News Article: The Athletic agents poll (Winnipeg edition) - paywall

[Yukon Joe]

The NHL Agent Poll: Agents have their say on GMs, Gary...

The Athletic survey's 22 NHL player agents anonymously, then puts together these results.

Some tidbits from a Winnipeg Jets perspective:

-Kevin Cheveldayoff did not rank on either the most reasonable, or most unreasonable, GMs to deal with

-Winnipeg just edges out Ottawa as the team most likely to land on a player's no-trade list. Top 4 rounded out by Buffalo and Edmonton. Which should be nobody's surprise.

Most interesting though were some of the comments from the agents about Winnipeg:

“Winnipeg. They’re going to win this every year.”

“It’s just the comparability of living. Do you want to live in Chicago, Nashville, Vegas or do you want to live in Winnipeg?”

“I don’t want to say Winnipeg. Those guys are classy, it’s a great organization. The players I’ve had there love it. Love it. Those cold weather small cities are too easy of a target.”

“Winnipeg will develop guys. They’ll make them into hockey players. Usually, it’s the quality of the owner or management. So Ottawa, because of Melnyk.”

“Winnipeg … Once you’re in the rink, it’s great. The other 22 hours of the day, it’s not so good.”

So I think we all pretty much knew where the Peg stands, it still kind of hurts to see it there in black and white. I guess it's nice to see the organization get some love (some of the other comments just savage the Senators organization).


[Note: I only pulled a few quotes from the entire article, which is allowed under Fair Use doctrine. Please don't anyone copy-paste the entire article

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[Adam da bomb]

The NHL Agent Poll: Agents have their say on GMs, Gary...

The Athletic survey's 22 NHL player agents anonymously, then puts together these results.

Some tidbits from a Winnipeg Jets perspective:

-Kevin Cheveldayoff did not rank on either the most reasonable, or most unreasonable, GMs to deal with

-Winnipeg just edges out Ottawa as the team most likely to land on a player's no-trade list. Top 4 rounded out by Buffalo and Edmonton. Which should be nobody's surprise.

Most interesting though were some of the comments from the agents about Winnipeg:



So I think we all pretty much knew where the Peg stands, it still kind of hurts to see it there in black and white. I guess it's nice to see the organization get some love (some of the other comments just savage the Senators organization).


[Note: I only pulled a few quotes from the entire article, which is allowed under Fair Use doctrine. Please don't anyone copy-paste the entire article

Thanks. I’ve read enough imagine rest is just the same.

 

[surixon]

No real surprise here.

 

[Lowered Expectations]

Look, don't let that get under Your skins. Organization is good, and just like in Finland: There is nothing we can do about geography. Winnipeg will have cold winters and Finland have Russia as a neighbour (I like those russians I personally know, but their leaders and our history...You get the picture).

 

[Hunter368]

Not surprising and I’m glad Chevy isn’t a push over or a tyrant.......that makes me happy.

 

[DannyGallivan]

Look, don't let that get under Your skins. Organization is good, and just like in Finland: There is nothing we can do about geography. Winnipeg will have cold winters and Finland have Russia as a neighbour (I like those russians I personally know, but their leaders and our history...You get the picture).

The bottom line is that winners like playing for winners. The more one ranks the frills of the city over the quality of the franchise, the less that player will likely help you to win anyways. If not, it wouldn't have taken the Rangers or Chicago so long between Cups; the Kings wouldn't stink; the Sharks, Canucks and Panthers would have Cups by now. I can go on.

The Jets need to somehow develop a culture of winning and then they'll be a destination of choice. Detroit is an armpit - worse than Buffalo - yet it was the destination of choice for free agents for years back in its most recent glory days.

 

[bustamente]

Remember this poll and comments when you are making your fantasy trade and wondering what free agents the Jets will get.

 

[Yukon Joe]

All in all this poll kind of confirms that management's "draft and develop" approach is the only one that will work. When players get here and get to know the city and the organization they tend to like it. Many have in fact signed extensions that bought up UFA years (Trouba is the only one who wouldn't).

But yeah - from afar, all players know about Winnipeg is flying in to the city in the middle of winter. The drive from the airport to downtown... isn't pretty. If that was my only exposure to Winnipeg I wouldn't want to live there either.

 

[Howard Chuck]

The only thing that will ever change that is to win, and win a lot.

We don't seem to be willing to do what it takes to do that however.

 

[cheswick]

The only thing that will ever change that is to win, and win a lot.

We don't seem to be willing to do what it takes to do that however.

Who's "we"? And what is it that "we" aren't willing to do?

 

[Howard Chuck]

Who's "we"? And what is it that "we" aren't willing to do?

"We" is Maurice in this case, and he isn't willing to make changes to anything in order to maximize the team's ability to win games. The PP, PK, lines, systems etc. It's all static and never changing unless an injury forces change.

It's all my opinion of course.

 

[Roughneck1]

Remember this poll and comments when you are making your fantasy trade and wondering what free agents the Jets will get.

Yep. Most of them are way overpaid and past there primes. Making them risky signings. It’ll save us from some bad decisions.

 

[tbcwpg]

Yep. Most of them are way overpaid and past there primes. Making them risky signings. It’ll save us from some bad decisions.

On the UFA side, sure.

The part I don't like about this is the NMC stuff. Might be harder to make some of these "hockey trades" that a lot of people are in favour of.

 

[Roughneck1]

On the UFA side, sure.

The part I don't like about this is the NMC stuff. Might be harder to make some of these "hockey trades" that a lot of people are in favour of.

Yeah that’s the bad part of it. It seems teams are getting a little more reluctant to hand those out lately though unless it’s to one of there very top players or ufas to convince them to sign.

 

[Eyeseeing]

All in all this poll kind of confirms that management's "draft and develop" approach is the only one that will work. When players get here and get to know the city and the organization they tend to like it. Many have in fact signed extensions that bought up UFA years (Trouba is the only one who wouldn't).

But yeah - from afar, all players know about Winnipeg is flying in to the city in the middle of winter. The drive from the airport to downtown... isn't pretty. If that was my only exposure to Winnipeg I wouldn't want to live there either.

Pretty accurate unfortunately.
Living here in the winter is like a black and white movie and it’s grimy AF
I love my city for the other seasons but winter is not appealing.

 

[Teemusalami204]

Detroit has had no problems getting players over the years. That city is ranked as the worst in America.

Players need to see that coming here is worth spending their life in our modest cold city

If we become a consistent force and a player knows that 2 years after he signs here the team wont go through a mini rebuild and waste his time the players will love to come here

 

[kanadalainen]

Pwinter is like a black and white movie and it’s grimy AF

This honestly made me laugh so hard!! 47 likes if I could.

<still laughing>

Then - I had an epiphany.... perhaps this is why I enjoy old B+W movies so much. Well, that and the high speed banter of Sidney Greenstreet.

 

[macmaroon]

 

[ps241]

Ok news flash it’s a tough market to attract UFA’s to, that is going to make winning the cup tougher. However, as we saw with Mason and Kuli, UFA’s can also f*** you up big time. Be careful what you wish for.

 

[kylbaz]

In 2018 the Jets were a serious contender and Stastny did waive his no-trade to come here.

In 2020 the Jets are a bubble team.

And then signed here long term.

 

[Guardian17]

There are only 31, soon 32, cities on the planet with an NHL team.

Winnipeg is one of them.

 

[Teemusalami204]

And then signed here long term.

Imagine the defense if stastny signed long term. Or not having one of our wingers because he was here. We are against the cap he was never going to sign here.

It would of been a wash. Maybe even made the team worse

 

[Arthur Fonzarelli]

I doubt many NHL players care about the cold. The leagues players are nearly all from cold weather climates and over half of NHL cities have their share of bad Decembers & Januarys.

The knock against Winnipeg is travel. Centrally located with the closest NHL city 750km away, players in Winnipeg will always have the leagues worst travel schedule.

 

[Buffdog]

I bet a few players would've been ok being a Jet when the city was going nuts in May 2018

 

[Howard Chuck]

Exactly. Win and the rest will sort itself out.