Confirmed with Link: Laine, 2nd 2026 to Montreal for Jordan Harris

[niflheim]

Mathieu Olivier about Laine. In French.

Comment définit-on Patrik Laine? | «Du talent plein les oreilles» -Mathieu Olivier

Écoutez Mathieu Olivier, coéquipier durant deux ans de Patrik Laine avec les Blue Jackets, parler de ce dernier à Mario Langlois.

www.957kyk.com

Certainly more informative than Portzline. By the way, Laine has had mental problems since at least before Olivier arrived if DeepL translates correctly for me.

«Moi, j'ai plutôt tendance à dire: «unique». Il n'y en a pas deux comme lui»

«I want to come back as a 40- to 50-[goal scorer]»

Everything went wrong from the very beginning, since the Winnipeg days, for the one who can become Ovi 2.0 (as Ovi himself said). Bitterness and anxiety growing over the years

I hope Montreal will give him inspiration for some time. This will be a real professional challenge for Jean-François Ménard

 

[Scintillating10]

Nope sold his condo and said under no circumstance will he play on this team again.

I get that. But thought Jackets would retain to open door for more suitors and better return. Sounds like money was big issue

 

[Bobby Holik agent]

Welcome to Columbus, Jordan Harris! | Media Availability

 

[VT]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1826209869206020488

 

[DoingItCoolKiwi]

Mathieu Olivier about Laine. In French.

Comment définit-on Patrik Laine? | «Du talent plein les oreilles» -Mathieu Olivier

Écoutez Mathieu Olivier, coéquipier durant deux ans de Patrik Laine avec les Blue Jackets, parler de ce dernier à Mario Langlois.

www.957kyk.com

Certainly more informative than Portzline. By the way, Laine has had mental problems since at least before Olivier arrived if DeepL translates correctly for me.

Older players in the current roster seem to have sympathy for him. Positive sign in that there probably wasnt anything too disturbing that could haunt the team or patty going into the next season.

 

[DoingItCoolKiwi]

On the Portzline stuff:

His reports started around the time Atkinson was moved. Atkinson was 110% a Torts guy, so when Laine and Torts didnt get along, Atkinson naturally sided with his coach. He told Portz about it and here we are. I doubt there's much more it than that.

 

[Jovavic]

Maybe they didn't retain to keep the slots open for the next two years? Provorov will for sure be one when he moves. Maybe Elvis plays decent and a team takes a chance on him at a discount. Maybe we get someone willing to take the Gaudreau or Severson contracts. Being a broker at the deadline for other teams.

 

[TaketheCannoli]

Porty's comments are essentially what I was talking about here.





He got a lot of details wrong. Jenner was there, not Foligno, and yes it was Spring 2021 when they had the meeting.



Werenski, Nyquist, and Jenner were all in the meeting and all stayed. Jones made it clear after that meeting that he wanted to leave, but it may have been partly related to him not liking the club abandoning it's locker room in favor of Laine / and or Elvis.

The Atkinson trade worked as a hockey trade but the immediate impetus reported at the time was to get him away from Laine.

You also have Brad Shaw leaving shortly after, which could easily have been covered as him wanting to stick with Torts, but Shaw specifically said he didn't agree with the club's decisions.



That's actually your editorializing. You don't like Portzline's narrative so you're inserting your own, which is further from the truth.

It was obvious at the time that the leaderber-talented guy who ship wanted to keep the accountability systems they had had in place for years. That's why they didn't want Laine or Merzlikins, because they refused to be held accountable. They weren't saying "build around us we're better players", it was about the room the entire time.

The timing of the Atkinson move was right after the meeting and it was reported at the time that it was because of Laine's presence. This isn't a new report.

Yes the team needed massive changes regardless, but that can be true in addition to the fact that the leadership group didn't want Laine and Elvis. Having a good hockey trade for Atkinson doesn't refute the report either.

I'm going into this with few pre-conceived notions. About the only one is that the Laine experiment was clearly a failure. Can you explain how you know the meeting happened when it did and who was involved?

I do think you are probably right about the changes in culture. It's a real shame that the team didn't learn from the past. Steve Mason was a classic good player who accepted zero accountability, always blaming everyone else for every loss. Filatov was an Uber-talented player who accepted no accountability. Zherdev etc. etc. I realize JD and Jarmo weren't here when they were, but it doesn't take a genius to see what held the team back in the past.
Do you agree with Porty's assessment that Jarmo made desperate deals trying to save his job?

 

[Viqsi]

Do you agree with Porty's assessment that Jarmo made desperate deals trying to save his job?

I think nearly everybody can agree on that; what folks will disagree on is when he started doing so. I don't think Laine was one of those deals, for example, but I do think Babcock absolutely was.

 

[NotWendell]

I put as much blame on Jarmo for Laine's struggles.

Jarmo's problem was he liked making big splashy deals to see his name in print when a smaller, safer (ie, boring) deal would have been a better course of action for the team.

Jarmo's other problem was not being on the same page as his coaching staff. Bringing in players that didn't play the kind of game the coach was demanding.

His third problem was he didn't value culture. In fact, he, himself, often made it worse. So we got all the drama that created a toxic stew. Just conjecture, but I would bet that didn't bring out the best in Laine and fed into his insecurities.

 

[Fred Glover]

I put as much blame on Jarmo for Laine's struggles.

Jarmo's problem was he liked making big splashy deals to see his name in print when a smaller, safer (ie, boring) deal would have been a better course of action for the team.

Jarmo's other problem was not being on the same page as his coaching staff. Bringing in players that didn't play the kind of game the coach was demanding.

His third problem was he didn't value culture. In fact, he, himself, often made it worse. So we got all the drama that created a toxic stew. Just conjecture, but I would bet that didn't bring out the best in Laine and fed into his insecurities.

As a scout Jarmo saw talent and sought to acquire it
Jarmo had no idea how to build a team

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

I have zero problems with the initial Laine trade. Dubois put them in a bad spot and I think Jarmo did his best to get out of it. It ultimately didn't work out how anyone hoped but that's largely hindsight talking. At that time and based on what we knew, it seemed like a solid and logical move.

I can't remember any of the Dubois trade rumors but it is likely they were futures heavy and given Dubois' attitude any real offers were probably less than what we'd like to think. And futures are a whole other kinda crapshoot. Would that have been better? Maybe. But swapping a high-risk high-reward possible problem child Dubois for high-risk high-reward possible problem child Laine made sense.

Sometimes you make the right decision and it still doesn't work out.

 

[CBJx614]

I put as much blame on Jarmo for Laine's struggles.

Jarmo's problem was he liked making big splashy deals to see his name in print when a smaller, safer (ie, boring) deal would have been a better course of action for the team.

Jarmo's other problem was not being on the same page as his coaching staff. Bringing in players that didn't play the kind of game the coach was demanding.

His third problem was he didn't value culture. In fact, he, himself, often made it worse. So we got all the drama that created a toxic stew. Just conjecture, but I would bet that didn't bring out the best in Laine and fed into his insecurities.

As a scout Jarmo saw talent and sought to acquire it
Jarmo had no idea how to build a team

Not going into all the specifics, but let's also remember where we were at when we made the trade.

IIRC we could have trade PLD for Laine way before we actually made the trade but Jarmo didn't want to trade PLD for a winger, until he was forced to take the best deal possible.

 

[tunnelvision]

I can't remember any of the Dubois trade rumors but it is likely they were futures heavy and given Dubois' attitude any real offers were probably less than what we'd like to think. And futures are a whole other kinda crapshoot. Would that have been better? Maybe. But swapping a high-risk high-reward possible problem child Dubois for high-risk high-reward possible problem child Laine made sense.

Sometimes you make the right decision and it still doesn't work out.

You're making a solid point but let's not forget Jarmo could have traded Laine in the summer of 2022 or sign him to a shorter deal than 4 years which would have been a more tradeable contract. I was in the small minority then that would have preferred either option over his current deal but Jarmo was clearly less skeptical about Laine's ability to fit in. So his initial decision to acquire Laine might have been the best possible move but the next one arguably wasn't, and it's a part of why it all ultimately "didn't work out" for CBJ.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

You're making a solid point but let's not forget Jarmo could have traded Laine in the summer of 2022 or sign him to a shorter deal than 4 years which would have been a more tradeable contract. I was in the small minority then that would have preferred either option over his current deal but Jarmo was clearly less skeptical about Laine's ability to fit in. So his initial decision to acquire Laine might have been the best possible move but the next one arguably wasn't, and it's a part of why it all ultimately "didn't work out" for CBJ.

Totally fair.

 

[VT]

No one knows what was really going on, but that doesn't stop us from making inferences based on Portzline's words from 3 years ago.

 

[Cowumbus]

No one knows what was really going on, but that doesn't stop us from making inferences based on Portzline's words from 3 years ago.

but we are okay to make excuses for Laine all along the way

Bottom line, is he is a guy that you can’t win with. Has not proven anything, often hurt, and has questions about his character and effort. He might be the best PPG player AND “perennial” 40+ goal who has never had above 70 points (or more than 36 goals in the last 8 years) AINEC. Almost 9 million bucks a year too.

This dude was a massive disappointment and said he doesn’t want to play here - but we are coming up with every excuse under the sun to justify it.

 

[Xoggz22]

Adam Fantilli is not owed a new contract until after Laine's contract was already going to expire.

Probably already did but he's eligible for an extension next Summer, but, to your point, the money impact isn't until after his ELC would be up. My thought is that CBJ could consider a big player now or next season depending on progress and allows them to determine who if the recent contract extensions to keep.

 

[VT]

but we are okay to make excuses for Laine all along the way

Commenting on his play is one thing, slandering ANY player based on information from 3 years ago is another (why has Porty never talked about any problems in future seasons?).

Like slandering ANY player for about the alleged bullying another player based solely on rumours. That's not fair either, since no one knows what really happened in Winnipeg. I don't like that either, were the reporters there when Scheiffele and Wheeler were supposedly doing it?

 

[Ice9]

So for months he's not worth a nickle and when he finally gets traded we were shortchanged...

Fans are strange critters...

 

[Monk]

Commenting on his play is one thing, slandering ANY player based on information from 3 years ago is another (why has Porty never talked about any problems in future seasons?).

Like slandering ANY player for about the alleged bullying another player based solely on rumours. That's not fair either, since no one knows what really happened in Winnipeg. I don't like that either, were the reporters there when Scheiffele and Wheeler were supposedly doing it?

Are you talking about posters here or Portzline?

 

[Nanabijou]

As a scout Jarmo saw talent and sought to acquire it
Jarmo had no idea how to build a team

I agree that Jarmo was a skilled talent evaluator. I also think he built the team the right way the first time and that team that lost in the second round to Boston was legitimate contender. I have no issue with him rolling the dice with that team instead of bailing and shipping Bob, Panarin, etc out at the deadline.

IMHO, it was his impatience with the situation the team was in after that (or at least after Torts left) that caused him to make decisions that he thought would be a quick fix to get the team back to that status. He had a taste of being close and wanted to get back to that level as quickly as possible, and he started taking bigger gambles and riskier swings. The team began to be built on 'what-ifs' that required massive steps forward from young players that gelled seamlessly with new veteran acquisitions.

It didn't work. The good news is that there was good talent acquired along the way, especially through the draft. The bad news is it is still going to take more time as DW fixes some of the later mistakes and builds the team the right way again.

 

[koteka]

As a scout Jarmo saw talent and sought to acquire it
Jarmo had no idea how to build a team

I agree he could evaluate forward talent, especially wings. Other than the 2015 NHL draft (when he drafted 6 defensemen and hit on 3 - Werenski, Gavrikov, and Nutivaara) he wasn’t that great with defensemen. Seth Jones was a great trade, but that was more about realizing RyJo was a problem and trying to maximize his return than looking for a defenseman. What he did to our defense in the last few years was horrible.

 

[VT]

Are you talking about posters here or Portzline?

I'm referring to those who evaluate players based on information from journalists, or more accurately their opinions, but supposed insides. This applies not only to Portzline, but also to the Finnish journalists who described Jets locker room, for example.

 

[DoingItCoolKiwi]

https://www.journaldequebec.com/2024/08/21/mathieu-perreault-excite-par-la-venue-de-patrik-laine--sil-joue-comme-le-jeune-laine-que-jai-connu-les-fans-vont-laimer

This was not necessarily veterans who didn't want to see it anymore. It’ is especially that, when it went wrong, he tended to’apitoyer on his fate instead of getting up his sleeves. At some point, it could become disturbing in terms of performance on the rink, explained Perreault, adding that Laine’ had never been a distraction in the locker room. It is not her personality that hung, but her way of’being on the ice.

Since there's been speculation of him being toxic in wpg lockerroom. From the broken english it sounds like the only one Laine abuses is himself, which hurts the team performances. Can only imagine that habit got worse along with his mental state during the last two years