Winnipeg Jets Front Office Deserves Credit for a Great 2021 Offseason

With the Winnipeg Jets ending their training camp, we can now look back at the offseason and assess how the Jets fared.

The Jets brought seven players to the franchise this offseason while losing eight players from their 2021 roster in free agency and also losing three draft picks in trades.

Winnipeg was also able to get deals done with four of their restricted free agents (Neal Pionk, Andrew Copp, Logan Stanley, and Johnathan Kovacevic) and three of their pending unrestricted free agents (Paul Stastny, Eric Comrie, and Dominic Toninanto) while closing in on the cap ceiling.

The Winnipeg Jets front office deserves credit for their moves during the 2021 offseason

The first reason credit is due to Kevin Cheveldayoff and his team is because they addressed their major issue from last season: the Jets’ defense.

When the Jets got swept out of the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs by the Montreal Canadiens, hockey analysts and Winnipeg supporters concluded that if the Jets want to become a Cup contender, they must improve their defense and they did exactly that during this offseason.

Winnipeg made two huge trades as they acquired Brenden Dillon and Nate Schmidt and they also re-signed Logan Stanley on a team-friendly deal.

The Jets’ defense has seven solid defensemen for the upcoming season that includes Josh Morrissey, Neal Pionk, Nate Schmidt, Brenden Dillon, Dylan DeMelo, Logan Stanley, and Nathan Beaulieu.  While they also have top prospect, Ville Heinola, waiting in the wings.

When you go from a Jets’ defensive corps that has some injury struggles last year to the depth they have right now, there needs to be credit given to Winnipeg’s front office for bolstering one of their major weak spots.

On offense, the two main signings for Winnipeg were Riley Nash and the re-signing of Paul Stastny. These signings can be considered as good veteran depth signings, but the Jets franchise, by way of the Manitoba Moose, made a low-risk signing that looks outstanding right now.

In late August, the Moose signed, free agent, Evgeny Svechnikov to a one-year deal. Svechnikov then joined Jets training camp on a PTO and had some great performances which has excited many Jets supporters. Svechnikov can definitely be a mainstay in the Jets lineup and if the Jets can get an NHL deal done with the former first-round pick then this will only improve the Jets’ great offseason.

The case can be made that the one apparent downfall this offseason for the Jets is goaltending. Laurent Brossoit, who played outstanding last season, departed in free agency and now the Jets will rely on Eric Comrie, who has yet to play over five NHL games in a season in his six-year professional career, to backup Connor Hellebuyck.

The Jets will only have more tough decisions to make today as their opening night roster for the upcoming regular season must be submitted by 4:00 p.m. central time this afternoon. This offseason was wild and had a little bit of everything, but the Jets can be considered one of the teams that had an outstanding offseason.

You can read our site’s full recap of the offseason by clicking the link here. This article takes an in-depth look at all of the Jets’ offseason moves.

Winnipeg Jets Fans: Do you agree, that as of right now, the Winnipeg Jets front office deserves credit for the business they have done during this offseason? Leave your comments below!