Canucks Army Roundtable: Ch-ch-ch-changes

The Canucks have had a pretty busy off-season. They’ve added a marquee forward in free agency, brought another back from Sweden and added a pair of blueliners by trade and draft that likely figure prominently in the Canucks’ long-term vision.

All this is to say that there are going to be a lot of new faces around town next season. Frankly, they’re mostly solid hockey additions, too. Like, that’s kind of neat. So, I asked the Canucks Army staff, who among these newcomers are they the most intrigued by or encouraged to see?

Loui Eriksson just to see if he and the Sedins can recreate Team Sweden’s super fun power play from the 2013 worlds.

I’m stoked to follow the development of Olli Juolevi. He’s the highest pick I’ve had the chance to see the Canucks make and following his development into (hopefully) an impact player in the NHL will be something positive to hold on to, even if this season’s team is as bad as last season’s.

Gudbranson because I’m hoping he can justify trading as much as we did for him. Obviously most of us don’t know much about him because we only saw Florida twice but hopefully he’ll make a name for himself. Loui Eriksson will most likely thrive with the Sedins, so obviously he/they will be very exciting to watch too.

Anton Rodin. Sure, he’s probably not going to make an impact in the way that Eriksson and Juolevi (one day) will, but his story is just so damn fun.

SHL>AHL>SHL>NHL isn’t exactly the development pattern you expect from a young player, and a former B-prospect coming out of nowhere and becoming a solid NHL contributor at 25 would be a great story to rally around if the season is disappointing.

More importantly, I just really like everything I’ve seen from Rodin and I think he can be a 35-45 point guy if things go well. If his scoring can translate, he’ll be a really fun player to watch, and I think the team has been pretty short on fun over the past few years.

In accordance with my personal bias towards defensemen, I’ve been excited about North Dakota alumnus Troy Stecher ever since the Canucks signed him  back in April. The Richmond, B.C. product skates and drives play forward exceptionally well. He can produce offence and his numbers last year at North Dakota were a marked improvement over his first two seasons. Assuming he does not pull a Ben Hutton and make the team directly out of camp – which I will not entirely rule out at this point – I will be closely monitoring his development down in Utica.

Im excited for Gudbranson myself. Its always good to see a potential stud defenseman come to Vancouver and turn into a star. Sami Salo was already pretty decent but he really made a name for himself as a Canuck. Gubby is gritty and a leader and this team needs both. Hopefully he’s used appropriately because well….sometimes Sbisa

I’m excited to see what Gudbranson can do. He’s under a lot of pressure (for good reason) and I would like to see if he can somehow rise to occasion and surprise some people.