The Vancouver Canucks have been struggling quite a bit of late. Some of that is injury related, some of that is not.
While it’s tough to pin their recent struggles entirely on injury, they have dealt with quite a few players bouncing in and out of the lineup due to health-related issues. It should come as no surprise to anyone that one of the players experiencing some of those issues is David Booth.
The acquisition of Booth has been an extremely disappointing one for the Canucks. Some of that is health related, some of that is not. Since he was acquired from the Florida Panthers, he’s demonstrated an inability to stay in the lineup. He played in 56 games with the Canucks last year, and has only appeared in 12 this season.
In that dozen games on the year, Booth has just three points, including only one goal. After returning from an injury towards the end of February, Booth finds himself injured again. He was unable to put any weight on his left leg after sustaining an injury during play on Saturday. Which means we could see him head to injured reserve again very soon.
There is a positive and negative side of this for the Vancouver Canucks. The positive is simply the fact that the trade was a complete wash. The Panthers didn’t win this deal any more than the Canucks lost it. The players traded for Booth, Marco Sturm and Mikael Samuelsson, are both gone from the Panthers roster.
The negative is the fact that they Canucks have barely had Booth in the lineup to make an impact. They traded for a guy who had scored at least 20 goals three times in his career and have yet to see anywhere near that level of production. Health is, of course, limiting that ability. Time to rule this one a wash, for both teams.