Laine scored 30 goals last season, down from 44 in 2017-18, but the 21-year-old forward said Monday he was dealing with back and groin issues when the Jets were eliminated by the St. Louis Blues in the Western Conference First Round last season. He said he's confident he can again be the player he was two seasons ago.
"I'm going to score a lot of goals, that's for sure," Laine said. "I've always trusted myself and this is no exception. I'm going to be betting on myself in these two years."
Laine said the focus of his offseason was to skate more and earlier, and to continue improvements in his 200-foot game. He scored five goals in 34 games after the 2019 Honda NHL All-Star Weekend.
"I need consistency," he said. "I've focused more on my 5-on-5 play, and that's something I've got to focus on when the season starts on Thursday. I think just be hard on pucks, get all the pucks deep, play smart with the puck, like on top of the blue lines ... not that many turnovers and just be hard on forecheck and obviously play better defense.
"Like you saw last year, the plus-minus was pretty terrible (minus-24), so I've got to do better in that section too. But it's always a new challenge and I'm up for it and I'll be real good this year."
Those elements were part of the discussion Laine had with Jets coach Paul Maurice, who traveled to Finland in the offseason to meet with him.
"Yeah, it was a great move from him to come over there and talk and talk about last year and talk about the future," Laine said. "I had great talks with him. We both want to be better. It's a different team this year, but we'll be good when the season starts. It was great meeting and it was a lot of fun."