List of active Jets who have scored over 40 goals in a season:
Laine
List of active Jets who have finished top 10 for Rocket:
Laine (2nd 17-18,
7th 16-17
)
Connor (6th 19-20
)
Connor probably would've scored 40 this season if it was full 82 games, he was almost 100% lock for that. Then again, scoring is up by a lot compared to 17-18 or 16-17 and Laine was 18 & 19 years old during those seasons.
2016-2017 Laine 5v5 goal differential:
+7 (2nd best behind Scheif, who was +13)
2017-2018 Laine 5v5 goal differential:
+18 (best in team, Scheif 2nd with +13)
After those two season, 2018-2019 I think he was leading the league in goals scored after his historic November. After that it seems that basically everything has turned to crap in the Jets/Laine relationship, at least if you listen to rumors and read the forum... Also you gotta remember these comments about not getting to play 1st line were made after those 16-17 and 17-18 seasons, which were pretty damn impressive seasons and he was facing contract year. Then after that November 2018 he's still playing 2nd line? Btw. I completely agree his comments lacked tact, but also that reporter is a known Little hater and took every opportunity to run with his narrative and get the most out of them. But also I think it's dishonest to compare how Wheeler "does anything asked for the team" while he's an old vet and captin who has already had his big payday in a pricy long term deal vs. Laine who was/is a young player playing for contract. The Jets have created that situation themselves.
In my opinion the take away here shouldn't be that Laine is an entitled brat (hey, I admit he might be, though he doesn't come off like that to me), but that during 18-19 everybody should have been asking
"Why is this guy who outscores opposition 2nd best in the team* and has scored most goals in the league second to Ovechkin only* asked to change how he plays the game?"
* combined stats from 16-17 & 17-18 seasons
I mean yeah, I think his overall game took steps forward in 19-20, but you gotta remember it was his 21 year old season, so he's bound to take steps forward basically just by sitting on the coach (EDIT: meant couch of course but maybe coach has more depth to it
) and playing Xbox because of maturing physically (well ok maybe not quite, but you get the point...) - I'm questioning if there exists a parallel universe where Maurice didn't get a power forward boner and what kind of improvements Laine's overall game might have taken there - or not - and if he would've kept his goal scoring. The fact remains the "one dimensional" teenager Laine was outscoring opponent by a good margin and had awesome WAR & GAR stats, and probably was a more effective hockey player overall than even the 19-20 Laine who is "rounding out" and "improving his overall game".
Laine is not perfect, he seems a temperemental guy with high highs and low lows, but that said, management and/or leadership has done a horrible job if they run him out of town.
Honestly I don't know how many times I've written out these things, probably as many times as I've read how horrible player Laine was 5v5 early on. Imagine if there was a book of Laine threads since he was drafted. You'd want to beat your head into a pulp against a wall by the time you get to christmas 2016. But when you space it all out like this, you get relatively sane people writing the same stuff over and over again.
