By: Brayden Fengler / March 11, 2023 Canucks Twitter is one of the most active (for better or worse) sports team Twitter spheres on the internet. But being that the team sees so much online engagement on a daily basis, it almost goes without saying that some tweets, hot takes, and comments from Canucks fans fly under the radar, just due to the sheer volume of content that is out there.
In this series, we aim to find tweets that have gone unread within Canucks Twitter. No one person can engage with every tweet (nor should they, that sounds like no fun), but we’ve collected a few tweets that we felt deserved more engagement.
Kuzmenko Sparks Joy
Kuzmenko has made this Canucks season worth watching. His exciting flashes of skill and pure uncontainable love of the game (leaking out contagiously through the TV during his goal celebrations) give fans reason to tune in every night.
This team is in the basement, and they are there to stay for the season, so fans can’t be blamed for not tuning in to watch every game. The pictures from this tweet highlight an exciting player with an infectious personality that is keeping fans engaged when they have every reason to become apathetic.
Kuzmenko, just like Podkolzin and Höglander before him, has been an unexpected “rookie” addition to this club during a year when fans are in desperate need of a silver lining.
Unlike those two other players, Kuzmenko hasn’t just stopped at being a somewhat exciting new face for the team, he has absolutely crushed any and all expectations laid out for him. Kuzmenko has scored 30 goals in 63 games this season. I would have been happy if he only came close to 20.
Glutton for Punishment
Let me ask you one question Markus, if that is your real name… Why would you do this to yourself? Is the pain and disappointment brought on by this Canucks season not enough for you?
Looking back at what could’ve been is never an exercise that will end well for a Canucks fan. My favourite masochistic tendency along these lines is to reflect back to the 2017 NHL entry draft.
Initially, you might be thinking, “hey, that’s the year that we drafted Elias Pettersson, what could’ve gone wrong there”? Well, after the first round, everything went downhill quickly for the Canucks when they decided to select, from the Kelowna Rockets, right winger Kole Lind at 33rd overall. Just a few picks later, Dallas selected Jason Robertson 39th overall.
Kole Lind has yet to break into the NHL while Robertson has earned a career-high 83 points in 65 games this season.
Examples similar to the above are plentiful across the league and the nature of drafting itself is sure to result in many missed opportunities only realized years later. For every Pettersson the Canucks draft, there is a Robertson that gets away. Sometimes, it can feel like it’s mostly the latter for this franchise.
Pettersson Can’t Be Stopped
I am all for any stat that Pumps Petey’s tires! He has been having an incredible season and despite the performance from the team as a whole, it is extremely rewarding to see EP40 rise above it all and put on a performance that blows his previous year out of the water.
In 80 games last year, Petterson earned 68 points. Now, in just 62 games, Petey has demolished his previous year’s performance, earning 81 points and counting. This stat says it all, Petey is done with the slumping.
If there was ever a year that Pettersson could’ve taken a back seat, and been excused for having the poor performance of his team hold back his own success, it may have been this year.
But Pettersson can’t be held back. Not even in a year when his team is, yet again, far from being a true contender. EP40 has had his slumps in the past, but with each passing game, Pettersson looks to be snuffing out that narrative once and for all. It’s stats like this one, that really highlight his dominance not just on the Canucks, but within the league.
Philly D
Phil Di Giuseppe is currently being asked to play more minutes a night than he has in his career since his first season in the NHL with the Hurricanes in 2015-16. Giuseppe has recently been playing top-six minutes and was on a line with Pettersson and Miller to kick off their last contest against the Ducks.
Other than this pun sparked by the player’s name, I’m not too thrilled with anything to do with Di Giueseppe in general. Phil currently doesn’t have too much to show for his added reliance under new coach Rick Tocchet.
Di Giuseppe currently has four points this season in Vancouver. Despite not completely fumbling the bag after being tasked with critical deployment, he has not been able to take full advantage of the opportunity given to him.
Perhaps if your team tank, a player like Di Giuseppe seeing heightened deployment is the stuff of your dreams. Otherwise, I wouldn’t spend too much extra time writing more rhymes about this player.
The Future of The Canucks’ Defence
With the addition of Hronek and the team’s decision not to flip a piece like Ethan Bear at the trade deadline, perhaps this management group really does feel like their right-shot d-man problem is solved.
This has been a problem lingering on the Canucks for years at this point, and although it would be nice to think that the struggles of filling that position are finally over, much remains to be seen. Hronek is currently out week to week with a shoulder injury, and although it is likely that he will return before the season is over, there is no telling how he will slot into the Canucks current defensive situation.
Wolanin and Brisebois are both “fine” for the Canucks right now, but long term neither one of them brings this team’s defense to where it needs to be. Over the years Brisebois has seen multiple brief stints with the Canucks, and Wolanin has played only nine games for the club so far but has been bounced around other NHL teams experiencing similarly short stints over past seasons.
With Brisebois at 25 years old and Wolanin at 27, this team should know what they have and don’t have in those players. Both players are decent, safe options for now, with “for now” being the keywords.
Although I don’t think either Wolanin or Brisebois need to be a part of the Canucks defensive future, I would like to see Elias Pettersson get his shot with the Abbotsford Canucks next season. The 19-year-old prospect is currently developing in the SHL but his World Juniors performance caught my eye and I would like to see him over on North American ice sooner than later.
Read and Replied
Another five tweets have now been saved from the void that is Canucks Twitter. You may say that “saved” is far too strong of a word to describe the rambling replies that you just read through, but we can agree to disagree. One thing is clear either way, Canucks Twitter is certainly not lacking content.