Winnipeg Jets Discussion - 2024/2025 Season

[Jockitch]

Will Chevy reach agreements, before they get to the arbitration table, with Barron, Vilardi and Samberg
All 3 offer special skills for our Jets

My hope is Barron gets no more than $2.5M for 3 years
Vilardi gets a nice vote of confidence with $7.5M
Banking on Samberg for no more than $5.25M
The terms for Samberg and Vilardi might be difficult but
no doubt Chevy will press for time into their UFA years

[blue_gold_84]

https://www.sportsnet.ca/nhl/article/5-teams-looking-to-make-trades-after-quiet-nhl-free-agency/

Winnipeg Jets

Winnipeg had less of a say in the shake-up that came this off-season, the Jets losing star winger Nikolaj Ehlers, who simply wanted a fresh start elsewhere. The great Dane benefitted most from the thin free-agency market, taking time to weigh his options before inking a $51-million deal with the Carolina Hurricanes.

The Jets find themselves in an interesting spot. They head into 2025-26 coming off a dominant regular season that saw them lead wire to wire and win the Presidents' Trophy by the year's end. Then came a disappointing post-season, and a Round 2 exit. In each of the past three years, Winnipeg has been bounced from the playoffs in early rounds by a Western Conference behemoth: Vegas in 2023, Colorado in 2024, Dallas in 2025.

Now, they're tasked with finding progress while navigating the loss of one of their most prolific scorers, Ehlers having finished third among all Jets forwards with 24 goals and 63 points last season.

The club lost two other wingers as well, as Mason Appleton signed in Detroit and Brandon Tanev signed in Utah. Making matters worse, Winnipeg will start the season without Adam Lowry, the captain still recovering from a hip surgery that will likely keep him out of the lineup through the early months of the campaign.

As pointed out by the 32 Thoughts duo, the issue in Winnipeg is just how crucial a strong start was to the team's sterling 2024-25 season — progress aside, the Jets no doubt don't want to start on the wrong foot and wind up taking a step back next year. But it seems they'll open 2025-26 as a notably different group up front.

GM Kevin Cheveldayoff has added some new names to the forward corps already — Jonathan Toews will make a run at an NHL return in his hometown, while the Jets also added Gustav Nyquist, Tanner Pearson and a number of other free-agent depth forwards.

The collection of additions could mean they're less likely to wade into the trade market. But the Jets have cap space to work with, given they'd planned to pay Ehlers — if they want to find a meaningful step forward next season, and a path to finally getting by their conference's best, more help may still be needed up front to replace the star winger's contributions.

One potential option who might just be available via trade, according to the 32 Thoughts crew, and could help shore up Winnipeg's centre depth: 20-goal, 60-point pivot Nick Schmaltz, who has a year left at $5.85 million.

[ModAdmin]

As always, we will leave this thread up until the new training camp and retire it at that point.