Canucks: The silver linings in a potential long-term Elias Pettersson injury

What did the Vancouver Canucks do to anger the hockey gods so much? In a season full of misery, Elias Pettersson might also be out long-term with a lingering wrist injury.

If the worst-case scenario does come to fruition, it may be a while before we see Pettersson back on the ice, and given the team’s current standing in the North division, I don’t think it’s out of the question that the Swedish phenom gets held out for the rest of the year.

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But enough of the doom and gloom! Let’s try and find some potential silver linings to his injury, and there are definitely a few that comes to mind.

Firstly, Pettersson is in a contract year, and having him experience a trying season might actually lower the price of his next deal. Before he was sidelined, Pettersson had turned around his play after struggling through January.

If it weren’t for his injury, there was a very real chance that he would’ve gone on a tear for the rest of the season and ended up scoring at higher than a point per game pace, raising his asking price exponentially. Now, Pettersson’s still going to sign a ludicrous second contract regardless, but any additional leverage that the Canucks might have should be celebrated given the team’s precarious cap position.

Secondly, Vancouver’s depleted centre depth should mean that Adam Gaudette could get another crack at playing down the middle, which would most likely be his last chance at convincing the team that he has a future as a centreman. If he impresses, great, but there’s not much downside to him struggling either; the Canucks would then know that he should be converted into being a full-time winger and develop him as such without continuing to try to force him to play down the middle.

Lastly, the team was already in an uphill battle to make the playoffs, and Pettersson’s injury should be the final nail in the coffin to those hopes. This will undoubtedly be a disappointment for many fans, but it could actually be beneficial to the team in the long run because it might convince management to sell at the trade deadline.

Let’s be honest, the Canucks weren’t going to make any noise in the playoffs this year even if they qualified, so dealing pending free agents such as Tanner Pearson and Brandon Sutter (most likely with retained salary) would allow the team to restock their draft assets and add more players to Vancouver’s young core, which is exactly what they need right now considering that the Canucks are still years away from true contention.

Those are the silver linings that I can think of in light of Pettersson’s injury, but are there any that I’ve missed? Let us know in the comments below!