Five down, two to go?

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/03/2016 (3737 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The plan, boss, the plan…

Winnipeg Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff reset his National Hockey League club last summer and it’s produced dismal results.

Is he playing rope-a-dope, as Muhammad Ali once did when he let his opponent tire out throwing a bunch of punches and then won the fight?

After the conclusion of the 2015-16 season, Cheveldayoff will have two years left on his contract (somehow getting a two-year extension added to his original five-year deal in 2013 after only two seasons of drafting, plucking players from the waiver wire and re-signing some others).

Let’s have a look at the job he’s done lately:

He did well last month in signing veteran defenceman Dustin Byfuglien to a five-year contract at US$7.6 million per year.

I like Marko Dano, the forward the Jets got in return for former captain Andrew Ladd from the Chicago Blackhawks prior to the NHL trade deadline. The acquisition fits with the moves the Jets GM has made since skill became a priority for his roster.

A first-round draft pick in 2013, Dano was strong on the puck and showed good speed and willingness to battle in posting nice stats for an NHL rookie (eight goals, 13 assists in 35 games in 2014-15 for the Columbus Blue Jackets).

The first-round pick the Jets also received in the Ladd trade is in Chevy’s wheelhouse, but with Chicago looking to go deep into the playoffs, it may be close to a second-rounder. (There is also a conditional third-round pick coming Winnipeg’s way if the Hawks win the Stanley Cup this season.)

Cheveldayoff did well in the deal (he obviously learned from former Jets forward Michael Frolik, who walked away as a free agent last summer).

On the ice, the Jets showed last season that Winnipeg was back as a serious team in the NHL, overcoming huge obstacles and grabbing a playoff spot. Do you remember the comparisons to the Los Angeles Kings? The Jets were big, fast, and difficult to play against as a physical, possession team.

After being swept in the first round by the Anaheim Ducks, Cheveldayoff decided to weaken that club (maybe it happened after he couldn’t re-sign Frolik). A youth injection into the lineup became the focus as the GM ignored other useful unrestricted free agents that had ended the season with the Jets.

The results (26-32-4 heading into Thursday night’s game against the New York Islanders) speak for themselves.

Five years ago, the hope was the Jets would be a perennial playoff team by now because “the cupboards were bare” (of prospects) and there were holes to fill in the lineup.

Remember the Nashville Predators model they were supposedly following in those days? Build a team that is a perennial playoff contender and keep the gas pedal to the floor when it gets there. It’s puzzling as the Jets got to the playoffs and then backed off the Nashville/Los Angeles plan and reversed themselves into mediocrity.

Why would you bring in rental players for (in some cases, less than) one season — four years into your plan — and then change the direction a few months later? How many plans are there?

Despite it all, the Jets prospects look good but the lineup still needs a lot of help.

During his post-trade deadline presser, Cheveldayoff said this summer’s unrestricted free agent market isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. Judging from that comment, it’s unlikely UFA season will have any real impact on next year’s Jets.

That would leave Winnipeg with a lineup going into the summer, and likely through to the fall, based on hope in its young players. Hope that they can carry big responsibilities against the battle-hardened teams of the NHL.

Fans can, at least, watch next year’s lineup (minus Bryan Little) with interest over the final games of 2015-16, if only to see if they’re ready to watch a full, 82-game schedule of the same. (The only player who has played with the Jets this season and isn’t under contract for the next is Matt Halischuk.)

Cheveldayoff has lots of salary cap room to deal with his restricted free agents this summer — most notably Mark Scheifele, Jacob Trouba, Adam Lowry, Joel Armia and Michael Hutchinson.

The GM has two more years unless another contract extension comes out of the blue. Maybe he’s hoping 2015 first-round pick Kyle Connor will be ready; Nicolas Petan and Josh Morrissey, too. Perhaps the wild card Cheveldayoff is betting on is Nikolaj Ehlers putting this team on his back next year — a lot to ask, even though his electric talent might warrant it.

Cheveldayoff will be looking for improvement from the other young, rostered players. Scheifele, Connor Hellebuyck and Trouba should do that; Armia, Andrew Copp, Lowry and Dano might join in. (Brendan Lemieux will need a good year in the American Hockey League after finishing his major-junior career.)

The GM has assembled today’s lineup after almost five years on the job, acquiring one of the top prospect pools in the NHL. But does he have the chops to follow through on a plan based on youth when he’s finally under the gun? How long can you sell hope?

Maybe Cheveldayoff, after taking all the punches this year, proves he really is hockey’s version of Ali as he comes back this summer throwing bombs in the form of a major trade and dumping some bad contracts.

Or maybe his punches come in the form of having all the hopes in his young players realized next season after grabbing the consensus No. 1 pick in the NHL draft this summer (Auston Matthews).

So many maybes, so many hopes…

Chosen ninth overall by the NHL’s St. Louis Blues and first overall by the WHA’s Houston Aeros in 1977, Scott Campbell has now been drafted by the Winnipeg Free Press to play a new style of game.

Twitter: @NHL_Campbell