I personally think the Jets made a huge mistake by bringing back the name when the records and history all reside in Arizona.
Appreciating history is one thing...trying to bring it back is something else.
On what level do you think it was a "huge mistake" to revive the Jets name? That's what the fans overwhelmingly demanded. What other consideration should there be? The team is for the fans; and it's on the fans the team depends for its financial success.
Chipman in Winnipeg had an idea to call them the Manitoba Polar Ice, or something like that. Maybe that was following the re-brand idea of the Wild, an example of a new team being very successful after a failed earlier franchise. But Minnesota maybe needed to distinguish itself from a previous franchise that, while loved by the fans, had been horribly led and ruined by owners Green and the Gunds. The judgment was they needed a clean break from that. Now that the Wild have succeeded so well, a change to the North Stars name, or incorporating it somehow as a third jersey (either of which I'd like to see) wouldn't harm us in any marketing sense, I don't think.
But the situation was entirely different in Winnipeg. There wasn't that same hostility between the fans and ownership (remember Gund firing local icon Herb Brooks, and the insulting way he did it? And Norm Green's demands and retrobate behavior?). Winnipeg had an old building and owners who couldn't afford to fix things. Fans understood that and their anger was actually directed far more at Gary Bettman, who blocked local efforts to find a solution, than with their ownership. In those circumstances, from a marketing standpoint, it would actually have been a huge mistake to call them anything other than the Jets. Why take that from the fans? They had a minor league WHL team called the Jets in the 1960's-'70s before the WHA team, and St. Paul has had several iterations of its traditional Saints teams in both hockey and baseball. There's nothing wrong with copying those historical names. Let the fans' love of tradition reign where it can work. I think tradition is gaining even more traction today: While the Wild didn't seriously consider calling themselves the North Stars, and the Jets didn't want to use the old name at first, but had to bow to fan sentiment, the Quebec investment group has made it clear that they will consider no name
other than Nordiques for the team. I say good for them, if that's what the fans want.