GDT: Canes v. Jets 11/1 1:00

ThinIce said:

It's amazing to think that the score could have been much worse for the Jets. I truly felt sorry for them - and considering the shellacking they were taking, it's a wonder that the chippiness was almost non-existent. That just shows how demoralized the Jets are.

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The Jets went out and took Florida's bait in their last game so I think they were just trying to play hard and clean.

The season is still early enough for the Jets to find some sort of footing again (they started 4-1-1). But if that doesn't happen and the team goes into a full free fall, you do have to wonder what exactly the plan becomes. Kyle Connor is just in year 1 of his 8 year $12 million AAV contract (full NMC). 33 year old Mark Scheifele has 4 more seasons at $8.5 million AAV. His full NMC protection ends after this season and becomes a 10 team approved trade list.

Gabe Vilardi, Cole Perfetti, Adam Lowry and Neil Pionk all have 4 more seasons left on their deals after this one.

The Jets cannot dump every good player that they have, but someone like Vilardi with an AAV of $7.5 million and without trade protection I would think could become a trade chip.

Yeah, they have some decent pieces to move, since most of their trade-able assets have no trade lists ... other than Scheifele, Lowry and Connor. And is Connor really gonna fight them on a move if they work out a deal with somebody decent? I doubt it. Not if he thinks he's going to have to ride out a full rebuild starting at age 29. Lowry and Scheifele are lifers, he doesn't strike me that way. I feel like you could get good returns for Morrissey when he healthy (15 team list) and Connor (full no move) so long as you ship them to teams that are competing or close to it. Pionk (15 team list) might get a decent return and Villardi should be easy to move. You could get a big shopping cart full of assets for that group ... so long as ownership is ready to trigger a rebuild. Which might be the biggest issue, honestly. There are a lot of voices in the boardroom at True North and being quick to shift into trends has never been their thing.

As for the game, when the Canes are rolling like they were Sunday afternoon, I find myself marveling at how terribly frustrating we make it for teams playing against us. When we are 'doing it the right way', the other team doesn't have time or space to accomplish much of anything.

Just getting the puck out of your own zone or successfully getting the puck skated across the blueline is a nightmare. Dump it into the Canes zone and go get it? Well, that isn't easy either because every one of our Dmen can skate and with Kochetkov and his puck handling abilities, that is all that much harder.

Even for really good teams we just create problems all over the ice. If you are team that is struggling already, we are their worst nightmare to face.

Love it!

The Canes kind of eased off the gas too. Stankoven's goal made it 5-0 and at that point, the Jets only had 5 shots. Over the last 31 minutes, they had 21.

Yeah, the Jets kind of went all out to avoid the sweep if they could. The first line in particular did a really good job of carving out possession and extending shifts in the offensive zone. Looking at the expected goals graph, the Jets only really managed to push the danger for about a 5 minute stretch in the middle of the 3rd ... same as they did in the middle of the 2nd after they changed goalies. They weren't able to sustain it, and Carolina did a great job of blocking passes and following through on zone exits once they gained possession. It was a solid, solid effort.

It doesn't seem like that long ago that we complained when this team played down to weak teams. Man, they're clobberin' these teams now, as they should. Pad those stats!