So it's been almost two full years since I last blogged about my hometown and favourite NHL team, the Winnipeg Jets. That includes the franchise's second-ever playoff appearance in 2014-2015, which saw them have the exact same outcome as their first NHL playoff appearance when the team was located in Atlanta, Georgia, losing to the New York Rangers in four straight, when the team was known as the Atlanta Thrashers. The 2015 outcome was no different, being a first-round 4-0 sweep at the hands of the Anaheim Ducks. That means in 17 years of existence, the Thrashers/Jets have appeared in two playoff series and won 0 games. Not exactly something that instills pride in your team.
But pride is what it was. I hardly cared the Jets were a mediocre team at best throughout their first incarnation in Winnipeg. It didn't matter to this young Jets fan that his heroes didn't hoist hockey's holy grail once in 17 years in the NHL. All that mattered was that I had a team to cheer on. A team to argue with Oilers fans about (that one didn't go too well for very long) A team to compare stats with among other hockey fans, especially Canadian ones. In short, I had an National Hockey League team to adore. That all changed in June 1996. The last ever Winnipeg Jets 1.0 game was played on April 28, 1996. A 4-1 playoff loss to the Detroit Red Wings that ended an era.
That blog mentioned above can be found at www.thenewwinnipegjets.blogspot.com. However, I had some personal issues come up which prevented me from posting as much as I wanted, then eventually things got hay-wire enough where I didn't post at all and just let the blog fall into obscurity.
However, that doesn't mean I wanted to lose interest in the team or interest in blogging about the Winnipeg Jets. I was a little too young to appreciate and enjoy the likes of The Hot Line of Bobby Hull, Anders Hedberg and Ulf Nillsson. I grew up watching Dale Hawerchuck, Thomas Steen, Laurie Boschman, Dave Babych, Dave Ellet and the like. I loved my Jets and was heartbroken and angry when they left to the hockey dead-zone of Arizona in 1996.
Before I go on with the "new" Jets, for the benefit of anyone out there who doesn't know what I'm talking about, like say any 10 to 15-year-old hockey fans, here's a quick look back at what happened.
Then, joy of all joys, a miracle happened:
And here is every moment of "The Return," May 31, 2011. Now, I don't expect anyone to watch every second of this, as it is a lot of regional pride and probably only exciting to Jets fans.
The story from the CBC
And of course the first draft in 2011 to name the team and the pick of Mark Scheifele.
And just for fun (really fun for me at least) is some of the first game back against the Montreal Canadiens. Not the outcome we were looking for, as the Habs spoiled the party 5-1.
So since a lot has transpired since that day, including being placed in the Thrashers old position in the NHL's south-east division (why not just swap out with the Nashville Predators who were in the central division where the Jets are now and are geographically close to all the teams that were in the south-east anyway. But that's neither here nor there now.) and not making the playoffs until 2015 I'm going to continue from here in the present starting with the 2016 NHL Lottery.
When the Jets went into the NHL Draft Lottery on April 30, they went in with a not very enviable chance of only 7.5 percent of walking away with the top pick. Much was made in Winnipeg and by Jets fans throughout the country that they should have tanked the last week of the season, thereby improving their chances of capturing the number one pick; most pundits assuming it would be the 19-year-old phenom Austen Matthews. But as it turned out, the hockey gods smiled very pleasantly on the Jets as not only did they win their last four games of the season (in doing so, winning their first three or more games consecutively in the whole 2015-2016 campaign) on a very tough California road trip; the points accumulated allowed them to be in the perfect numerical position for those ping pong balls to fall their way and be the lucky team that jumped up no less than four spots in the lottery from sixth to second. Of course this allowed them to select Patrik Laine (pronounced LIE-NAY) and very quickly change the fortunes of the franchise for years to come.
Although only 18 years of age, Laine is expected to carry the Jets into the future along with Mark Scheifele, Kyle Connor and Jacob Trouba. He has been compared to his idol, Russian superstar and sure-fire Hall-Of-Famer Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals. With a comparison like that, one would have to wonder a) is it a fair and accurate description, and b) can Laine not only produce what is quickly being expected of him, but can he handle said expectations. Is he a big fish in a little pond? Or will the small market Winnipeg media not be as unforgiving to a "white night" as say the hockey writers in Toronto, Montreal or New York? Make no mistake, Patrik Laine has the tools. The guy can put the puck in the net as this highlite reel demonstrates:
But he is only 18 after all. He is one of, if not the most talented and NHL-ready 18-year-old on the planet, but he is 18 and bound to make mistakes. The Jets realize this and will not do as their predecessors did in Atlanta and that is rush a potentially game-breaking young player if he's not ready. The Atlanta Thrashers did exactly that with the likes of Evander Kane and Alexander Burmistrov. They were young. talented players that the Thrashers organization rushed into the NHL too quick and it cost them. You can be sure the Jets will do no such thing. I fully expect Laine to crack the Jets roster next season, but I would not be shocked to see him spend a couple of months or more with the Jets American Hockey League affiliate, Manitoba Moose just to get him comfortable with the North American-style game and dimensions of NHL-sized rinks. It may not seem like much on that end, but developing your skills on international-style ice surfaces, then to ply your trade across the pond in smaller ones would take some getting used to I imagine. Not to mention, although he did do very well in Tampara in the Finnish elite league with players older and stronger than he, he still has to get used to the rough and tough style of the National Hockey League where it is a nightly grind. Will he burn out, or will he show Winnipeg fans and the rest of the NHL that he is indeed
the second coming of Teemu Selanne? The knock on Laine is that he may be a tad too arrogant. Some may call that confidence. He did say that he should be the number one pick ahead of Matthews who went to the Toronto Maple Leafs and that he should be able to crack the Jets first line, but ultimately of course, that decision falls to head coach Paul Maurice. Laine will have the opportunity to prove it, as Maurice has said that he will have "the opportunity to excel."
Having said all that, I have no doubt that Patrik Laine will be the player the Jets have been waiting for. Will he be the number one, most productive guy? Probably not at first, but eventually he will carry this team. I predict he will be the Calder trophy winner ahead of Austen Matthews (that's if the media is fair to him and not the typical all Toronto, all the time articles we will no doubt read about)
Along with Laine, the Jets managed to acquire 6'7 defenseman Logan Stanley by trading the 18th (the position the Jets held from the Andrew Ladd trade) and 79th overall picks to the Philadelphia Flyers' for their 22nd and 36th overall picks. The Jets had been in need of another left-shooting defenseman for some time. Stanley is said to have been someone the Jets had coveted since the draft season began a few months prior.
