2024 Offseason - moving forward

[Chef Boi RD]

Chef isn’t worried about EP. He’s young, that whole experience is exactly what he needed. I guarantee you nobody is more unhappy with his play than he is. All you EP trashers need to chill

[Cousin Strawberry]

Weren't you concerned by his play in the playoffs?

I was positive he was hiding an injury only to find out he was fine (yeah...the knee...THE KNEE! Baloney!!)

[Raile]

Weren't you concerned by his play in the playoffs?

I was positive he was hiding an injury only to find out he was fine (yeah...the knee...THE KNEE! Baloney!!)

It was more than playoffs, it was since ASG. he didn't look right for the entire second half of the year.

there's been different views on his injury, even on this board alone, so I'm trying to take the positive road on this and just assume he'll be back to his average come season start.

let's face it, if he doesn't start playing like his first half of last year as a minimum, we are fucked as a team pretty quickly with that contract looming.

[Raile]

to add, EP has always come across as ultra competitive in anything leading up to last season. Maybe it's not his drive to be good that's missing but just lack of knowledge of what it was going to take. Hopefully I'm right and that drive makes him question and make the changes he needs to get it all together.

[Blob Mckenzie]

Weren't you concerned by his play in the playoffs?

I was positive he was hiding an injury only to find out he was fine (yeah...the knee...THE KNEE! Baloney!!)

Why is it baloney? Because you said so?

[Cousin Strawberry]

Weren't you concerned by his play in the playoffs?

I was positive he was hiding an injury only to find out he was fine (yeah...the knee...THE KNEE! Baloney!!)

Why is it baloney? Because you said so?

If it was legitimate and serious enough to affect his play then he would've been shut down and rested when his game was obviously suffering since the ASG as pointed out by Raille.

Tocchet acted like this was all new to him during the season ending interview.

Baloney!

[Cousin Strawberry]

...and furthermore...

I have been one of Pettersson's advocates on this site forever. I have been saying he goes through these confidence issues fairly regularly but had a pretty solid bubble playoff run which gave me hope.

This issue is a whole new ball of cheese and a gyhumous concern Blobby Brown

[Blob Mckenzie]

Hargraves will enjoy feeding some folks crow by the shovel full.

[Topper]

Scooter played to his $11.6M potential for 4 games over a six night stint on the eastcoast road trip. This is when Ricky reunited the Lotto Line.

NJ - 3pts, 2G, 1A
NYR - 4pts, 2G, 2 A
NYI - 1pt, 1G
Pitt - 4pts, 2G, 2A

One goal into an empty net and one powerplay assist in those games.

In the next six games he was held off the score sheet three times and had 4 pts, 2G, 1A,in the other three games. All on the powerplay.

[Blob Mckenzie]

Great.... players have hot streaks and cold streaks.... what a novel concept. I swear some folks think a guy who averages 82 points a season should get one point in every single game. Mick had 1 goal in 60 games despite getting a lot of good looks. Kuzmenko was terrible and the coaches were disgusted by his defensive effort and attention. They were both decent to good the previous but it's all Peter's fault and now he's a bald faced liar regarding his knee. What a neat fanbase! Half of the same people wanted to run Miller out of town on a rail before his contract kicked in.

80 points is no longer an 8 million dollar per max length contract. It's more like 10 now. Get used to it and get over it. What will the German's deal be worth? How bout McJesus or Quinn Hughes? Folks need to wake up.

[Strangelove]

Baloney!

[Topper]

show me the hot streaks.

[Hockey Widow]

I think most will acknowledge that he had a let down as the season wore on and was all but invisible in the playoffs. I kept waiting for him to flip a switch. I think he has shown difficulty playing through adversity and needs to find a way to make that mental adjustment. Was he injured? I'll accept he had something with his knee that he obviously was not fully candid about at the time but I also accept that it was an injury he had to find a way to play through and he wasn't able to step up his game and do so.

Its hard for me to argue that after last season he has shown himself to be an 11.6 million dollar player though. It was/is too risky to let him go to RFA status so I get the urgency in getting him signed. I do believe he will grow into his contract and I do believe he will find a way to develop some mental toughness because to me that is his biggest issue. Things have always come easy to him and he has been able to dominate at every level. Well the NHL is a different beast.

He was showing signs before he was extended so it cannot be blamed on the new contract. Just as JT had to mature and learn to not be so emotional on the ice, Pettersson needs to learn to not be so emotional. I'm behind him and I think he will bounce back and show he is an annual 100+ point player.

[Lancer]

I don't have too much concern about Petey. He can be temperamental and can get cold. He's had is slumps, but he usually comes back better. I agree that he doesn't handle adversity well. That's stuff a kid can grow out of, and thankfully he's not the be-all-end-all of the forward core - even if we will only go so far if he goes invisible like he did this past playoffs.

I'll reserve judgement until next Christmas.

[Carl Yagro]

All good points about EP. It's just the whole "He who cannot be criticized" is absurd.

He'll come back and be better... because he has to. He will have more scoring support because the coach will trust these newly signed wingers more. Pettersson is a confident individual who will be motivated to live up to his new contract and to the same class of top forwards earning similar coin.

He has to be the difference maker that makes linemates better, not the other way around. He needs to make personal improvements like the other moody guy before him and take the reins of this team because he will be looked upon to one of the two leading co-pilots along with Hughes.

If he even played at 75% of capabilities this past playoffs, I have no doubt we would have been in the 3rd round instead.

There's no reason he shouldn't have been criticized for his late season performance. No other players were exempt from call outs including a guy with an actual major knee injury and a rental who had his own unknown issues. If it was known in January and was a major issue which needed rest, then it should have happened even before the ASG. Is that the fault of the player of agent? Or the incompetence of the coaching and medical staff? Either way with some hindsight, some rest would have been good considering a spot was locked up long before.

The whole you can only pump this one guy's tire at maximum PSI but never have a single critique is ridiculous.