The start of the 2022-23 season hasn’t been great for Nikita Zaitsev. He’s currently on a $4.5 million salary and, paired with him playing poorly, has led to fans being brutal. This is Zaitsev’s fourth season with the Senators after joining the team from Toronto Maple Leafs in 2019. He signed a 7-year, $31,500,000 contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs in May 2017 but has not lived up to the expectations, and now, Senators fans have just about had enough.
Several Senators meme accounts have whipped Zaitsev for his performances this season, and apparently, it’s been hard on him.
One fan made memes about how Zaitsev always is on the ice when Senators concede a goal, and the Russian actually responded on Instagram DM’s, asking him to ”meet up.”
”Want to meet tomorrow face to face?” Zaitsev wrote.
”Come on, text me back,” he added.
”Wanna see you face to face immediately.”
READ ALSO: Mika Zibanejad gets called on softest goalie interference this season, and fans are outrageous
However, that’s not all. The defenseman’s dad also contacted the person behind the meme, threatening to press charges.
When fans found out about Zaitsev’s messages, they were outrageous, and some even suggested he should get kicked out of the league.
However, many believe that Zaitsev was doing rights by standing up for himself and that he doesn’t deserve to be made fun of.
”Stop harassing players and expecting no consequences, obv not professional for Z to speak out like that but he’s human too. Grow up,” one said.
”It’s so weird playing victim after harassing a player with an account impersonating someone else,” another added.
”Stop harassing players, they’re humans too. Zaitsev did nothing wrong, and in fact just told your friend to say it to his face, rather than over a screen. No threats, no violence. Of course your friend deleted the messages they sent earlier to look like the victim though,” a third said.
