Working hard in Winnipeg, dreaming of Auston

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 08/04/2016 (3454 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Social scientists say one of the most consistently reliable patterns in all of human behaviour is the tendency to overestimate the likelihood of a low-probability event occurring.

Government lotteries are built on this principle. It’s why you bought a fistful of Lotto Max tickets this week even though the odds of winning the jackpot are — I hate to break this to you — one in 28,633,528.

It’s also why the lotteries people always release a photo of the happy winners. You see someone like yourself holding an oversized cheque and imagine you’re next, even though the numbers suggest you almost certainly won’t be.

This same principle also works in reverse: we as a species also hopelessly overestimate the possibility of something bad happening to us.

You just saw this phenomenon in action late last month when school divisions across Manitoba cancelled European trips for their students following the terror attacks in Belgium.

Here’s the reality: the children of this city (along with the rest of us) are 35,079 times more likely to die from heart disease than we are of a terror attack, according to one study. And that needle didn’t really budge simply because of what happened in Brussels.

Indeed, you could travel to Europe right now and spend your entire holiday in the Brussels airport — like Tom Hanks’ character in The Terminal — and, as long as you also lowered your consumption of butter at the same time, you’d be more safe, not less so.

The kids are gonna be alright, in other words.

And so, too, are the suddenly red-hot Winnipeg Jets, regardless of what their exceedingly ill-timed — and long-awaited — three-game win streak has done to the club’s chances of getting the first-overall pick in this year’s NHL entry draft.

It is yet another example of the curse of being a sports fan in Winnipeg that, after a season of hand-wringing over the team’s inability to win often enough, Jets Nation finds itself on the final weekend of a lost season anguishing over the team winning too often.

Can’t win for losing? On paper, it looks like these clowns can’t even win by winning.

As of noon Friday, the Jets were 25th overall in the NHL standings and had a 7.5 per cent chance of securing the first-overall draft pick and the right to select Auston Matthews, an 18-year-old American centre regarded by some as a generational player.

Those are the worst draft lottery odds the Jets have had in weeks — and a result of a late-season run, posting a 5-2-3 record in their last 10 games.

That all this great hockey has come with a) the Jets out of playoff contention and b) Matthews hanging in the balance is, obviously, maddening to many.

Some perspective is in order: even in dead last in the NHL standings heading into Friday night, the Toronto Maple Leafs still only had a 20 per cent chance of winning the draft lottery. Just six times in the 20-plus years of the lottery has the first pick actually gone to the team with the fewest points.

Plus, in the tweaked system in place this season, the non-playoff teams above the bottom three in the overall standing actually have a better chance, collectively, of winning the first pick by a margin of 55 per cent to 45 per cent.

Put it together and you can make a serious case the Jets’ recent stellar play has done at least as much real and tangible good for this team (the exposure and confidence it’s given its young prospects has been invaluable) than any harm it has caused in regard to lottery odds.

It is true you have a better chance of winning Lotto Max if you have 10 tickets instead of one. But the Edmonton Oilers are living proof of what a fool’s errand it is to stake your future on winning a lottery.

The Oilers have made the first-overall pick in four of the last six drafts, including last year’s selection of another generational player in Connor McDavid. (Quick tangent: are they really “generational” players if a new one comes along every year?)

And yet for all those sexy lottery wins, the Oilers are still awful, sitting second last in the NHL heading into Friday night.

Sure, it’s hard not to be envious as a Jets fan when you see your neighbour (and fellow small-market team) holding up that oversized cheque every year. Sure, it’s tempting to just dump the whole paycheque on Lotto Max tickets.

But that’s a pipe dream and there is no substitute for good, old-fashioned hard work if you’re hoping to build a meaningful and sustainable future.

The Jets would be infinitely better served by ignoring what Edmonton has done and instead, focus on another small-market team in a different sport: Major League Baseball’s Kansas City Royals.

It’s instructive the Jets are wrapping up a disappointing season at the same time the Royals are beginning one in which many prognosticators are picking them to advance to their third consecutive World Series and repeat as champion.

While there’s many fans in this town of the Toronto Blue Jays and their high-octane — and highly paid — lineup, it says here it’s the continuing success of the Royals that should give hope to all Jets fans.

So how did the Royals do it?

There was a draft component for sure: 10 of the 25 players on last year’s American League Championship Series roster were either Royals draft picks or international free agents.

There was a couple of world-class trades: the deal that sent ace Zack Greinke to the Milwaukee Brewers brought in key pieces (Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar), while the trade that sent Wil Myers to the Tampa Bay Rays gave K.C. a dominant reliever (Wade Davis).

Add to that some modestly priced free-agent signings and a willingness to spend when the team is on the cusp (the Royals had the 17th-highest payroll in baseball last year, huge by K.C. standards) and you’ve got a rare small-market dynasty in the making.

It was neither flashy nor easy. Hard work never is. But if the Jets are looking for a model to build their future upon, the one in K.C. looks both more achievable and more sustainable than whatever they’re trying to do in Edmonton.

The value in buying a lottery ticket isn’t the almost non-existent chance at fame and fortune but rather all the delightful fantasizing you get to do in the lead-up to the draw.

Regardless of what the Jets did down the stretch, Auston Matthews in a Jets jersey is a fantasy.

Dream the dream, sure. But it’s hard work that will get you there.

email: paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek