Preseason is a great time to see who had the best offseason.

Whether a player has spent the summer bulking up or vegging out, it will show in the early going. After the incredibly disappointing start that the 2024-25 season got off to, the Vancouver Canucks had to be hoping for more positive signs as 2025-26 got going.

And positive signs there have been. Several Canucks look noticeably better already than they did at any point last season, with the chief among them being the senior Elias Pettersson. But if we were to isolate the individual in the organization who would seem to have undergone the most personal growth this past offseason, so far it seems to be the 21-year-old Jonathan Lekkerimäki.

Lekkerimäki came into the 2025-26 season with a curious set of expectations. Most pundits have him ranked anywhere between the best and third-best prospect in the Vancouver system. He played 24 NHL games last year – just narrowly retaining his rookie eligibility – and tore apart the AHL with 19 goals in 36 games. And yet, most believed he would be on the outside of the Canucks’ lineup looking in, at least to start.

There were a few reasons for this. Despite playing so many games as a 20-year-old, Lekkerimäki almost always looked like a player who still had plenty to learn. Due to injury, he was not a full participant in the Abbotsford Canucks’ run to the Calder Cup, and was thus seen as someone who could still use some further development at that level. On top of all that, Lekkerimäki retains his waiver exemption, which makes him easier to send down than some of the older prospects he’s competing with for a spot.

Yet Lekkerimäki has put himself in a position to earn an opening night spot despite all those factors. A spot not just in the lineup, but perhaps in the Canucks’ top-six.

Now, Nils Höglander’s injury – said to keep him out of the lineup for the first eight weeks or so of the regular season – is what has truly opened the door for Lekkerimäki. But that’s an opportunity that could have been grabbed by any number of players. Lekkerimäki is the one grabbing because, as we mentioned at the outset, he had one hell of an offseason.

Lekkerimäki’s gifts have always been apparent. He was named one of the best shots in his draft class, and that has certainly proven the case. He’s a genuine sniper with a preternatural ability for finding the back of the net. That much was evident last year in Abbotsford, with Lekkerimäki’s goal-per-game rate being the eighth highest in the AHL and the highest of anyone under the age of 23. There were also glimpses of it at the NHL level, whenever Lekkerimäki got the time and space to put his shooting skills on display.

But getting that time and space was the issue. Lekkerimäki was left with a laundry list of things to improve on over the offseason. That included adding some footspeed to gain distance out on the ice, increasing his ability to win puck battles, and finding ways to use his growing frame to protect the puck once he had it.

Check, check, check-erimäki.

When we say that Lekkerimäki turned heads at Training Camp and then again during the preseason, we don’t mean for the usual reasons. Well, we do. That elite shot is still very much present and readily apparent:

But what has really been drawing notice is how many other facets of Lekkerimäki’s game seem to be catching up to the shot. Lekkerimäki is visibly more engaged out there, and has been winning that necessary time and space for himself. He’s all of a sudden a lot quicker to loose pucks, a lot harder to knock off them, and doing a lot more to create room for himself and his linemates.

In other words, Lekkerimäki seems to have spent the offseason addressing the shortcomings in his game, and it shows. And he hasn’t done so in a way that gets him away from what has made him successful so far. He’s adding facets to his game that emphasize his top skills. He’s becoming a more complete player.

When a player has an offseason like this, and shows up to camp having worked on everything an organization asked them to, you really want to see them rewarded with a spot. And now that a spot has opened wide open in the wake of Höglander’s injury, there’s little reason for that spot not to go to Lekkerimäki.

Besides being the right reward for the player himself, it’s also probably the best move for the team. That’s especially true if another impressive youngster, Braeden Cootes, makes the final cut.

Centre ice was always going to be a position of weakness for the 2025-26 Canucks, and a position in need of some insulation. Cootes being an unexpected success right off the bat certainly helps with the strength of the centres, but not with that need for insulation – he is, after all, 18 years old.

The best way to insulate centres is with strong wingers. And the Canucks have a fine enough collection, with their top four wingers probably being Brock Boeser, Jake DeBrusk, Evander Kane, and Conor Garland.

Boeser and DeBrusk seem likely to line up with Pettersson on the top line. If we’re just going by the next-most-qualified, then that would leave Kane and Garland to line up with Filip Chytil. But that doesn’t leave the most support for Cootes as the ostensible 3C.

A much better, and more balanced solution might be the arrangement that the Canucks opened camp up with. That’s Lekkerimäki in the ‘top-six,’ on the wing with Kane and Chytil, and Garland down on the third line. It’s a spot Garland is familiar with, and it would allow him to be a pitch-perfect support to Cootes. Garland’s feistiness, his competitiveness, and his defensive excellence would all go a long way to making Cootes’ transition to the NHL smoother.

And, honestly, it’s hard not to like this arrangement of wingers, even in a world where Cootes goes back to junior. Whether it’s Cootes, Aatu Räty, or Teddy Blueger in that 3C spot, they’re going to need support from wingers. And right now, Lekkerimäki sure looks like one of the best six wingers that the team can offer.

If he makes the final cut, Lekkerimäki should have a good eight weeks to establish himself. When Höglander comes back, if Lekkerimäki still looks like someone who could use further AHL development, it’s easy enough to send him down at that point.

And if Lekkerimäki proves impossible to dislodge from the forward corps by then?

All the better.