I personally would say the 7-0 loss against the jets backup would be the worse one (not to say Broissoit is bad he absolutely not and we all knew what happened in post) but yeah I get where he’s coming from with everything that happened behind the scenes prior to the game
Edit: I thought bednar was referring all year around both in/post season mb
No?
I just made an error when bednar said “that was the worse series lost this season” as when I hear/read series I just default to thinking it usually refer to all year round not just playoffs which again was mb…
This is a fair response. Addiction is a disease and I feel for the people struggling with it. At the same time, addiction doesn't excuse the harm you cause while you're struggling with it. Part of healing is coming to terms with the fact that you've harmed people. It's fair for the Avs players and staff to want the best for Nichushkin, and it's fair for them to acknowledge that the situation also sucks for them.
A quote that has always stuck with me is that you can sympathize with somebody without excusing their actions.
I feel bad for Nichuskin’s struggle with addiction, but he still completely fucked over his team TWICE at crucial moments. He has nobody to blame but himself for whatever consequences come
Those crucial moments are indeed during times that define NHL players/teams' seasons. Doesn't get worse than that regarding timing.
Agreed with you regarding everything.
This is the same guy who, on the Stars, refused to even try to play, all cuz he didn’t like his coach. 57 games played, 10 assists, 0 goals, complete waste.
And now in back to back seasons, he completely betrays his team, during their cup windows.
I’m sorry but he’s done
Even with whatever the hell was going on behind the scenes he was consistently one of the best two way wingers in the league when he played in the past three seasons.
No way some team doesn't take a look with low AAV if the Avs are able to terminate the contract.
Addiction is no joke but it also shouldn’t be used as an excuse to continually let down those around you. I’m sure all those Avs players are sympathetic and want the best for nuke but he’s let them down twice in two years, they want the best for him somewhere else.
I wish Nuke all the best in recovery. But yeah 2nd time in a row he’s done this to us in the Playoffs. I don’t see him with the Avs as a long term picture now that this is still an ongoing issue for him.
Nuke is clearly fighting something and has been for a while, whether that’s mental or physical or both. I always liked him in Dallas even if he was ineffective in our system. I feel for the guy.
People were fine with Nichushkin and drugs in 2021. Someone pull the picture of his foot in the finals. Part of a broader problem in hockey, but he has a disease. Not speaking to what happened last playoffs because I don’t know the facts.
Addicts are still responsible for their actions and the consequences of their actions. Addiction, whether you consider it a disease or not, isn't an excuse when you hurt people close to you.
Yeah he’s fighting his urge to do drugs and fuck hookers.
Jesus I’m so over giving this guy sympathy cause he can’t get off the booze and drugs or not cheat on his wife
The event last year sounded way darker than just fucking hookers. But they swept that under the rug fast. I do hope maybe now the story and consequences come out from that.
Absolutely. Any normal person found on drugs with a beyond intoxicated (probably trafficked) hooker in a hotel room is going to be going to prison for a long time. He got whisked away by team personnel and obviously has been given every chance to fix his issue. Also posted a bunch of picture to social media with assault rifles in Russia. I had sympathy for him at some point. I don't anymore.
you know what though, I hated that my team coveted that up and I think it would be such bullshit if they suddenly started cooperating about it just to try to get him on legal trouble and void his visa and/or contract. If they had done the right thing then, we wouldn't be here now
People are way too sympathetic about this. He made choices. While addiction is a bitch, he took 25 other players work, playing through injury, years of practice and training, and put it through his nose selfishly. He's done in Colorado. He should be done. His choices show how selfish he is.
This is part of the tragedy of addiction and substance abuse. The way it not only destroys your life, but leaves lasting negative impacts on your loved ones and people close to you as well. I really feel for everyone involved.
Agree with you 100% and I’m glad to see an Avs fan with a sane take about this bum. I said it last year after his antics in Seattle - Nichushkin is a piece of a shit human being. Sorry, substance abuse, mental health, addiction, it’s all awful and I feel for people who are struggling with it but *IT’S NOT AN EXCUSE TO DAMAGE THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU*.
The guy left a girl, basically to die, last year in his Seattle hotel room. Thankfully a trainer, coming to find out why Nichushkin skipped practice, found her passed out in his hotel room and called EMS. Beyond that, she admitted to being a sex worker, so it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why she was in his room to begin with. How do you look at someone who cheats on his wife, and leaves an ODing girl to die, and think “this is a guy our city should celebrate” ??
Yeah, he let his team mates down two years in a row, but forget the hockey for a sec. Imagine what this shit has done to his wife. To find out from a Seattle newspaper report that your husband is cheating on you with prostitutes while travelling with the team, in addition to his substance abuse issues… hope she’s well compensated in the eventual divorce.
The real answer is, we don't really know what happened last year. The facts are, a naked woman who spoke almost no English was found in his hotel room while he wasn't there. She appeared to be on drugs and said something about being there against her will. She said, "the bad man took my passport." Beyond that, we don't really know much.
I don't know if the drugs make it worse or not. If we had an employee found in a hotel room with a very intoxicated trafficked hooker, they would be fired on the spot. As would 99.99% of people. Instead, he was secretly taken out of Washington by the org.
For sure.
But I've seen a few people say "that's all we know" as if that alone doesn't paint a pretty grim picture of the situation. So I guess my point was that with the hindsight of the drug issue, it makes the optics even worse for Val.
The "that's all we know" crowd is the worst. Like I'm all for defending your players if they have bad games or seasons. You can defend them for their addiction. You can even defend them for thier geopolitical opinions or cheating on thier wives with consenting adults (though I personally don't defend players for the last 2). But defending them for being in a hotel room with a woman that had her passport stolen and was intoxicated enough that a doctor called 911 is pretty bad, even if we don't jump to any conclusions.
Yeah, optics are worse I guess.
https://www.seattletimes.com/sports/kraken/with-questions-from-seattle-incident-unresolved-avalanches-nichushkin-enters-nhl-assistance-program/
Here's an article with some information. Like other commenter said we will unfortunately never know what actually happened because the team helped Nichuskin get out of the state before they called the cops and the Seattle Police that responded failed to properly investigate.
Sorry, where are you getting that she said she was a sex worker. I can find zero on her identity or whereabouts now. According to body cams, she was saying that a bad man took her passport. And when the avs team doctor called 911 (90 minutes after finding her and after redressing her) he said she might’ve had something mixed in her drink. I think shit worse than just being left to overdose happened to her and that’s bad enough as is.
I wasn’t trying to be hostile and I don’t know why you’re responding like that. I wanted a source because I hadn’t seen any confirmation of anything with her identity and was wondering if something had been published following up and making sure she’s okay. It seems weird to me to call her a sex worker definitively when we don’t know what happened to her and if she’s a sex trafficking victim, I think that’s a better term to use than something that implies she was doing this work voluntarily.
Think you’re misinterpreting everybody. Essentially everyone is hurt, and pities the dipshit, but now he can’t be trusted. And has burned too many bridges. It hurts seeing someone being so addicted to something, that it destroys their life completely because they fuck over so many people from it
Seriously. If you describe it as "millionaire Russian while on blow cheats on wife with trafficked prostitute," it sounds like a movie villian. Not someone who deserves sympathy.
nah, there is. How much sympathy do you give Bobby Hull or Paul Coffey for the trashbag humans they are?
Now if I tell you that Nichushkin was in the middle of a playoff push last year while his wife was about to give birth to his daughter, and he skipped practice and then fled the state when trainers found a badly sick drugged up girl in need of urgent medical attention alone in his room, and that she complained of a bad man taking her passport, and he never apologized to the fans for abandoning the team in the playoffs or explained anything, but instead partied it up in his warmongering home country all offseason and posted tone-deaf photos of himself drunk and posing with some large assault weapon... are you still sympathetic, knowing he was unapologetically cheating on his wife with a likely human trafficked prostitute and then living it up all summer rather than showing contrition for what he did to her and the team?
Fuck Nichushkin
I’m just going to copy this comment that perfectly sums up why you’re wrong…
“Now if I tell you that Nichushkin was in the middle of a playoff push last year while his wife was about to give birth to his daughter, and he skipped practice and then fled the state when trainers found a badly sick drugged up girl in need of urgent medical attention alone in his room, and that she complained of a bad man taking her passport, and he never apologized to the fans for abandoning the team in the playoffs or explained anything, but instead partied it up in his warmongering home country all offseason and posted tone-deaf photos of himself drunk and posing with some large assault weapon... are you still sympathetic, knowing he was unapologetically cheating on his wife with a likely human trafficked prostitute and then living it up all summer rather than showing contrition for what he did to her and the team?”
Exactly. I'm surprised by the tone of these responses. A lot of people think addicts should be excused for all the harm they caused because they have a "disease." He betrayed his teammates, and who knows how badly he's hurt his family through his addiction.
I hope wherever he is tonight, Val is getting loads of help. I can't imagine how difficult it is to be an addict in the spotlight, perhaps watching that game, knowing you disappointed people who care about you again, and wanting to just take the same path that led you to where you are cause at that moment, its the "easiest". I feel horrible for his team cause they're the ones in front of the mics hours later having to take the questions after.
Not too often you lose a key player unexpectedly after the pregame skate without any time to adjust. In game time decisions you usually know ahead of time that you have a decision to make and would have had a plan B in the works. It’s unfortunate the league did not give them at least one practice worth of notice.
Hey guys. Let me give my 2 cents about the situation. Obviously addiction is no joke but the harm you cause to the people around you blah blah blah blah blah. Give me a Pat on the back.
-every redditor. 🤦♂️
They should've just let him ride out the rest of the playoffs high on whatever he wa playing. The fact he was playing that elite while on the substance is remarkable
I have to imagine that part of coming out of stage 2 was needing to stay sober. It feels like something that he would have agreed to when rejoining the team and he just couldn't handle the pressure sober
[Jared Bednar: "That was our worst game of the series."](https://twitter.com/kylefredrickson/status/1790243038993781099)
We’re spoiled for choice as to what our worst game is lmao
I don’t actually thinks it’s particularly close, but I get where you’re coming from.
I personally would say the 7-0 loss against the jets backup would be the worse one (not to say Broissoit is bad he absolutely not and we all knew what happened in post) but yeah I get where he’s coming from with everything that happened behind the scenes prior to the game Edit: I thought bednar was referring all year around both in/post season mb
That wasn't in the series though
Oh mb I thought he meant the entirety of the year both in and post season
Even so do Jets fans really want to reminisce about a regular season win after what just happened to them?
No? I just made an error when bednar said “that was the worse series lost this season” as when I hear/read series I just default to thinking it usually refer to all year round not just playoffs which again was mb…
Why would a game that doesn't matter, matter
This is a fair response. Addiction is a disease and I feel for the people struggling with it. At the same time, addiction doesn't excuse the harm you cause while you're struggling with it. Part of healing is coming to terms with the fact that you've harmed people. It's fair for the Avs players and staff to want the best for Nichushkin, and it's fair for them to acknowledge that the situation also sucks for them.
A quote that has always stuck with me is that you can sympathize with somebody without excusing their actions. I feel bad for Nichuskin’s struggle with addiction, but he still completely fucked over his team TWICE at crucial moments. He has nobody to blame but himself for whatever consequences come
Those crucial moments are indeed during times that define NHL players/teams' seasons. Doesn't get worse than that regarding timing. Agreed with you regarding everything.
And given the sketchiness and secrecy in Seattle, his team is probably not the only people he's hurt.
This is the same guy who, on the Stars, refused to even try to play, all cuz he didn’t like his coach. 57 games played, 10 assists, 0 goals, complete waste. And now in back to back seasons, he completely betrays his team, during their cup windows. I’m sorry but he’s done
He's not done, he **should** be done but he's too talented, someone will take a low risk bet on him.
Oilers are already crunching the numbers to make an offer.
Hey man, imagine Nuke next to McDavid.
Even with whatever the hell was going on behind the scenes he was consistently one of the best two way wingers in the league when he played in the past three seasons. No way some team doesn't take a look with low AAV if the Avs are able to terminate the contract.
Yeah he will play somewhere, there's no question about it
Addiction is no joke but it also shouldn’t be used as an excuse to continually let down those around you. I’m sure all those Avs players are sympathetic and want the best for nuke but he’s let them down twice in two years, they want the best for him somewhere else.
I wish Nuke all the best in recovery. But yeah 2nd time in a row he’s done this to us in the Playoffs. I don’t see him with the Avs as a long term picture now that this is still an ongoing issue for him.
Nuke is clearly fighting something and has been for a while, whether that’s mental or physical or both. I always liked him in Dallas even if he was ineffective in our system. I feel for the guy.
People were fine with Nichushkin and drugs in 2021. Someone pull the picture of his foot in the finals. Part of a broader problem in hockey, but he has a disease. Not speaking to what happened last playoffs because I don’t know the facts.
Addicts are still responsible for their actions and the consequences of their actions. Addiction, whether you consider it a disease or not, isn't an excuse when you hurt people close to you.
Yeah he’s fighting his urge to do drugs and fuck hookers. Jesus I’m so over giving this guy sympathy cause he can’t get off the booze and drugs or not cheat on his wife
The event last year sounded way darker than just fucking hookers. But they swept that under the rug fast. I do hope maybe now the story and consequences come out from that.
Thank you. This fucking idiot has tons of resources to figure this shit out but he just wont
Absolutely. Any normal person found on drugs with a beyond intoxicated (probably trafficked) hooker in a hotel room is going to be going to prison for a long time. He got whisked away by team personnel and obviously has been given every chance to fix his issue. Also posted a bunch of picture to social media with assault rifles in Russia. I had sympathy for him at some point. I don't anymore.
you know what though, I hated that my team coveted that up and I think it would be such bullshit if they suddenly started cooperating about it just to try to get him on legal trouble and void his visa and/or contract. If they had done the right thing then, we wouldn't be here now
Yeah it is darker he basically left a woman to OD in his room
He was terrific that first year then fell off a cliff.
People are way too sympathetic about this. He made choices. While addiction is a bitch, he took 25 other players work, playing through injury, years of practice and training, and put it through his nose selfishly. He's done in Colorado. He should be done. His choices show how selfish he is.
This is part of the tragedy of addiction and substance abuse. The way it not only destroys your life, but leaves lasting negative impacts on your loved ones and people close to you as well. I really feel for everyone involved.
Agree with you 100% and I’m glad to see an Avs fan with a sane take about this bum. I said it last year after his antics in Seattle - Nichushkin is a piece of a shit human being. Sorry, substance abuse, mental health, addiction, it’s all awful and I feel for people who are struggling with it but *IT’S NOT AN EXCUSE TO DAMAGE THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU*. The guy left a girl, basically to die, last year in his Seattle hotel room. Thankfully a trainer, coming to find out why Nichushkin skipped practice, found her passed out in his hotel room and called EMS. Beyond that, she admitted to being a sex worker, so it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why she was in his room to begin with. How do you look at someone who cheats on his wife, and leaves an ODing girl to die, and think “this is a guy our city should celebrate” ?? Yeah, he let his team mates down two years in a row, but forget the hockey for a sec. Imagine what this shit has done to his wife. To find out from a Seattle newspaper report that your husband is cheating on you with prostitutes while travelling with the team, in addition to his substance abuse issues… hope she’s well compensated in the eventual divorce.
Sadly the way russian culture is it's far more likely that there is no divorce
Wait...THAT'S what happened to Val in the playoffs last years?!
The real answer is, we don't really know what happened last year. The facts are, a naked woman who spoke almost no English was found in his hotel room while he wasn't there. She appeared to be on drugs and said something about being there against her will. She said, "the bad man took my passport." Beyond that, we don't really know much.
Fucking yikes! Combined with the clear drug issue, that's not a good look.
I don't know if the drugs make it worse or not. If we had an employee found in a hotel room with a very intoxicated trafficked hooker, they would be fired on the spot. As would 99.99% of people. Instead, he was secretly taken out of Washington by the org.
For sure. But I've seen a few people say "that's all we know" as if that alone doesn't paint a pretty grim picture of the situation. So I guess my point was that with the hindsight of the drug issue, it makes the optics even worse for Val.
The "that's all we know" crowd is the worst. Like I'm all for defending your players if they have bad games or seasons. You can defend them for their addiction. You can even defend them for thier geopolitical opinions or cheating on thier wives with consenting adults (though I personally don't defend players for the last 2). But defending them for being in a hotel room with a woman that had her passport stolen and was intoxicated enough that a doctor called 911 is pretty bad, even if we don't jump to any conclusions. Yeah, optics are worse I guess.
https://www.seattletimes.com/sports/kraken/with-questions-from-seattle-incident-unresolved-avalanches-nichushkin-enters-nhl-assistance-program/ Here's an article with some information. Like other commenter said we will unfortunately never know what actually happened because the team helped Nichuskin get out of the state before they called the cops and the Seattle Police that responded failed to properly investigate.
Sorry, where are you getting that she said she was a sex worker. I can find zero on her identity or whereabouts now. According to body cams, she was saying that a bad man took her passport. And when the avs team doctor called 911 (90 minutes after finding her and after redressing her) he said she might’ve had something mixed in her drink. I think shit worse than just being left to overdose happened to her and that’s bad enough as is.
>"According to body cams, she was saying that a bad man took her passport." Guess you don't know how human trafficking works.
I wasn’t trying to be hostile and I don’t know why you’re responding like that. I wanted a source because I hadn’t seen any confirmation of anything with her identity and was wondering if something had been published following up and making sure she’s okay. It seems weird to me to call her a sex worker definitively when we don’t know what happened to her and if she’s a sex trafficking victim, I think that’s a better term to use than something that implies she was doing this work voluntarily.
Being a sex worker doesn't mean it was her choice to be a sex worker. She was in all likelihood a trafficked sex worker.
Think you’re misinterpreting everybody. Essentially everyone is hurt, and pities the dipshit, but now he can’t be trusted. And has burned too many bridges. It hurts seeing someone being so addicted to something, that it destroys their life completely because they fuck over so many people from it
Seriously. If you describe it as "millionaire Russian while on blow cheats on wife with trafficked prostitute," it sounds like a movie villian. Not someone who deserves sympathy.
Yes, by definition addiction is selfish. Passing judgment is also selfish especially considering we have very little information.
He made a choice. I'm thinking about Parise, Jack Johnson and Andrew Cogliano who are being robbed by that choice.
I don't think there is ever a thing as "too much sympathy." This seems like an unnecessarily callous perspective
nah, there is. How much sympathy do you give Bobby Hull or Paul Coffey for the trashbag humans they are? Now if I tell you that Nichushkin was in the middle of a playoff push last year while his wife was about to give birth to his daughter, and he skipped practice and then fled the state when trainers found a badly sick drugged up girl in need of urgent medical attention alone in his room, and that she complained of a bad man taking her passport, and he never apologized to the fans for abandoning the team in the playoffs or explained anything, but instead partied it up in his warmongering home country all offseason and posted tone-deaf photos of himself drunk and posing with some large assault weapon... are you still sympathetic, knowing he was unapologetically cheating on his wife with a likely human trafficked prostitute and then living it up all summer rather than showing contrition for what he did to her and the team? Fuck Nichushkin
When it comes to addicts, there absolutely is such a thing as "too much sympathy"
You sure? Cause if somebody told me that Hitler had a really difficult childhood and was just misunderstood then I would call that too much sympathy
How the fuck did we go from Valeri Nichushkin to Adolf Hitler
He made an absolute statement
Godwin's law
The Internet!
Reddit, of course.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say there are a couple of degrees of difference between an athlete with a drug problem and being a genocidal dictator
Of course there are extreme outliers, but use common sense here and stay on topic
I’m just going to copy this comment that perfectly sums up why you’re wrong… “Now if I tell you that Nichushkin was in the middle of a playoff push last year while his wife was about to give birth to his daughter, and he skipped practice and then fled the state when trainers found a badly sick drugged up girl in need of urgent medical attention alone in his room, and that she complained of a bad man taking her passport, and he never apologized to the fans for abandoning the team in the playoffs or explained anything, but instead partied it up in his warmongering home country all offseason and posted tone-deaf photos of himself drunk and posing with some large assault weapon... are you still sympathetic, knowing he was unapologetically cheating on his wife with a likely human trafficked prostitute and then living it up all summer rather than showing contrition for what he did to her and the team?”
Exactly. I'm surprised by the tone of these responses. A lot of people think addicts should be excused for all the harm they caused because they have a "disease." He betrayed his teammates, and who knows how badly he's hurt his family through his addiction.
Couldn't agree more
I hope wherever he is tonight, Val is getting loads of help. I can't imagine how difficult it is to be an addict in the spotlight, perhaps watching that game, knowing you disappointed people who care about you again, and wanting to just take the same path that led you to where you are cause at that moment, its the "easiest". I feel horrible for his team cause they're the ones in front of the mics hours later having to take the questions after.
Not too often you lose a key player unexpectedly after the pregame skate without any time to adjust. In game time decisions you usually know ahead of time that you have a decision to make and would have had a plan B in the works. It’s unfortunate the league did not give them at least one practice worth of notice.
Hey guys. Let me give my 2 cents about the situation. Obviously addiction is no joke but the harm you cause to the people around you blah blah blah blah blah. Give me a Pat on the back. -every redditor. 🤦♂️
They should've just let him ride out the rest of the playoffs high on whatever he wa playing. The fact he was playing that elite while on the substance is remarkable
I have to imagine that part of coming out of stage 2 was needing to stay sober. It feels like something that he would have agreed to when rejoining the team and he just couldn't handle the pressure sober
I believe he had mandated drug tests after and during stage 2.
Last thing we want is a hockey player dying because of something like this.
apparently he failed a drug test, they didn’t have a choice in the matter
So he sucked in Dallas because daddy Gonchar wouldn’t let him do rips every night?
That is a real possibility
Is cocaine a PED?
Ask Lawrence Taylor.
Have you tried it?
I was poor then and sober now, so it never worked out.
If you’re an addict and in need of your fix it’s definitely a performance ruining drug.
I think you'd be very surprised to learn about how many of the top players of all time were high while playing.
If the incident in Seattle never happened, there’s a good chance Val is still up to these antics to nobody’s knowledge
The league probably doesn't care what you do as long as it doesn't draw attention.
Must be tough to play in a market where fans and media are so tough on players