NHL Rumors: Are Changes Coming with the Winnipeg Jets?

The Winnipeg Jets‘ season came to a disappointing end with a five-game series loss to the Colorado Avalanche in Round 1 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. This time last year, there was a lot of turmoil surrounding the Jets. The NHL Rumors were swirling about the potential changes that were going to happen after what head coach Rick Bowness said, along with the futures of Kyle Connor, Connor Hellebuyck, and Mark Scheifele.

We know what happened. General Manager Kevin Cheveldayoff hit a home run with the Pierre-Luc Dubois trade. Blake Wheeler was bought out and signed with the New York Rangers. Cheveldayoff got Hellebuyck and Scheifele to buy into the culture change in Winnipeg. He added unrestricted free agents Sean Monahan and Tyler Toffoli at the Trade Deadline, and it appeared the Jets were destined for a deep playoff run.

However, the same questions appear for the Jets this offseason. The biggest question will be about head coach Rick Bowness.

Rick Bowness’s Status with Winnipeg Up in the Air

Bowness addressed his future on Thursday during the Jet’s final media availability of the season when asked if he was going to be back as head coach.

“I’ll talk to Chipper (Mark Chipman) and Chevy. I know what I’m going to do. I know what I want to do,” Bowness told reporters on Thursday. “I know what I want to do. That will come up. We will let you know.”

Bowness will meet with Cheveldayoff, as the Winnipeg Jets have a club option to extend Bowness for another season. Scott Arniel will also be there, and the team played well when Bowness had to step aside for family matters this season.

This is something to watch moving forward, but TSN Hockey Insider Darren Dreger does not think Bowness will be back when speaking with Jay Onrait on SportsCenter.

Well,  obviously Jay, that’s the big question right and the assembled media wanted to know and find out today whether or not you know they could expect the veteran head coach to be back in the bench with Winnipeg Jets. My gut tells me that that’s unlikely I don’t think that Rick Bowness will be back. I don’t know that for sure. But I do take stock of the season that it’s been. I mean, this man is as deeply invested as any coach that I can remember no different this year, but he also had family issues that he had to pay attention to.

You know, his wife Judy went through a tough time he had the leave of absence to look after Judy, you know he had his own health issues near the end of the regular season. Two things I know about Rick Bowness one priority. Top of the list is his family and two, he loves to coach in this case. I think that the family is going to win out. He’s going to slide back into retirement again, unofficial. We’ll see but what a way to go out. I mean, he has to be has to be in the Jack Adams conversation. That’s the job that Rick Bowness did this year in Winnipeg.” – Full Press Hockey Transcriptions

Winnipeg Jets: Winnipeg Jets Defense Gets Exposed By Colorado

Are There Changes Coming with the Jets Core?

The Winnipeg Jets are making changes. But what do those changes look like for Winnipeg? As Darren Dreger of TSN states, maybe it is time to add another top-four defenseman, but what is the cost of that? 

I mean, there’ll be changes. Organically. There’ll be changes. I mean, you look at the unrestricted free agent list in Winnipeg. What’s going to happen with Sean Monahan, who was acquired from the Montreal Canadiens? What about Tyler Toffoli, who came in from the New Jersey Devils?

That stuff will look after itself, but then you take stock of what you’ve got. And it was interesting. There wasn’t a lot of attention paid to the core of the Winnipeg Jets as part of the media availability and that’s what I’m most interested in.

You know, again, to analyze maybe some of the weaknesses, I looked at the top four defence of the Jets, and that feels like an area that Kevin Cheveldayoff, the GM, is going to want to try and improve. But here’s a news flash for you, Jay. Unless you draft those pieces, they’re incredibly hard to acquire. Winnipeg struggles when it comes to convincing unrestricted free agents to come into the small market.

So how do you acquire that piece? And that’s where I think it’s going to get interesting. Does Cheveldayoff use, say, a forward like Nikolaj Ehlers, who will go into the final year of his contract as a trade acid to acquire that defence? So I’m not saying that’s going to happen either. I just think those are the conversations hockey operations have to have in Winnipeg to move forward. – Full Press Hockey Transcriptions.

The Winnipeg Jets’ off-season will be another interesting one. The NHL Rumors will swirl about what they do this off-season.

That does it for this edition of NHL Rumors. Stay tuned for another edition coming on the weekend.