Laine wants to be better in first full season with Columbus

The thing about Patrik Laine is that you know he's always going to be blunt.
So when he says he doesn't have much to prove, having already put together seasons pretty much every other forward in the NHL would dream to have, he's right.
But when he also says this past season with the Blue Jackets wasn't what he wanted, it's hard to argue that as well.

"I don't think I need to prove anything anymore," Laine said Thursday after the first on-ice day of CBJ training camp, presented by OhioHealth. "I think I proved already what I can do in this league. Scoring over 40, that's not an everyday thing for a lot of guys in this league. I've done that already, but I don't think I'm in that position anymore where I have to prove anything to anybody.
"But I still want to be better. It doesn't matter if I scored 70 last year ... I just want to be a better player than I was the last year. It's gonna be pretty easy this year because I was pretty (crap) last year, but I just try to kind of build on last year and try to be better and have fun this season."
The hope is that part of the fun is that Laine has a bounceback season, with results matching those of the All-Star-level player who pumped in 44 goals in 2017-18, not last season's 10-11-21 line in 45 games with the Blue Jackets that left both the player and team frustrated.
His 0.22 goals per game would have projected to 18 tallies over an 82-game season, by far the lowest output of his career (his 30 goals while playing all 82 games in 2018-19 was his previous low). For someone known as one of the most talented players in the league, with an all-world shot that helped make him the No. 2 overall pick in the 2016 draft, it was not the debut that anyone had hoped for.

"We have kind of beaten this to death," head coach Brad Larsen said. "He didn't have a great finish with us. He admitted it. But he's put that behind him. I've put that behind him myself. It's a fresh start for him. He's put the work in. He's excited. I think he's energized. That's the first step, and I think now we get into camp and everybody wants to get going at this point. … I expect Patty to have a better start, a better year, but I expect that from a lot of our guys."
It also appears the Blue Jackets made it a point during the offseason to bring in some help for Laine, starting with the acquisition of Jakub Voracek, who is expected to start on the same line as the Finnish sniper. One of the NHL's premier passers, Voracek has 333 assists in the last seven seasons to place sixth in the NHL in that span. That's especially true on the power play, as Voracek has 127 assists on the power play in that span, ninth in the NHL.
"I'm excited to bring in Jake," Laine said. "He's definitely a pass-first type of guy, which I prefer, and we had some good looks on the ice today so I hope we can build some chemistry between us too. Hopefully we are going to be able to play together and win a lot of games for this team."
In addition, Columbus added defensemen Adam Boqvist and Jake Bean via trade, two young blueliners with offensive skills who have NHL experience quarterbacking a power play. Laine had an NHL-best 20 power-play tallies during his 44-goal season but a just a career-low four a season ago.
Add in the fact that Laine will be able to start the season from Columbus and go through an entire camp, plus has familiarity with his teammates and can actually spend time around them with many of the league's COVID restrictions lifted, and the hope is this season will be a bit of a fresh start.

"After I took my skates off after the last game," Laine said when asked how long it took him to put last season behind him. "I hit the reset button for myself. Yeah, it was a tough one, but I'm not thinking about it anymore. As an athlete, you will go through ups and downs. It would be pretty boring if you were just playing good all the time. You have to have bad stretches and even sometimes you are going to have a bad season. You can't help it. You just have to try to fight it and try to get out of it. Now there's 82 and hopefully more great opportunities to play good, and I'm excited about that."
Laine admitted last season wasn't particularly enjoyable, largely because the Blue Jackets were out of the playoff chase by the trade deadline and ended up finishing last in the Central Division. This year, the hope is to turn things around, in large part because of a big season from the Tesoman tykki.
"Losing is not fun," he said. "Everybody in this league wants to win, and that's the most fun thing about this sport is to win with those guys in the locker room. That's what we are here to do -- have fun and play as hard as we can, and good results are going to come.
"We are going to get a lot of wins and we're going to lose some games, but you always have to remember to have fun. I think a lot of guys, me included, forgot that last year. It's just a game. You gotta take it seriously, but there's more than that, so just try to have fun and win a lot of hockey games."