JT Miller finally opens up and spills details on his departure from the Canucks

JT Miller is finally back inside Vancouver's Rogers Arena, but this time as a member of the New York Rangers.

In fact, not only is Miller a Ranger, he's the team's captain and he has shouldered a lot of blame for the team's dreadful start.

"You just can't be okay with coming out flat. We're in no position to come out flat," Miller told the media earlier this week. "We're obviously not getting a ton of bounces offensively. There's no excuses to come up flat. It sucks. This is not fun right now. We need to correct the starts. I think it's becoming like the trend now, so we need to fix this now, on this trip. I mean, it's a hard road trip, so we got to be ready to go to start the game." Miller said according to Mollie Walker of the New York Post.

Today, ahead of the Rangers' game against the Vancouver Canucks, Miller took questions from the Vancouver media where he expressed regrets for how things ended with his former team.

"A lot of good memories here. The way that the city treated myself and my family is something we'll never forget. Definitely a special place," Miller said. "You can't go back and change anything but obviously it was ugly at the end. I think for the majority of the time I was here though it was all positive. A lot of good things. I'm not going to sit here and dwell on the way it ended. I didn't expect that to be pretty and it wasn't."

This is the first time that Miller has publicly confirmed that things were ugly between him and his teammates and that ultimately, that's what led to his blockbuster trade.

Obviously there were a ton of rumors circulating last year of a rift between him and former teammate Elias Pettersson and this seems to confirm that there was at least some conflict.

"It's something that I've embraced," Miller said on his gruff nature and his tendency to be a bit tough on his teammates. "I embrace who I am as a person and a player and emotion comes with that. Obviously it's not going to be pretty all the time."

Miller was then asked specifically on his thoughts about lining up against Pettersson one on one tonight.

"Nothing changes for me. (He's) been putting some pucks in the net.... we have a job to do against them," Miller said on his assignment.

For what it's worth, Pettersson was also asked for his thoughts on playing against Miller this evening and he politely shut down any conversation of a player vs player rivalry.

“I played against him last year too,” Pettersson deadpanned.

Miller's full comments:

For what it's worth, Walker also conducted a one on one interview with Miller for the Post today. While the article is behind a paywall so I can't share that content with my readers, suffice it to say that Miller owns up to some of his shortcomings as a player and a leader.

He talks openly about learning from his mistakes in Vancouver and getting a fresh start in New York. Ironically, it reads similar to quotes that he said back in 2018 when he was acquired by the Tampa Bay Lightning from the Rangers and in 2019 when he was traded from the Lightning to the Canucks.