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Winnipeg Jets: 5 burning questions for 2018-19 season

By Bruin Belisle

WINNIPEG, MB - MAY 12: Goaltender Connor Hellebuyck #37 and Dustin Byfuglien #33 of the Winnipeg Jets celebrate following a 4-2 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights in Game One of the Western Conference Final during the 2018 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at the Bell MTS Place on May 12, 2018 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Jets lead the series 1-0. (Photo by Darcy Finley/NHLI via Getty Images)
WINNIPEG, MB - MAY 12: Goaltender Connor Hellebuyck #37 and Dustin Byfuglien #33 of the Winnipeg Jets celebrate following a 4-2 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights in Game One of the Western Conference Final during the 2018 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at the Bell MTS Place on May 12, 2018 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Jets lead the series 1-0. (Photo by Darcy Finley/NHLI via Getty Images) /
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BUFFALO, NY – JANUARY 9: Patrik Laine #29 of the Winnipeg Jets celebrates his goal against the Buffalo Sabres with Kyle Connor #81 in the first period at the KeyBank Center on January 9, 2018 in Buffalo, New York. (Photo by Kevin Hoffman/Getty Images) /

3. Can the Winnipeg Jets keep this team together?

Winnipeg Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff has his work cut out for him this coming season. While the Jets are locked in for this year (pending a Josh Morrissey signing), they have a handful of very important restricted (RFA) and unrestricted (UFA) free agents to lock down after the end of the season.

Blake Wheeler, Brandon Tanev, Tyler Myers and Ben Chiarot are all upcoming UFAs. While losing one or two of these guys would not be too detrimental, you definitely don’t want to lose all four. Most importantly, you have to lock down captain Blake Wheeler, who is still playing great hockey and in terms of leadership, may be the best captain in the NHL.

More worrisome for Cheveldayoff is going to be locking in the RFAs to long-term deals, most notably Patrik Laine and Kyle Connor. These two are the future of the Jets organization and it is crucial that they keep them both.

Andrew Copp and Dano Marko will also be RFAs at the end of this season, joining defensemen Joe Morrow and Jacob Trouba. Winning a Stanley Cup is obviously the goal this year but it would definitely boost the expected salaries of these types of role players.

Both Jacob Trouba and Tyler Myers are sitting at $5.5 million cap hits this season. If they stay healthy, expect both to have one of the better seasons of their career. If this is the case, the Jets are saying  goodbye to one, if not both players.

More than anything, the Jets need to find a way to pay Patrik Laine and Kyle Connor contract extensions at the large sums of money they will be asking for next year. Both of these guys are on their entry-level deals and making less than a million dollars in the 2018-19 season. This is definitely going to change.

Cheveldayoff and thee Jets organization have been good about staying on top of this. They locked down Nikolaj Ehlers to a seven-year $42 million deal before he played his final season under contract and they will likely try to do the same with the two future superstars.

On top of these players, if the aforementioned Jack Roslovic blossoms as we think he will, he will be up for a new contract in the 2020-21 season as well. He’s showing that he could be a difference maker and will likely be someone the Jets will want to keep around in two years.

Having too much young talent is definitely not a bad thing but when it comes time to pay them, you best hope everyone is buying in to the winning atmosphere because there’s no way the Jets can afford everyone.

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