Player Discussion Elias Pettersson Talk | Also Chiropractors, the Medical Staff, and You

[Hodgy]

I think Pettersson’s struggles are probably a bit of both bad play and his linemates.

It’s right that no other top player has to carry crap like Mikheyev, Lafferty, etc. like he had to down the stretch last year.

As an aside, it is too bad they couldn’t make it work with Kuzmenko as the two did get elite results when together. Pettersson scored 3.7 P/60 with him and they had ~55% of the goals when on the ice. Pettersson’s defensive results are better without him but not enough to offset the loss in offence.

At the same time, at even strength over his last half season’s worth of games he’s scored at a ~30 point/82 game pace. That’s the production you get from a good middle six forward playing with other middle six players.

Ya, there is a weird false dichotomy here where people are looking for a singular explanation for his bad play. To me, its a combination of him just playing poorly and his linemates. If it was just the latter you’d expect him to look better at even strength and see plays die on his teammates sticks, or for him to still dominate in the power play, but neither is the case. He just looks pretty bad, relatively speaking, no matter the context.

 

[clay]

I strongly believe in Petey still. The Monstars didn’t zap his superstar talent. He needs to get his confidence back which will happen at some point.

 

[Hodgy]

As an aside, based on contributing to HF for like 20 years, when a player or prospect is playing poorly and excuses are made for that player, like 80% of the time those excuses turn out to be unwarranted. It’s just the reality of fan-based forum.

 

[MS]

I think this fanbase just needs somebody to complain about. Miller was equally divisive and that was proven to be absolutely stupid as well. Sedin hate was also f***ing stupid.

This isn't 'needs someone to complain about'.

Pettersson has 0 ES goals in 34 games. 1 ES goal in his last 40 games. He has looked absolutely horrific for half a season. This would be a major story for any superstar athlete in any sport in any city.

It's not 'hate'. It's one of our most important players playing so badly that if it continues it essentially ends our competitive window. It's a big f***ing deal.

 

[Bonham]

This isn't 'needs someone to complain about'.

Pettersson has 0 ES goals in 34 games. 1 ES goal in his last 40 games. He has looked absolutely horrific for half a season. This would be a major story for any superstar athlete in any sport in any city.

It's not 'hate'. It's one of our most important players playing so badly that if it continues it essentially ends our competitive window. It's a big f***ing deal.

I knew it was bad but I didn't realize it was that bad.

Those are replacement level numbers.

 

[arttk]

This isn't 'needs someone to complain about'.

Pettersson has 0 ES goals in 34 games. 1 ES goal in his last 40 games. He has looked absolutely horrific for half a season. This would be a major story for any superstar athlete in any sport in any city.

It's not 'hate'. It's one of our most important players playing so badly that if it continues it essentially ends our competitive window. It's a big f***ing deal.

We are talking about different things here. I do think there is legit concern that he has not recovered in form, I think those convos are justified and valid. I think where I don't agree is the hysteria around it and from some posters, the f***ing hate.

There is a big difference between saying he's struggling and that's a concern vs using that and laddering to the idea about how he was bad since after Oct and he simply is not the same player as before when the numbers clearly do not suppor that.

That is a classic case of you guys want a conclusion to be true and just trying to rationalize that rather letting the evidence guide you to it. You cannot be shit and put up PPG+ ES numbers with both linemates putting up 2 and 3 points respectively at the same time, that's just not factual and the evidence doesnt support it. If your eye test says he sucks and yet he put up like 100+ point pace(including PP production), then your eyes are wrong because there is no f***ing wrong way to put up 100+ point pace. Hell if you drop somebody into this thread and read all the messages about him, one would assume he put up like 30ish points, not 89 points last season.

And most importantly, no he was not horrific for half a season, his slump started post Feb. he scored 13 points in Dec, 21 in Jan and 11 in Feb and then the production dropped starting march. When you guys take the truth and stretch it, you lose credibility. He scored at a slightly lower pace in Feb compared to Dec and Nov, like literally 1 or 2 point difference. Hell in March, he scored 4 goals which is the exact same amount he scored in Nov and Dec and he scored only 5 in Oct when apparently he was hot, like come on.

Yes, he did slump and if you look at the numbers, it really started at end of March lasting through the playoffs. I think if his linemates actually were a little bit better in april and march, his points total would probably be in the 100s but people would still be concern because his playoffs numbers would still be shit.

At the end of the day, my view on this is a bunch of people are just stretching the truth to make it seem like, Petey is f***ing done, in fact he was so done that he was cooked since after his hot streak in Oct when the truth is he peaked in Jan and put up 136 point pace that month and then his performance dropped right exactly when his injury was reported and even then it didn't drop that much, it went down to a 76 point pace the following month then to 60 point pace the following and then 50 point pace in the last month and 40 point pace in the playoffs. It's almost like his effectiveness gradually decreased as he kept on playing through his injury. But a gradual decrease in effectiveness from playing through an injury doesn't sound as alarming and sensational as, HE WAS f***ING SHITE IN 40 GAMES, ABSOLUTE TRASH I TELL YOU.