Hard to believe that Edmonton gave up this guy; he would fit in perfectly there right now.
As a 2nd round pick he developed in NCAA then came out Spring of Jr year (btw, he has his college degree by taking his remaining courses online) (28 credits in 2 years WHILE HE WAS PLAYING IN EDMONTON).
The Oilers called him up in December of his first full year (he had about 20 or so, AHL games under his belt). The talk was that he was going to pair with Ryan Whitney and get protected/limited minutes. Whitney's foot was shot and he was done. Then Jeff was thrown out there to sink or swim. Ladi Smid became Jeff's D partner and showed him the ropes. They were a fairly decent pairing as Oiler pairings went. At one point they were 11th best shutdown pair in the league. So of course the Oil f'd that all up.. traded Ladi and there must have been 20 D guys come through there that are now selling cars. Ralph Kruger became the coach and he was starting to right the ***** show in the lock out year.
It was not good enough for SiMpLe JacK McTARD so he blows that developing good thing strait to hell. They fire Kruger by SKYPE, They hire this Marlie's GQ guy named Eakins and he scratches Jeff (on orders from McTARD to send a message) on opening day against the Kings. Score LA 6 EDM 0. We found out later that Eakins was being micro managed right down to the type of puck bags to use by McTARD all year. Jeff is rolling 25 minutes a night on the sh*ttiest run pro hockey team in North America. So he accrued a big deficit in +/-. But he learned all about the NHL rolling night in and night out against the top lines in the West.
The Edmonton press was merciless against Jeff. (He wasn't a good Western Canada boy like Justin Schultz etc). He wasn't a fighter but he was near the top in hits every year. He wouldn't come down from the blueline to get in some useless scrum because the Ref's warned him not to and the big macho Western Canada tweeter reporters would call him out.
I could go on and on, the day that his phone rang at 6:30 AM and McTARD told him he had traded him to the most storied team in NHL history was truly a rebirth!
Let's see how it goes. He's rolling with a 4" mesh job and nerve endings cut out of his hernia and a knee brace as well. He might be a tad slower at the first of this year. But he's smart and he knows positioning now.