Jets front office has seen all it needs to plot future course

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/01/2016 (3550 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Count me among the many who looked at this current chunk of the Winnipeg Jets schedule — nine of 10 games at the MTS Centre, with four games already in the rear-view mirror — and declared it “season-defining.”

Even more recently, the talking points swirling around this homestand had it providing clarity for Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff as to what to do with pending unrestricted free agents Andrew Ladd and Dustin Byfuglien.

A good run and maybe the boss would be more apt to lock up one, or both, with new multi-year, multimillion-dollar deals. A bellyflop would mean just the opposite and the Jets would be aggressive sellers before the NHL’s Feb. 29 trade deadline.

Here’s what is now rolling around in yours truly’s cranium today, with the Jets just 1-3 on this homestand and yet still close enough to the Western Conference playoff line to keep things interesting:

Hasn’t this team already defined what it is? And don’t Cheveldayoff & Co. already have the clarity needed to make a call on their captain and game-changing defenceman?

Just as a refresher, the Jets will line up Thursday against the Nashville Predators at 21-22-3. They haven’t won more than two games in a row all season, are last in the Central Division and two points from the conference cellar. The recent rash of injuries that has taken Mark Scheifele, Drew Stafford and Adam Lowry out of the lineup has also hammered home how thin the organization is in offensive depth, what with their best scoring prospects — Kyle Connor, Jack Roslovic and Brendan Lemieux — playing at the U.S. college and CHL levels and not ripening on the AHL farm with the Manitoba Moose.

Include me among the many who felt what happened late last year, with the Jets going on a 10-3-1 run from March 14 to the end of the regular season to earn a playoff spot, would carry over into 2015-16. But since a 7-3-1 run through Halloween, this bunch has been a sub-.500 squad that consistently teases, then disappoints. Rinse. Repeat. Over and over and over again.

All of this isn’t to suggest Cheveldayoff couldn’t soon lock up his two 30-year-old vets. Byfuglien’s agent indicated Tuesday, after a meeting last week in Minnesota, the two sides are talking, which is always a good thing.

But it’s here where two objectives are colliding for Jets brass: short term, locking up those two mainstays undoubtedly gives the club a better shot at securing a playoff spot for the second consecutive spring. Then what? This team has hardly flashed the kind of resolve it had a year ago that would lead anyone to think it could advance beyond the first round.

It’s long been franchise owner True North Sports & Entertainment’s mantra that it didn’t want just a consistent playoff team but, instead, a consistent contender. And there’s a mammoth difference as to where the Chicago Blackhawks are today, as an example, and where the Jets find themselves.

One squad pays its top-end talent a ton, consistently adds affordable pieces to round out the roster and has won three Stanley Cups in the past six years.

And the Jets? They have some good pieces, but their best prospects are teenagers and they have exactly one playoff appearance since relocating to Winnipeg five years ago.

That’s pretty dang clear in the right here and now, regardless of what happens over the rest of this homestand.

Five other takes on the Jets

1. SO AT WHAT POINT… Does Winnipeg Jets goalie Connor Hellebuyck begin getting some love from across the NHL as a legitimate Calder Memorial Trophy candidate? This race was all about Connor McDavid (Edmonton Oilers) and Jack Eichel (Buffalo Sabres) when the lid lifted on the 2015-16 season, but McDavid has been injured and Eichel is fourth among rookies in scoring prior to Wednesday’s games, with 14 goals and 15 assists. Chicago Blackhawks forward Artemi Panarin, the sensational 24-year-old Russian, was ninth in the NHL in scoring (16 goals, 45 points) heading into Wednesday’s action and is gaining momentum as the Calder front-runner.

But Hellebuyck has been spectacular since his promotion from the AHL’s Manitoba Moose in late November, going 11-7-1 with a 2.00 goals-against average and .932 save percentage. His GAA is third-best in the NHL to John Gibson of the Anaheim Ducks (1.97, who also qualifies as a rookie) and Ben Bishop of the Tampa Bay Lightning (1.97), while his save percentage also ranks third overall behind Michal Neuvirth of the Philadelphia Flyers (.936) and James Reimer of the Toronto Maple Leafs (.934).

Worth noting: a goaltender has won the Calder three times since 2001:

 

• Steve Mason, Columbus, 2009 — 33-20-7, 2.29 GAA, .916 save percentage
• Andrew Raycroft, Boston, 2004 — 29-18-9, 2.05 GAA, .926 save percentage
• Evgeni Nabokov, San Jose, 2001 — 32-21-7, 2.19 GAA; .915 save percentage

 

2. HARD NOT TO FEEL SORRY FOR… Thomas Raffl, the veteran Austrian pro who gave up a good gig with Salzburg to pursue his NHL dream with the Jets. He’s 29, and has the big body type and maturity to his game Jets brass thought would provide good depth for the organization. When he was assigned to the Moose at the end of training camp, there was a consensus he would be back with the big club soon. But he suffered a dislocated collarbone, a broken rib and concussion in the Moose opener after being caught on an open-ice hit by Toronto Marlies defenceman Viktor Loov. In early December, Raffl suffered a broken jaw during practice.

He was to return to the Moose lineup Wednesday. Since the Jets declared their season-opening roster, a forward has been recalled for help eight times: Patrice Cormier, Joel Armia and Matt Halischuk twice each, J.C. Lipon once and Lowry once (after being demoted). Raffl has been hurt through most of the shuffling. Tough to chase that NHL dream from the trainer’s room.

3. FURTHER TO OUR EARLIER REFERENCE… About the Blackhawks and a comparison to the Jets. Chicago won its 12th consecutive game Tuesday, a first in the franchise’s 89-year history, after icing a lineup that featured six players making $6.5 million (all currency US) or more — goalie Corey Crawford ($6.5 million), defenceman Duncan Keith ($7.5 million) and forwards Marian Hossa ($7.9 million), Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews ($13.8 million). The Jets’ highest-earning player this year is Blake Wheeler at $5.8 million.

Interestingly, the Hawks roster Tuesday also included nine players making less than $1 million. Seven of those — the exceptions being Eric Desjardins and Scott Darling — are 25 or younger, with four added as free agents, two via trade and just two others (Teuvo Teravainen and Phillip Danault) are Chicago draft picks. The point is: there are all sorts of different ways to piece together a winner.

4. DISCUSS AMONG YOURSELVES… A debate percolating and about to boil over: what do the Jets do when Ondrej Pavelec — who ended last season and began this campaign as their No. 1 netminder — returns from injury? We’ve gushed about Hellebuyck in this space and it’s hard to imagine him giving up the crease right now.

But also consider this: there are 23 goaltenders in the NHL making more than Pavelec’s $4.25 million annual salary and only five teams — Anaheim, St. Louis, Buffalo, Edmonton and San Jose — currently have less money invested in their goalies at the NHL level than the Jets’ $5.517 million with Pavelec, Hellebuyck ($667,000) and Michael Hutchinson ($600,000).

As much as many want to move the big Czech out of River City, he and Hellebuyck (Hutchinson is a restricted free agent this summer) would be a solid pairing next season at a combined $5.44 million. Pavelec would be playing in the final year of his deal ($4.75 million) and Hellebuyck would be earning $693,000.

5. DON’T LOOK NOW BUT… Jets 2015 first-round pick Kyle Connor is really gaining momentum as a contender for the Hobey Baker Award as the top player in U.S. college hockey. Connor, a freshman with the University of Michigan, is second in the nation in scoring with 36 points (18 goals) in just 21 games.

Since being inexplicably left off the American roster for the world junior hockey championship, Connor has 12 goals and eight assists in eight games. (FYI: in 2015, Jack Eichel became just the second freshman to win the Hobey Baker in its 35-year history. The other: Paul Kariya in 1993.)

ed.tait@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPEdTait