Cash crisis leaves Jets with lack of options

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 01/07/2019 (2261 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

On a day when many of their NHL rivals were making a big splash, the Winnipeg Jets barely caused a ripple.

Sure, they briefly dipped their toes into the free-agent pool and brought back a couple familiar faces in depth defencemen Nathan Beaulieu and Cameron Schilling. But there were no multi-year, multimillion-dollar contracts to be found. No superstars packing their things and heading to ’Peg City. No blockbuster trades. No major excitement or buzz or drama. No Canada Day fireworks. Nary a frenzy to be found.

None of this should come as a surprise to those following the franchise, which finds itself in a very precarious position at the moment. The Jets are going to be flirting with the US$81.5-million salary-cap ceiling and still have several young, core players to sign as restricted free agents. As a result, there is precious little money left to do anything but hopefully find some bargains in the discount bin.

They appear, at least on paper, to be a weaker team today than the one that clearly wasn’t good enough when the season ended in April. And that should be a concerning development for an organization that is going to have one of the highest payrolls in the league and still believes the window for winning a Stanley Cup is wide open, but may find it closing much quicker than anyone anticipated.

Kevin Hayes, Jacob Trouba, Tyler Myers, Brandon Tanev and Par Lindholm are all gone, with the Jets either unable or unwilling to meet their salary demands. Ben Chiarot and Joe Morrow are expected to join them as ex-Jets, although both unrestricted free agents have yet to find new homes. Matt Hendricks has retired. Bogdan Kiselevich has gone to play in Russia.

That’s nine players that were on the playoff roster for a Jets team that faded badly down the stretch, then bowed out in six games to St. Louis in the opening round of the playoffs.

Given how it all ended, perhaps some change was for the best. But so far, the only new addition in town is defenceman Neal Pionk, brought back in the Trouba trade, and a couple European free agents signed on the cheap last month to provide depth on the farm with the Manitoba Moose in Andrei Chibisov and Joona Luoto.

Are those few really going to move the needle?

General manager Kevin Cheveldayoff said Monday he expects to make a few more signings in the coming days, but expect them to be of the depth variety and close to NHL minimum-wage, considering the Beaulieu signing means the Jets now have US$60.2 million tied up in 17 players expected to be on their opening-night roster.

That leaves them with US$21.3 million to get six more players under contract to fill out a 23-man roster. We already know four of those players in restricted free agents Patrik Laine, Kyle Connor, Andrew Copp and Pionk, although how much of the remaining pie they consume remains to be seen.

You can put another defenceman or two with NHL experience, plus perhaps a veteran bottom-six forward who can take some faceoffs and kill penalties, as priorities for the club.

“There’s other things we’ve been working on. Again, every free-agency period or talking period takes on a life of its own. There are some other depth moves or some other moves, hopefully, that we can announce as the days go on,” Cheveldayoff said Monday.

There’s also the ever-present risk of an offer sheet coming their way, specifically for one of Connor or Laine. What once seemed like a near-impossibility became much more realistic Monday when Montreal tendered one to restricted free agent forward Sebastian Aho, the first of its kind in six years in the NHL. His Carolina Hurricanes now have seven days to decide whether to match the five-year, $42.27 million deal on the table, or receive a first, second and third round draft pick in compensation.

For what it’s worth, Cheveldayoff continues to insist the Jets would match any offer that came his way, but there’s no denying it could potentially handcuff them in terms of the cap given they’d have no say in the financial terms.

“It’s part of the CBA (collective bargaining agreement). You always prepare for the unexpected and you’re always in the background thinking about different things that could happen or might happen,” said Cheveldayoff.

With little money to play with and several players already out the door, it appears Winnipeg’s best bet to continue hanging with the NHL heavyweights is hope for continued growth from its young core, plus perhaps some internal promotions with the likes of Jack Roslovic, Kristian Vesalainen, Mason Appleton, Sami Niku and Tucker Poolman all taking on much bigger roles than in the past.

It’s a risky proposition, for sure. But there’s few other options at this point, given where the Jets are in their current life cycle.

“So, we haven’t had that kind of opportunity for young guys to step in over the last couple of years. We’ve been really fortunate we were able to create a roster that was solid, certainly on the back end with veteran players that had established themselves. But it wasn’t so long ago that a young player like Josh Morrissey came and toiled in the American Hockey League and found his way to training camp and lo and behold became, obviously, the player that he is,” said Cheveldayoff.

“This game evolves. For us right now, we felt for two years we had an established core that remained the same. I stood here at the end of two seasons ago and said I’d do my darndest to keep that whole group together and pretty much did knowing that we’re going to try and take a big swing, knowing the rises in salary of a lot of the players was going to make it prohibitive to keep all of that group together beyond.”

Those days are now over. Change became necessary. Whether it’s for the better remains to be seen, although it’s worth noting they aren’t dropping the puck on the 2019-20 season until three months from now.

“We don’t play hockey for a while. There’s a lot of summer that will still be going on and it will be interesting to see if there are other conversations that do happen throughout the course of summer, either through adding in free agency or maybe through trades,” said Cheveldayoff.

Indeed, a player-for-player swap where the money in equals the money out may be the best route at this point. And Cheveldayoff certainly left that door open as he wrapped up his latest media availability, suggesting the current roster could still undergo a makeover.

“With the salary cap not really rising as much as maybe anticipated, I think everyone is kind of approaching it with a little bit more of an open mind and seeing what exactly might or might not happen. It’s a busy time, there’s no question about it. (Monday) is kind of that culmination of that, I think everyone takes a deep breath and assesses did I get the guy that I wanted, didn’t I get the guy that I want, where do I go from there?” said Cheveldayoff.

That’s the million-dollar question right now for an organization that doesn’t have many bucks to spare.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg