Around the NHL 10 - 2022/23

[Mortimer Snerd]

Is that more of a matter of not drafting defenseman high in the first round or their development plan? They had no problem creating space for the elite D prospects in Trouba and Morrissey.


It was done with Chariot, Poolman, Stanley, Kovy Samberg, Chislholm, Gawke, and we can see it play out with their other D prospects. The organization brings along their D prospects and gives them gradually bigger roles until the end of team control, and then holds onto who they believe are the ones who they want to keep in the NHL. There were 2 exceptions far an away our 2 best 2 prospects Trouba and Morrissey.

They didn't draft Dmen high. That doesn't support your argument for a development pattern. The pattern you think you see is just a natural extension of the way they drafted.

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

isn't there clear arguments to be made either way for this?

i think there's to many variables just to conclude it often is a disaster imo. coaching , linemate mix, play-style, role, TOI etc.

is dallas w/ robertson+hintz+oettinger a disaster? devils w/ bratt and mercer (leaving out hughes since 1OA)? MIN with kaprizov or boldy? lots of examples.


agreed. this is the stark difference in the handling of niku vs stanley/samberg/heinola. niku had to compete with buff/trouba/morrissey/enstrom/chirot/kulikov/myers... he's not better than any.

The thing is that each individual is different. If a team is creating some kind of a template for development and then trying to squeeze every player into that template it is going fail. The team needs to be able to recognize what players are ready for and when they are ready for it. They need to be able to set the players up to succeed, not telling them to become different players because they only have openings for certain types.

 

[DRW204]

drafting premier prospects would for sure help, but lets not ignore that there is a high quantity of quality defenders in this league drafted outside the 1st. just to exemplify this a bit: of the 18 players receiving Norris votes last season, 9 of them were outside the 1st rd. it's not impossible, and for a team priding themselves in draft-and-develop, imo this should be a strength.

2 homegrown top-4 quality Dmen in 12 drafts (tbd on the last couple as it's to early) to me at least is pretty underwhelming? especially considering the list of dmen brought up earlier that have occupied spots in the line up in recent years. if the Jets were acquiring great top-4 defenders to play, ok fine, might not be a big deal. ie: TBLs top 4 which had Cernak, McDonagh and Sergachev.

to be fair though, i dont think you will find many teams that are great at drafting everything but teams will still find ways to ice strong-line ups..having said that: defense has been this teams pain-point since its been here. whether it be personnel acquisition or coaching, the same person is in charge of both.

 

[KingBogo]

Literally anyone since all the guys in the quoted post are not even in the league.

But at the time we didn’t really have anyone even close to NHL ready.

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

I don't know about that. I think it's pretty complex. I think you have to assess if your D prospects are able to perform and continue to develop in the NHL or if it will be damaging to them. Also, where the team is in its competitiveness cycle has to be considered.

Defensemen have a larger impact on success than forwards, and there are less places to hide. Errors by D more often end up in your net than errors by forwards.

I think you can still ruin a forward prospect by promoting them too soon, but it's for different reasons. You may force them into a role they aren't suited for, but it's easier to shelter them.

Defensmen are going to be exposed to the very best the league has to offer. Even if you D match there are plenty of scenarios where they will end up on the ice against the McDs and Landys of the world. Additionally, there are only 5 other players at that position so they will naturally be on the ice more.

Yes. It varies from prospect to prospect. Everything needs to be considered and evaluated.

You make a very good case for something I have been advocating since Buff retired. Pay the premium price to get a premium Dman for 1RD. We don't have one. We don't have a potential one in sight anywhere. Barring that, at least pay the price to get a lesser one who at least has the potential to develop into even a borderline 1st pair RHD.

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

While I agree with a lot of this some organizations are more willing to give their prospect dmen an opportunity then others. At some point you have to A) take the water wings off and see if they can swim, or B) Make a call that the player isn't going to get where you want and move them while they still have some value. This perpetual wait until the last possible moment before deciding isn't working imo.

I guess it would also help if I had the same confidence in the org assessing defensive talent as I do with their ability to assess forward talent. Looking back throughout the years the org has gotten it wrong on dmen so many times that I don't have much faith in them correctly assessing what we have in our system currently.

Yes to the first bolded.

I suspect this applies at the draft table as well. We haven't drafted a highly regarded Dman in 9 consecutive drafts now - and counting.

 

[WaveRaven]

You can't buy a #1 D not here anyhow. You need to draft one. Too bad there wasn't a stud #1 instead of Laine.

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

Yeah I cant point at any f prospect really that we held back that ended up being better than what we had.

Roslo had lots of chances to move up the lineup and didn't perform, same can be said of Harkins, and Copp was the one guy I think who got much more to 6 playing time than his abilities warranted.

We let him go and now Detroit is overpaying for him

IF we mishandled a prospect to the point of ruin then we can't really judge by the fact he didn't produce elsewhere. Not saying that happened in any specific case, for one thing because it is a pointless, unprovable argument. Both Roslovic and Harkins are more offensive players who did not develop into checkers, as Jets demanded. They might have done well on a scoring 3rd line.

I think it is too soon to judge how Copp will turn out in Detroit and that they are overpaying him. Don't really know how he is being used or what he has to work with. If they are expecting him to drive play it may not work well.

 

[voyageur]

I feel like the main issue is the Jets are drafting b+ prospects at d at the highest, with some b's and c's.

These other organizations are drafting blue chip or a level prospects which tend to be more equipped to play at the nhl level.

Which organizations? Vegas #1 was gifted Theodore, signed Pietrangelo. Dallas #2, drafted Heiskanen (top 5 pick), pretty much everyone else on their defense is a trade or free agent acquistion. Edmonton doesn't have a great defense by any means. Calgary got lucky getting Hamilton from Boston, then turning him and Ferland into Hanifin and Lindholm. Colorado? Two top 5 draft picks at d, and the Duchene trade helped them out, and Girard still sucks in my opinion, compared to what we have. St. Louis only drafted Parayko out of their top 4. Minnesota got a good haul dumping Zucker, Spurgeon any team could have had. Is Dumba better than Morrissey? Probably not.

Who am I missing that we are competing with?

Jets did well with Morrissey, turned Trouba into Pionk and Heinola, Samberg was a good draft pick. Stanley is going to be a solid #5/6 for awhile. What the Jets did wrong is they only drafted quality LD for 3 years in a row, and now they all are mature, and the team needs some RD. Those aren't easy to find (we miss you Buff) and they go for inflated prices, so teach your kids how to shoot right and play defense, folks.

 

[JetsFan815]

But at the time we didn’t really have anyone even close to NHL ready.

Not saying that there were stud d-men sitting in the minors for the Jets just that there was an opportunity cost to wasting those minutes on the likes of Beaulieu, Sbisa, Bittetto types.

 

[KingBogo]

Not saying that there were stud d-men sitting in the minors for the Jets just that there was an opportunity cost to wasting those minutes on the likes of Beaulieu, Sbisa, Bittetto types.

I hated our defense at the time as well, and I remember their was absolutely nothing in the pipeline to fill the void. Maybe a better move was to leverage a forward or picks to fill the hole with an NHL ready D prospect?

 

[voyageur]

Not saying that there were stud d-men sitting in the minors for the Jets just that there was an opportunity cost to wasting those minutes on the likes of Beaulieu, Sbisa, Bittetto types.

You forgot Dahlstrom too, who got some top 4 minutes. In a season where Buff suddenly retired, and Morrissey couldn't kill penalties because of injuries, with no De Melo until the deadline, an oft injured Tucker Poolman, Kulikov out at times, Samberg choosing to play a 3rd year in college, the options were play an 18 year old Ville Heinola, or play a shitty Sami Niku, who also couldn't stay healthy, or play the plugs, who plugged well enough that the Jets were in a playoff position points wise, when Covid hit. Revisionism here on HF is somewhat inaccurate.

 

[KingBogo]

Yes to the first bolded.

I suspect this applies at the draft table as well. We haven't drafted a highly regarded Dman in 9 consecutive drafts now - and counting.

I think this is our biggest problem. We haven't drafted a top pairing D prospect in close to a decade. Maybe Heinola gets close to that, but more likely he is a second pairing offense first guy the can QB your 2nd PP. Kind of a Tyson Barrie type. Samberg is a younger Dillion. Stanley is a 6/7. Maybe Chisholm continues his upward momentum and becomes a more well rounded 2nd pairing guy. I just don't see anything that changes our fortunes on defense.

 

[blueandgoldguy]

You can't buy a #1 D not here anyhow. You need to draft one. Too bad there wasn't a stud #1 instead of Laine.

Hindsight can be fun. Given how things have turned out, we would have drafted James McAvoy with the number 2 pick and our problems of finding a #1 defenseman would be solved.

 

[bumblebeeman]

Yeah I cant point at any f prospect really that we held back that ended up being better than what we had.

Roslo had lots of chances to move up the lineup and didn't perform, same can be said of Harkins, and Copp was the one guy I think who got much more to 6 playing time than his abilities warranted.

We let him go and now Detroit is overpaying for him

It's still crazy to me that Copp is getting 5.6 million for 5 years. Like he isn't any better then prime Perrault who was making around 4 a year if I recall correctly

I think this is our biggest problem. We haven't drafted a top pairing D prospect in close to a decade. Maybe Heinola gets close to that, but more likely he is a second pairing offense first guy the can QB your 2nd PP. Kind of a Tyson Barrie type. Samberg is a younger Dillion. Stanley is a 6/7. Maybe Chisholm continues his upward momentum and becomes a more well rounded 2nd pairing guy. I just don't see anything that changes our fortunes on defense.

Maybe that's the plan, just have 1 top pairing guy a decade and hope they all last for 2 decades so it lines up perfectly

 

[nobody imp0rtant]

turned Trouba into Pionk and Heinola

Yeah, that's turned out well so far. A guy with one good season in an inferior covid division, and another malcontent Finn. Woot!

 

[gojetsgo]

 

[sipowicz]

4400 in Tempe, Coyotes can't even sell out a 4700 seat arena! Friggin joke!

Halfway through the second period

 

[gojetsgo]

erik karlsson now has 10 goals...

 

[Jet]

Yeah, that's turned out well so far. A guy with one good season in an inferior covid division, and another malcontent Finn. Woot!

Pionk has been better than people give him credit for. He's one of our truly offensive defensemen. It's really hard to assess Heinola at this point because whether he becomes a player for the Jets or an asset to pick someone else up, that chapter has not been written yet. Then you have to consider $$$/vs performance, and JT is overpaid. Extra cap has to be considered as part of any trade.

When you layer in the context of the way that JT Avs his agent conducted themselves during the trade process and how difficult that made it on the Jets, I think the org. did very well on that deal.

 

[CorgisPer60]

When you layer in the context of the way that JT Avs his agent conducted themselves during the trade process and how difficult that made it on the Jets, I think the org. did very well on that deal.

They did well in the deal all things considered, but post deal criticisms are to be had. Pionk is being paid like a top pairing defenseman for decidedly not top pairing production. He and Schmidt are basically the same player. The Jets have way too much money tied up on the back end for it to be _that_ bad.

 

[DRW204]

They did well in the deal all things considered, but post deal criticisms are to be had. Pionk is being paid like a top pairing defenseman for decidedly not top pairing production. He and Schmidt are basically the same player. The Jets have way too much money tied up on the back end for it to be _that_ bad.

and then consider what we had in trouba-morrissey as a top pair, and how morrissey/top pair has not performed well in 3/4 seasons since.

even the 18-19 year there was that stint of trouba-beaulieu as the top pair, they performed surprisngly well compared to what we saw w/ beaulieu on the top pair afterward ( this teams infatuation w/ beaulieu )

 

[Jet]

They did well in the deal all things considered, but post deal criticisms are to be had. Pionk is being paid like a top pairing defenseman for decidedly not top pairing production. He and Schmidt are basically the same player. The Jets have way too much money tied up on the back end for it to be _that_ bad.

I don't think it's _that_bad_

We've seen a significant improvement already this year defensively and I think it's only going to get better.

We've only played 10 games in the new systems and 2 with Bowness behind the bench.

Old habits don't die quickly, especially when they've been coached in.

I think we have unrealistic expectations of our players and have trouble measuring them against other teams sometimes . Kovacevic is a micro example of this.

People were up in arms that we let this great, usable defenseman go for nothing, but watching him last night it was pretty obvious he's in over his head as an nhler.

Almost every nhl team has players that get shit on relentlessly by their fans. The amount of players that are infallible or rock solid in every aspect is miniscule. Most players have flaws and weaknesses, especially considering the talent of the players they are opposing on any given night.

When a player is established and his weaknesses are known to a fanbase they tend to focus in those and they become the central focus on that players performance assessment.

Then you get a shiny new guy like Heinola, and all his flaws get minimized as the focus seems to be on their strengths. Then they play a while and those flaws become the central focus. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

[bumblebeeman]

Hindsight can be fun. Given how things have turned out, we would have drafted James McAvoy with the number 2 pick and our problems of finding a #1 defenseman would be solved.

Unless they drafted Juolevi, who was the first defenseman taken, and then had nothing to show for that number 2 pick

 

[CorgisPer60]

Then you get a shiny new guy like Heinola, and all his flaws get minimized as the focus seems to be on their strengths. Then they play a while and those flaws become the central focus. Lather, rinse, repeat.

The point was to let the player find out whether they can play the NHL game or not. Create an opportunity for them. Don't bury them. It was never just about losing Kovacevic, but there not being an obvious path forward for a developing NHL prospect to supplant the incumbents. The main reason Stanley made the team was because he lost waiver exemption status and they didn't want to risk losing him through waivers. He stayed in the AHL until then. It's purely a numbers game. If you're waiver exempt, you go down.

The Jets were gifted with a very stable defense corps when they relocated from Atlanta. They never had to look far and wide for defensemen. Now we're seeing the fallout from that.