- Jun 10, 2014
- 57,460
- 29,308
My thoughts on the first few seasons was that TNSE was trying to walk a line between drafting and developing into a contender and having a reasonable competitive team on the ice so fans enjoyed the hockey experience and start identifying with the players. They probably could have got away with a full on rebuild since there was such a fierce honeymoon feeling those first couple years and there is enough knowledgeable fans who would have understood the direction. This is balanced against the huge demand for tickets and fans so in love with having an NHL team to cheer and treating Jets games as a night out on the town spending 100's on food and drink before, during and after games. Many of these fans were not diehard hockey fans but those enjoying the experience of something new and novel. Those early years were really good for TNSE bottom line and for businesses in and around downtown. I don't think Chipman had an appetite at that time to put a damper on this by start selling off stars like Buff and Wheeler that fans were growing to love. At the same time Chevy was asked to patiently go about is business of drafting and putting the resources into player development.
Yeah, something like that. They may have failed to take full advantage of the honeymoon period by going full on rebuild. Or not. They did have that once in a lifetime opportunity. They chose not to use it. There is no way to say definitively whether they were right or wrong with that choice.
Hindsight again, the best trades would have been dumping those last 3 Thrashers picks after the '12 season. Even Burmi would have returned something of value. But it certainly would have looked strange to be trading him plus Kane and Bogo at those early ages.