Before the post mortem could begin on the Jets season after being eliminated from the playoffs by the eventual Stanley Cup winner St. Louis Blues there were cries that this would be 'the summer of Chevy'. The Jets GM had Trouba, Myers, and Tanev to deal with along with contracts for RFAs Copp, Laine, Connor and Beaulieu plus questions to answer as to why the team had such a disappointing second half of the season.
So far there is no Myers, Trouba was traded, Tanev walked free and not a contract in sight for the key RFAs. There have been some depth signing with Letestu, Nogier, Beaulieu and Bitetto, plus entry level deals for drafted players such as Heinola but what else? There has not been a sniff of anything from Laine's camp, Connors camp or Copp's and Pionk has now shown up at Da Beauty League in Minneapolis for some summer work.
The summer of Chevy has been a marvelous masaterpiece of working from the cottage dock and who can blame him? Nothing is urgent if bigger changes are not going to happen.
Who said that?
The answer is not set in stone by anyone but if you start reading some tea leaves (that's what we do here during the summer months, and fall and winter and spring) perhaps the hold up has more to do with issues away from actual players and the organization. For some this may be wishful thinking but let's look at some of the information slowly seeping out- accurate or not.
Laine was frustrated at the end of the season, felt demands by team leadership were too much
Wheeler and Scheifele did not want to play with Laine.
Ehlers and Laine felt they were not given adequate support
The ice time/usage of many players was frustrating for them
And of course the one quote that did set off alarm bells, after Winnipeg Free Press reporter Mike McIntyre reported there were rifts within the locker room, was from head coach Paul Maurice saying, 'we have to unruffled some feathers'.
Finally the gossip. It's everywhere and my DMs on Twitter basically explode with it when something 'new' ramps up. So here's a challenge to those who want to believe it when it comes to this idea that some one is sleeping with some one else's GF or SO- PROVE IT!
Come on out and name your source, who is telling you this crap because I'm going to tell you mine.
I have spoken with one of the parties alleged to be involved. It's pure and utter fiction. This is the same kind of BS that this fan base whipped up around Frolik's wife, also some one I spoke with due to a mutual friend of ours. This follows the pattern of many juicy stories that have accompanied various players since the Thrashers relocated to Winnipeg. Trouba, Bogosian, Kane, Ladd were all targets of gossip, and the same stuff is happening again. It's time for Winnipeg to grow the hell up.
With that being said most of the issues above the gossip would point back to the head coach. If Laine is unhappy with aspects of leadership and usage is this not something that any logical person(like an agent) would look at and want to discuss when it comes to the contract to be negotiated? The same could be thought of with Copp due to the strange usage in the second half of one of the Jets best lines which could have been reunited but wasn't for some time. He is set for arbitration and hopefully something comes to fruition before the award is made.
It would appear the Jets are in no hurry to deal with Connor and Laine's contracts and it would also appear based on no noise from either player that they are content with the pace as it stands. Take that two ways- either they are moving in the right direction or they are at a stalemate and agreeing to disagree and keep quiet.
Back to the coach and others, if the part of the management post mortem was to address problems brought forward by coach and players, how long should this take and what possible changes come?
Here is where I believe the problems are manifesting itself. There is a clear and present point where play changes for the Jets last season in December and they never recover.
As you can see the team recovers near April but not nearly enough to overcome what the Blues' tactics were. Sure the games were close but that speaks more to goaltending but the Jets were outshot in all but two games.
The questions that needs to be answered are likely something like these:
What changed in December?
What resources existed to address the problems?
How were those resources used?
Was there agreement in how to use resources?
Were the players buying into tactics and strategy?
How does the team adjust to changing roster and will that address underlying problems?
There are probably more but if some players have concerns about tactics and usage and those players are needing new contracts, then certainly presenting a plan to address problems would be important to said players.
This 'plan' could be the dertermining factor in whether a player wants to sign short or long term and at what value? If there is a lack of belief in the coach how does that affect the GM and how he builds the team and works with the coach? How does the GM then manage contracts?
To think that the Jets problems were roster-based last year is naive, the problems went through the team and on paper that team should have finished better in the regular season and gone further in the post-season. There has to be more diversity with tactics and an open mind to embrace diverse ideas, does that exist now?
The Jets could easily overpay and get deals that Connor, Laine and Copp would sign but the goal is get them on fair deals for them and the team so that the GM is not stuck to them. The reason there might be no news is that player(s) and team have a different view of what's fair under the current system.
Many have been pointing to the Jets system in all three zones for sometime and if it's obvious to the fans then it is more than obvious to the players. Hopefully that's been a huge part of the summer of Chevy and that once there has been change agreed to and made the Jets and their players can get the contracts sorted. The money is there now but the deals aren't and given the way the season finished I'd be cautious if I was a player.
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