Bauer ‘better and better every year’ Jets defenceman spent whole summer working on getting to the next level By: Ken Wiebe Posted: 1:25 PM CDT Monday, Sep. 28, 2026 Last Modified: 1:57 PM CDT Monday, Sep. 28, 2026 Updates

Tyrel Bauer makes no apologies for the pugilistic piece of his path.

The Winnipeg Jets defenceman is ready to drop the gloves and throw down when the situation calls for it and he takes great pride in protecting his teammates.

It’s a big part of the reason Bauer will be among the 23 players submitted by the Jets on the opening-day roster on Monday.

“I’ve fought and clawed, both metaphorically and literally and now I just want to show that I can play as well,” Bauer said during a chat with the Free Press during training camp. “(Toughness) is always something that I have, it’s always something in my back pocket and something that I take a lot of pride in doing, for my teammates, for the city and the people who invest in this hockey club. That will never change.

“But it’s very clear to me that in order to get to the next level, you have to play.”

Bauer, who was chosen by the Jets in the sixth round (164th overall) of the 2020 NHL Draft, is entering his fifth professional season and this is the first time he’s broken camp with the big club.

The timing isn’t a coincidence either.

“I’ve fought and clawed, both metaphorically and literally and now I just want to show that I can play as well.”

With Logan Stanley and Luke Schenn departing at the NHL trade deadline last March, having Bauer around and in the lineup adds an element the Jets don’t have a lot of, beyond captain Adam Lowry.

The Jets have others who are willing, but none of them — aside from Lowry — are as capable as Bauer, who has 45 regular season scraps chronicled on HockeyFights.com.

“It’s less of the actual skill of fighting in how it started for me. It’s more the will of not being deterred,” said Bauer. “Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always been a rough and tumble kid. I played middle linebacker and my first ever fight was in a baseball game.

“No matter how polarizing it is, (fighting) is part of the game. And it’s a skill, like anything else. Obviously, there’s a large mental component to it. Not everybody wants to get hit in the face and understandably so.”

When Bauer arrived for the condensed training camp, he was paired immediately with off-season free agent addition Mario Ferraro.

While nothing was set in stone, that appeared to be an immediate vote of confidence for Bauer, given where Ferraro is expected to be on the Jets’ depth chart.

“Maybe when I was younger, I used to think about that stuff more,” said Bauer. “As I’ve gotten older, listen, I know what I’ve got to do. There are people that get paid a lot more money than I do to make those decisions.”

After spending a few days in Colorado Springs for team bonding, the Jets return to the ice in Winnipeg on Wednesday to prepare for Friday’s season opener against the Boston Bruins.

Bauer, 24, has a clear understanding of what is required of him.

“It needs to be hard, it needs to be simple and it needs to be reliable,” he said. “I’ve got to have confidence in myself as a player. To feel like I belong out here with this group. All of this stuff, you feel it, you try to develop it and you feel it grow.

“It’s less of the actual skill of fighting in how it started for me. It’s more the will of not being deterred.”

“For me, I like to stay curious about it. I like to see what happens on the ice and see where we can improve. You recap it, you stay curious, you take it as data points. Once you compile all of that data, you kind of see where you’re at. These are data points on a very long and drawn out science experiment.”

Head coach Scott Arniel spoke openly during training camp about how Bauer was on the radar for a recall last season, but an injury to the rugged defenceman eliminated the opportunity to make his NHL debut.

Bauer was aware of the potential at the time, but rather than let the circumstances that prevented that get him down, he used it as additional fuel on the road to trying to achieve his ultimate goal.

“It’s hard not to think about that kind of stuff. But at the same time, it’s something that I can’t afford to think about,” Bauer said.

“There are so many what-ifs in hockey and in life. It’s (about) what is going on today and what is going on tomorrow. Obviously I watched that (potential opportunity) fly by, but listen, it gave me a whole summer to prepare and a whole summer to have a little bit of an understanding of where I could be and what I have to do to get to the next level and I attacked that.”

“I’ve always been a bigger guy and it’s always been an area of my game that I’ve needed to focus on.”

The biggest question surrounding Bauer’s ability to stick at the next level — or to carve out a more regular role — revolves around his skating. Quite simply, can he keep up to the frenetic pace?

Bauer has gone to great lengths on that front since turning pro, spending the past two summers in Winnipeg working with Manitoba Moose skills coach Dave Cameron on a number of things to refine his game.

“I’ve always been a bigger guy and it’s always been an area of my game that I’ve needed to focus on. It’s an area of my game that I do spend a lot of time on,” said Bauer.

“It’s not just straightaway speed. It’s where you can get to, from the net to the corner. It’s not crossing over when a skilled forward cuts to the middle. Little things like that, to set yourself up in a better position. Turning and going back for pucks and minimizing steps and being able to be smooth, so that you get your vision up. It all plays into one another.”

The improvements were on display last spring during the Calder Cup playoffs, when Bauer skated alongside Ashton Sautner on a shutdown pairing against the Milwaukee Admirals and Grand Rapids Griffins.

Arniel was in the building for the home playoffs games and got a first-hand look at those gains.

“Tyrel has improved,” said Arniel. “He’s gotten better and better every year. But to just go out and just try to get into fights and do those types of things, those days are gone. But the compete part and the playing hard (part) is still always part of it. If something happens to our top people, we do have people that have to respond.”

Lowry, who was in the building for multiple Moose playoff games as well, sees that Bauer’s growth goes beyond fighting.

“He’s tough as nails,” said Lowry. “He seems to be rounding out his game. When he came here, he was a real tough abrasive defenceman. Maybe the puck skills weren’t there. But he’s not just one dimensional. I don’t mean that as a knock, but he’s rounding out his game.

“He’s continued to find different ways to improve. I think you see that with the confidence in the plays that he makes, he’s a real hard defender and makes it hard to get to the net. He’s a great teammate, a great guy in the community. He’s another guy that has continued to progress.”

That progression could lead to Bauer being in the lineup for the first time in an NHL regular-season game as early as this week.

“I’ve lived the journey so far,” he said. “A lot of ups, a lot of downs, a lot of long days, a lot of hard days. A lot of blood, sweat and tears on all fronts.”

winnipegfreepress.com/kenwiebe