The Positivity Thread

[ERYX]

How's about a thread where we take a break from the nonstop negativity in every other thread and focus on the positives?

I know I'm not the only poster who'd like a bit of a break. There are tons of threads to air grievances and level criticisms (both warranted and otherwise). I'd like to talk here about the positives.

First and foremost, here's the #1 positive for me. We are at the end of October and here are the standings:

We're in a while card spot with 1-2 games in hand on the teams above us. We win against Pittsburgh on Monday and we leapfrog up to 3rd in the Central! To me this is a massive positive, especially since we haven't been playing our best hockey. Imagine when things start clicking.

So that's the general positive I'm jazzed about. If you asked me 6 months ago if I'd be happy about Jets being in this situation I would have said "heck yeah!". As for positives:

1) Hellebuyck - the man is playing like the stud goalie that many thought he would be. I was skeptical last season but tried to keep the faith considering that there are several elite goalies who started out a bit uneven -- not everyone is Matt Murray. Helle keeps this up and this is AWESOME for Winnipeg's future. If we have an elite goalie AND the young talent up-front in Laine, Schiefele, Ehlers, Morrisey, and (yes) Lowry, that's not just good for this season but for years to come.

2) Tanev - lots of people hate him here, but I'm starting to develop a bromance. He's not the most skilled -- I'm certainly not claiming he is. But I just love his hustle and to see how straight-up hard work results in good things. He's one of the main reasons we walked away with one point last night. I say good on him. He gave us some desperately needed secondary scoring on a night when our top guns were not firing on all cylinders. He's kind of a pleasant surprise to me and can make a solid fourth-liner Mo can trust for us when Perrault and Lowry return.

3) Lowry - although currently hurt, he's still a beast, and although pointless was one of our best (if not the best) players on the ice early in the season when things were a tire fire. It just makes me happy to see a guy that still just puts his nose to the grindstone and plays hard when everyone else is self-destructing around him. He'll get rewarded with points like Tanev has when he gets back.

4) Ehlers - Signed a sweet home-town discount contract and has really taken his game to the next level so far this season. Again, bodes well for this season and years to come. What's not to like?

So what are the things you're happy about so far this season?

Click to read more...

 

[mcpw]

Games 3-9: 0.929

That's really good.

 

[Aavco Cup]

You just made the mods a lot of work. LOL.

I'm not convinced everybody here will be able to resist their natural urges

If the season ended today we'd be playing the Kings in the Playoffs

 

[YWGinYYZ]

Connor: he's here to stay, I think. Like his tenacity and speed on the forecheck - points will follow.

Ehlers has looked really, really good.

Helle has put in some really nice performances.

Holding CBJ and the Pens to 2 regulation time goals on the road is a positive.

 

[Aavco Cup]

Kyle Connor has finally arrived

 

[Garbox]

How's about a thread where we take a break from the nonstop negativity in every other thread and focus on the positives?

I know I'm not the only poster who'd like a bit of a break. There are tons of threads to air grievances and level criticisms (both warranted and otherwise). I'd like to talk here about the positives.

First and foremost, here's the #1 positive for me. We are at the end of October and here are the standings:

View attachment 81571

We're in a while card spot with 1-2 games in hand on the teams above us. We win against Pittsburgh on Monday and we leapfrog up to 3rd in the Central! To me this is a massive positive, especially since we haven't been playing our best hockey. Imagine when things start clicking.

So that's the general positive I'm jazzed about. If you asked me 6 months ago if I'd be happy about Jets being in this situation I would have said "heck yeah!". As for positives:

1) Hellebuyck - the man is playing like the stud goalie that many thought he would be. I was skeptical last season but tried to keep the faith considering that there are several elite goalies who started out a bit uneven -- not everyone is Matt Murray. Helle keeps this up and this is AWESOME for Winnipeg's future. If we have an elite goalie AND the young talent up-front in Laine, Schiefele, Ehlers, Morrisey, and (yes) Lowry, that's not just good for this season but for years to come.

2) Tanev - lots of people hate him here, but I'm starting to develop a bromance. He's not the most skilled -- I'm certainly not claiming he is. But I just love his hustle and to see how straight-up hard work results in good things. He's one of the main reasons we walked away with one point last night. I say good on him. He gave us some desperately needed secondary scoring on a night when our top guns were not firing on all cylinders. He's kind of a pleasant surprise to me and can make a solid fourth-liner Mo can trust for us when Perrault and Lowry return.

3) Lowry - although currently hurt, he's still a beast, and although pointless was one of our best (if not the best) players on the ice early in the season when things were a tire fire. It just makes me happy to see a guy that still just puts his nose to the grindstone and plays hard when everyone else is self-destructing around him. He'll get rewarded with points like Tanev has when he gets back.

4) Ehlers - Signed a sweet home-town discount contract and has really taken his game to the next level so far this season. Again, bodes well for this season and years to come. What's not to like?

So what are the things you're happy about so far this season?

A good summary! To me the biggest thing to be happy about must be the fact that you too pointed out; even thought there's a lot of room to improve we're doing pretty good! Now that can also be seen as an indication of a good team if one wants to

And Helle must be the player I'm most happy about of finding his game. A couple of months ago the team had a pretty sure starter (Mason) and a question mark as a backup (Hellebuyck). Now the latter seems to have turned roles upside down (with some help from the previous one of course).

This thread is a good reminder for all of us that things are not that bad right now. Could be much worse.

 

[Swiftt]

This is the kind of thread that I like to see around here. The constant negativity that seeps into every single discussion is extremely tiresome and really turns me off from engaging into more discussions around here. I'm not saying that it isn't warranted sometimes, but it gets very old.

That being said, the positives:

1) Like many have already stated, Kyle Connor is here, and he is not going anywhere. His skating ability and his quickness on the forecheck is amazing. His points will come, and they already have! His set up to Wheeler against Minny was a thing of beauty, and he has the talent to be a top 6 winger for us for a long time.

2) Goaltending has improved immensely. Hellebuyck looks like a completely different player out there. Mentally you can tell that he is all there, and his off season training has paid off. He already has kept us in games that we would've been blown out of last year. He has been the early pleasant surprise of the year for me so far.
It was great to see Mason have himself a good game last night as well. You really gotta feel for the guy the first couple games, coming in to a new team with the expectation that he is going to be our saviour, and then crapping the bed and losing games that aren't even his fault. You have to imagine he felt like he was letting the team down. Once he gets that first win off his back his confidence will sky rocket and I will be confident that we have two solid goalies that can go every night.

3) Ehlers. My god is he something else. My favourite jet since we drafted him and he is playing out of this world so far. Cooled off a bit the last couple games, but so has our entire offence. That deal he signed is looking better every single day. I really hope that he gets put on the PP and we can utilize his quickness and ability to enter the zone better instead of just dumping it in.

4) Kulikov & Hendricks. Our two FA acquisitions (excluding Mason). Personally, I think they have been totally serviceable so far. Kully has given our D some quickness and his puck handling skills are 100x the improvement over the last guy to wear #5 for us. Especially being a LHD, I think he has been a good pick up.
As for Hendricks, he is doing exactly as intended so far in his 2 games for us. People like to sh*t on our 4th line all the time and everyone has their own idea of who should play there, but I think that Hendy has been reliable and strong holding down those grinder minutes. Which we do need. I don't care how many people tell me different. His faceoff % has been great and it's just another body to throw on the pk that isn't a top 6. Plus, he seems to really care about this team. He's only been here for ~3 months, and he looks like he's willing to die for every guy here. Can't help but love a guy like that.

5) We are 4-3-2 right now. We are not Arizona. We are not Montreal. We are not Edmonton. We are not even below .500!! And people are saying that this season is a wash?! We are comfortably in a playoff spot, 2 points up on the next team, with games in hand!! That never happens. After tomorrow, we will have already finished our 2 games a piece against arguably the 2 best teams in the east! and we can potentially get 4 out of 8 points from them. I wouldn't have expected much more than that tbh, and we have only played 1 game in our division, which we play really well in.

There is plenty to be positive about this team. We aren't even 10 games in yet lol.

GJG.

 

[Whileee]

Hellebuyck.
Ehlers.
Connor.
Kulikov.

 

[Neuf]

1) Free agents are contributing lately
2) Probably the best schedule on the league for a few months. Fewest back to backs, no insane 60 stretches.
3) Kyle Connor.
4) Goaltending
5) Depth. It's just a matter of the right combinations at the right time.
6) Tanev. I said it.
7) Arizona.

 

[Hunter368]

I hadn’t noticed an imbalance in negative vs positive comments on our forum. I’ve only seen realistic observations of results. But I’ll play along:

- Eventually our bottom six will be improved one way or another....either internally or via trade. We can’t go an entire season with virtually no production, when the bottom six is improved we shall see more wins.

- Ehlers....he’s good.

- Wheeler is normally a slow starter, we can expect to see him improve

- Helle is finally starting to look like he was advertised

- Myers is healthy still, knock on wood

- Impressed so far with Poolman

That’s all i’ve got off the top of my head without posting sarcastic points.

 

[FFHockey]

- Helle biggest thumbs up for me. So glad to see him take charge and do what he needs to do to get better and then back it up. I was a Helle detractor.
- Tanev...I know he doesn’t have the skill/potential of the other “2” but nice to see his energy/hard work paying off for him. Good on him!
- Kulikov....hasn’t been perfect but he has had a few games that look like he can regain his Florida form, if we get something close to that consistently and he can stay healthy, what a great signing it will be.
- Our record overall. Considering we haven’t awoken our offence yet, we have games in hand, and we are sitting where we are...how can we not be “relatively” pleased?

There is certainly more to add, but I don’t want to come off as too much of a fan boy

 

[KCjetsfan]

Connor
Goalies
Playing somewhat poorly but still getting points out of it.

 

[Daximus]

I'm positive we can beat the Pens and Wild coming up which puts us in a real good spot. If we can get some things clicking in the next couple of games we could be in a playoff spot by American thanksgiving.

 

[Saintb]

I like the way Buff is playing within himself this year. He is a formidable talent when he is not tired.

 

[LowLefty]

PK
Hendricks (especially PK)
Ehlers
Both Conners
Lemieux (like his grit)
D depth

 

[DashingDane]

You just made the mods a lot of work. LOL.

I'm not convinced everybody here will be able to resist their natural urges

If the season ended today we'd be playing the Kings in the Playoffs

Another positive! That would mean I get to watch playoff hockey live

 

[kunekune]

Haven't seen most of the games but goalies shouldn't be the biggest problem anymore.

It's important that you have a goalie that give you a chance to win every night. Having unrealiable goalie affects players mindset and they tend to stupid plays.

 

[Dayofthedogs]

Everyone has covered most of my bases already as far as individuals.

I was actually extremely pleased with taking 2 loser points out of our B2B. Those were the kind of points we didn't pick up last year.

Being in a playoff spot with games in hand by the 10ish game mark is a very good sign to me as I don't feel like a lot of our players have hit their stride.

Have really enjoyed Buffs game the last few as well, Despite the lazy puck recovery last night.

 

[Afterburner]

Helle is looking hella sweet this year

 

[ps241]

There is going to be overlap but I will double down.

1) GOALTENDING (shouts from the top of a roof). In a league that is so even it could be the difference between making the playoffs or not.
2) Our record considering we haven't played well yet. I sincerely mean this as a positive because good games are coming and if we can string together some good games our record could be really good.
3) Kuli has exceeded my expectations.
4) Poolman and Niku were both good but long shots a few years ago and they have both taken big steps forward and given some hope to our young D core
5) I think this past draft will help our D depth. I think 1 or 2 of the boys could slot into our top 4 one day.
6) Nobody in the central is looking like a Juggernaut yet.
7) If we beat Pitt that means we will have taken 4 of a possible 6 points from Pitt, Columbus, Pitt (that would be big but is a big "IF")
8) Being able to avoid Sip on a thread sarcasm
9) This thread
10) Nic Ehlers has taken another step forward.


Thats it for now I am sure some other things will come to me.

 

[Guffman]

I am not sure what happened in our first two games, but iwe are 4-1-2 since then. Good depth, especially on defense surprisingly.

Some concern with our third line but when we get some players back, and I imagine Roslovic will eventually be brought up, we can even be more formidable.

I am fine with where we are and how we are trending.

 

[puck stoppa]

Great thread! Add Poolman to my list of great things this year, I see ps241 beat me to it.

 

[Daximus]

Our schedule gets a little bit better after Pittsburgh too.

Pens, Wild, Stars, Habs, Stars, Knights, Yotes x2.

If we can beat the Wild we can help bury them early. I'd be happy with even a point from the Pens. Habs could potentially be an easier game. If we can get at least 3 points out of the Stars that could be big. Yotes might be easy pickings as well. Knights will be an interesting one.

 

[Hunter368]

I am not sure what happened in our first two games, but iwe are 4-1-2 since then. Good depth, especially on defense surprisingly.

Some concern with our third line but when we get some players back, and I imagine Roslovic will eventually be brought up, we can even be more formidable.

I am fine with where we are and how we are trending.

Good depth?

On D sure I agree, but at forward we have a black hole for depth? Amongst the worse bottom six results in the nhl.

 

[Hunter368]

Our schedule has been very good this year. That’s a good thing.