Central Division Offseason Roundup: Winnipeg Jets

The Winnipeg Jets are another team that hasn’t done a whole lot of moving and shaking this summer. After analyzing the Minnesota Wild yesterday and the Nashville Predators and St. Louis Blues earlier in the week, we head north to explore a team that many predicted would go deeper than they did last season.

The Jets as-is are a big, physical team known for their no-nonsense play that often frustrates teams like the Colorado Avalanche. But what have they done this summer and will it help their playoff chances in 2015-16?

Biggest moves so far:

• Extended RW Drew Stafford for 2 years.
• Extended D Paul Postma for 2 years.
• Extended D Adam Pardy for 1 year.
• Extended RW Matt Halischuk for 2 years.
• Signed F Brendan Lemieux to a 3 year ELC.
• Signed C Patrice Cormier for 2 years.
• Signed RW Matt Fraser for 2 years.
• Signed C Alexander Burmistrov for 2 years.
• Lost RW Michael Frolik to Calgary.

Although it didn’t take place this offseason, the loss of talented winger Evander Kane will likely have a lasting effect on the Jets’ roster on the left side unless they find a free agent or traded replacement. A couple of us couldn’t help but comment on Kane’s absence.

A full list of the Jets’ moves is available on their official website.

The Jets haven’t done a whole lot this offseason in regards to their NHL roster. What stands out to you?

AJ: I look at the list of stuff they did and my reaction is just kind of to shrug. When the most “controversial” decision was to extend Stafford and and let Frolik walk, well, you’ve had a pretty quiet summer. I like Frolik more than Stafford but with the glut of quality forwards getting ready to push for NHL ice time, I understand the Jets not wanting to go long-term on Frolik and preferring the two year term they were able to give Stafford.

Getting Burmistrov back from the KHL could be a boon to their bottom 6, I guess. He’s a young, talented guy who probably won’t justify being selected 8th overall but he’s not going to actively hurt the team, either. Blah. Their whole summer is blah.

Cole: The offseason for the Jets was definitely quiet, but I think any real assessment of their outlook has got to center around the blockbuster trade last spring that sent Evander Kane to Buffalo for Tyler Myers. At the time, that trade was no big blow to Winnipeg because they were comfortably in the playoff race, and Evander Kane was already down with a long term injury which eventually ended his season.

In the short term, the Jets got “something for nothing” in Tyler Myers, but now in the long term they’ll have to find a way to make up for Evander Kane’s scoring over a full 82 game schedule. Myers is a big guy with incredible potential, but the Jets really need him to recapture the magic of his rookie season soon or his albatross of a contract will start to get ugly when Winnipeg’s up and coming young talent starts looking for big paychecks.

Casey: Kane was the change that was on my mind, too. While the trade made sense at the time, they haven’t done much to patch the Evander Kane-shaped hole in their roster. There are still some free agent options available down the left wing, but not anyone that immediately leaps out as a solution.

Burmistrov’s numbers weren’t terrible for a bottom-six guy in his prior stint in the NHL. He got 58 points in 194 NHL games and despite having most of three NHL seasons under his belt, he’s still young. He may not always be good for 10-13 goals a year, but as a 3C or 4C the Jets could do worse.

Trade acquisitions Jiri Tlusty and Lee Stempniak both have yet to be re-signed. I think the Jets could let Tlusty walk, but they might be wise to hold on to Stempniak. Stempniak fills out their bottom six and plays a valuable role on the PK. Though the Jets have some players due for raises next year, they could likely still keep him.

Are the Winnipeg Jets a better team now than they were in 2014-15?

AJ: Yes? No? Like so many of the teams in the Central Division, this isn’t a clear-cut easy response because their biggest question marks remain on the roster and only seeing them on ice and in action is the way to answer them.

The Jets are going to rise and fall as a result of their goaltending. If Pavelec and Hutchinson can repeat their performances last year, they’ll be a competitive team pushing for the playoffs again. If they can’t, and I’m not sold they will, they could be back to the draft lottery yet again.

Cole: Like AJ said, goaltending is going to be the biggest question by far in the great white North next year. Pavelec and Hutchinson played uncharacteristically high quality hockey last year, and the Jets’ offseason indicates that they are comfortable betting on those two horses again. The Jet’s very deep, well-rounded crop of skaters will give them every opportunity for success in the Central next season, and even average goaltending will take them a long way, but we’ve seen a few recent Jets teams unravel on the shaky shoulders of Ondrej Pavelec.

Casey: The Jets remind me very much of Minnesota in this regard and I’ll echo what I said about Devan Dubnyk. Pavelec and Hutchinson don’t have to be superstars for this Jets squad to make the playoffs. They just need to be average. The Jets can withstand some injuries with their logjam of talented defenders and young forwards. They struggled to score a lot of goals last year at times, but with their defense minimising scoring chances, all they need is to keep goal totals low and I can easily see them sneaking back into the playoffs.

How do the Jets’ offseason changes affect their matchup against the Avalanche?

AJ: Bleh. I feel the Avs are a step above last year but it hasn’t really mattered much. These two teams have taken each other to overtime like 553453 times over the last couple of seasons so the skill disparity hasn’t really mattered.

These two teams seem to have a healthy dislike of each other but no real legit rivalry blood can start boiling until the two teams at least play each other in the postseason. Until something drastic happens, I fully expect these two teams to keep taking each other to overtime and shootouts, no matter what the changes are. Reto Berra had a 41-save shutout against these guys last year to cost the Avs the 8th overall draft selection. If that can happen, anything is possible when these two teams matchup.

Cole: Over the last two seasons this has been a really tough matchup for the Avalanche. The Jets aggressive forecheck and physical game were overwhelming for a defense that couldn’t move the puck out of their own end if they were already standing on the blue line with the puck. They were awful, and the Jets exploited it better than most teams in the Central Division.

The Avalanche’s upgrades on the defensive end of the ice should help mitigate that side of the matchup, but Dustin Byfuglien is always a big X-factor to watch for when the Avs play the Jets. Byfuglien always seems to play lights out against the Avalanche and has found his way under the skin of a number of Avalanche players. Whether it was punching Semyon Varlamov in the face after an OT goal in 2014, his monstrous hit on Tyson Barrie in 2015, or the number of scraps he’s engaged in with every Avs player from Gabe Landeskog to John Mitchell to Michael Sgarbossa, Dustin Byfuglien has given everyone in burgundy and blue a reason to dislike him.

Casey: The Jets are a team that the Avalanche seemed to struggle against when given a cold start. Once they scored a few goals on the Jets, they tended to do better, but if they didn’t get those early goals, they ran the risk of being held to a single goal or even shut out. If anything affects the way these two teams match up next season, it will be the Avalanche’s additions, not Winnipeg’s. I agree with my colleagues above.

Lastly, the Jets had a strong draft this offseason. While it doesn’t impact their immediate NHL roster, any thoughts on that?

AJ: There were plenty of teams that I think did well on draft day but the Jets draft class was definitely one of my favorites. They sat back and used their bevy of early selections to grab great value all over the board. Getting Kyle Connor as late as they did could be a coup in a few years because there was a heavy amount of talk that he was a potential top-10 pick. Their selection of Jack Roslovic surprised some but he was a player I heavily scouted and was a late first round selection on my personal draft board so I’m definitely not going to ding an NHL team for coming to the same conclusion.

Jansen Harkins is a player I think is a guaranteed NHL player in the future. His ceiling is questionable, though, and likely the reason he slipped to where he did, but he’s going to be a player who sees the NHL sometime in his future. Another player I scouted heavily, Erik Foley, was their 3rd round selection and while I didn’t love his game, there’s definitely upside there because effort and the mental side of the game are already there.  If his skill level ever catches up, he could be a big-time steal for them down the line. I love what the Jets did on draft day. They kept adding high skill players to their already loaded prospect pipeline at positions of need. Great job, Chevy.

Casey: Jack Roslovic was a player I paid a lot of attention to prior to the draft as well. I drafted for Winnipeg in our mock drafts this year and loved their selections. They are continuing to build a stable of solid prospects that should serve the team well for years to come and their front office should be proud.

Final thoughts:

Casey: Coming into the halfway point of our Central Division Roundup series, I find myself again and again impressed by just what a meat grinder this division is. Digging deeper into each team’s lineup and reading over the strengths and weaknesses of their builds, I have yet to come across a single team where I can look at the roster and say, “Yep, it’s highly unlikely these guys make it to the playoffs.”

All the talk about potential expansion franchises lately has had me thinking about what potential impact two new franchises would have on divisional restructuring. That’s definitely a subject for another article, but it’s worth noting that after looking over several suggestions from all over the internet, my immediate response was almost always one of oh yeah, getting a Pacific team in here would be a relief.

That just goes to show you just how stiff the competition in the Central is.