’s been here.

There’s a difference between being a “bad” player, and a player that hasn’t lived up to expectations. Eriksson is the latter. He’s been very good defensively for us and rarely makes mistakes, but that’s not nearly worth the price tag. He’s been far from horrible however.

 

[PuckMunchkin]

Daniel Sedin recorded 2 hits in his final season. 21 hits is the highest season total of his career (31 for Eriksson). Not saying Eriksson wasn't a floater. Just that low hit totals does not always reflect on the quality of a player. In Erikssons case I think it summed of his season pretty accurately.

I don't think anyone thinks hit totals reflects on the quality of a player.

But... Eriksson did have the least hits in the league of any skater that played 20 games or more. You can make what you want out of that.

There’s a difference between being a “bad” player, and a player that hasn’t lived up to expectations. Eriksson is the latter. He’s been very good defensively for us and rarely makes mistakes, but that’s not nearly worth the price tag. He’s been far from horrible however.

You can get a player like that on league minimum contracts every summer.

That means he is extremely replaceable. Obviously it doesn't seem like that when you watch what Jim signs every summer. You get conditioned to think that NHL players are almost impossible to find and you need to pay 3 mil + term to find negative possession players like we have filled our bottom6 with.

 

[TruGr1t]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

That's not particularly accurate. Much like Myers, any positive feedback on Eriksson at the time was largely driven by the fact we didn't give Lucic a really bad contract, and that Eriksson's cap hit came in well below the rumored $7M AAV (sounds familiar...).

Many posters here hated it from day one, but even they didn't foresee just how bad it would be over the life of contract.

Someone in hockey ops should have figured out we were signing an inconsistent, 31 year old slacker who has career-long issues remaining engaged and competitive (usually in contract years, surprisingly). But everyone was too infatuated with the fact he'd had a couple decent international showings with the Sedins.

This situation should have been fairly predictable to anyone who actually knew Eriksson as a player and followed his career.

 

[member 290103]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

But we are not putported “master talent evaluators” like Jim.

 

[PuckMunchkin]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

Most fans, probably.

Most fans at HFboards? Definitely not.

 

[MS]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

Most casuals thought it was great. Most posters here called it as a stupid signing that was going to blow up in our faces from Day 1.

Now, I expected we'd get 1-2 40-point seasons out of Eriksson before it got really bad, but I fully expected we'd be in exactly this position in year 4 of the contract and said as much at the time.

 

[4Twenty]

I've been completely down on Eriksson for a long while. Terrible work effort, seemingly terrible attitude and, of course, terrible contract. An on-going pain in the ass for the team.

I'd like to beat on Loui as much as the next guy but some of the solutions being suggested really don't improve anything.

Buy him out: Get so little in cap relief that it's not worth it. Moreover, would have to bring in some sort of replacement and that'll cost something.

Send him to Utica: Might make you feel better to punish Eriksson but Canucks have enough problems attracting players and this black eye won't help. Also, you've now got a festering problems in the minors that the Comets don't need.

Press box him in Vancouver: Probably less destructive than sending him to Utica but you wonder about the effect on his teammates and does nothing to remediate the situation. - just leaves the team in a holding pattern that could get quite negative.

Trade him elsewhere: Easy to say, near impossible to do. Get back something equally atrocious like the Lucic nightmare or have to include real asset or assets and then retain a good chuck of the contract.

The only way forward I see is to play Eriksson and pray you get something out of him. At the end of last year (admittedly during time garbage when the Canucks were regrettably lowering their draft choice), Eriksson looked not great but marginally passable on a line with Horvat and Pearson. That seems to me the best case scenario moving ahead. Let him try to get some chemistry there and maybe you get some production. It's a "put up or shut" proposition for Eriksson and at least puts him in a position to succeed. Beyond that, we don't have great options for the 2nd line anyways. Baertschi hasn't shown much and could go down at any time. And its unlikely Levio is a legit second line NHLer.

Ultimately, there is probably no real satisfactory solution with Eriksson but IMO this is the best way forward.

Man, I couldn't care any less about the black mark to potential free agents a waiving of Eriksson would lead to.

Other teams bury guys all the damn time.

 

[PuckMunchkin]

Man, I couldn't care any less about the black mark to potential free agents a waiving of Eriksson would lead to.

Other teams bury guys all the damn time.

I feel like we as a fan base somehow worry about this way more than we should.

Build a good team and UFAs will come.

 

[Jay Cee]

Man, I couldn't care any less about the black mark to potential free agents a waiving of Eriksson would lead to.

Other teams bury guys all the damn time.

Not to mention the fact how Eriksson's camp have handled this off-season. It removes any good will we might have had as a team and fans.

 

[VanJack]

No matter how unmovable the contract might be, I just can't see how the Canucks can bring Eriksson back for next season.

Sometimes a player and an organization just reach a fork in the road, and somebody has to take it.

it's going to be painful, not matter how it plays out. But time for a change of scenery for both the Canucks and this player.

 

[Cupless44]

Most of the Canucks fans here WANTED Ericksson and talked up about his proven chemistry with the Sedins... very few of us voiced our displeasure about this contract.

Speak for yourself. I despised this signining from minute one