Vancouver Canucks: Should Loui Eriksson play on the first line?

Loui Eriksson spent large portions of last season on the fourth line. Would a move to the first line do him some good?

The contract that general manager Jim Benning handed out to Loui Eriksson in the summer of 2016 will go down as one of the biggest blemishes in his career. It’s been three years of complete disappointment for Vancouver Canuck fans.

However, I feel as though head coach Travis Green played a role in Eriksson’s regression last year.

I know there were some comments made by Loui Eriksson this off-season that were slightly out of line. As pointed out here by Patrick Johnston of the Vancouver Province, the former 30-goal scorer was frustrated with his usage. But maybe he had a point?

If you want to get more production out of Eriksson, you can’t have him playing the majority of his shifts with Jay Beagle and Tyler Motte. And you certainly can’t have him start 62 percent of his shifts in the defensive zone. Eriksson got an extended look on Bo Horvat’s line last season, but again playing a shutdown role.

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Before playing in Vancouver, Eriksson had always thrived playing with skilled players. He put up 30 goals the year before signing in Vancouver with the Boston Bruins, playing along side the slick passing David Krejci and a highly skilled, puck moving defenceman in Tory Krug. The Canucks have two similar players in the savior himself, Elias Pettersson and potential rookie phenom, Quinn Hughes.

Although Eriksson got the chance to play with Pettersson last year, it was brief and along side another under achieving forward in Nikolay Goldobin.

With Hughes making the jump to the NHL late last year and the chemistry Brock Boeser and Pettersson have developed, the Canucks have all the tools they to help Eriksson become at least a sliver of the player he used to be.

Playing Eriksson on the first line is a win/win for the Canucks anyways.

If the first line experiment is a complete bust, which it most likely would be, at least they don’t look like they tried to bury another veteran in the minors. Everyone looks at it like the Canucks gave him the best opportunity to succeed at the NHL level. The demotion to Utica would be justified.

In the slim chance that he is a fit along side Pettersson and Boeser, Green looks like an absolute genius. It isn’t hard to imagine Eriksson potting 20-25 goals while playing along side two forwards as skilled as Petey and Boeser. The increase in his offensive zone starts would help hide his deficiencies in his own zone.. Hopefully, this would make him tempting enough for another team to take a flyer near the 2020 trade deadline. At full cap hit.

While highly doubtful, I would love Green to give this a shot, even if its just for one game. Let us know where you think Eriksson should play.