The Winnipeg Jets and Patrik Laine are at a crossroad

The Winnipeg Jets and RFA forward Patrik Laine seem to be playing a huge game of chicken. Which side will be the first to blink? And will either side blink?

The Winnipeg Jets have a lot to figure out this summer. They only have seven forwards signed. Of their top four leaders in points last season, two of them – Patrik Laine and Kyle Connor – are restricted free agents. There hasn’t been too much talk about either of the two. But Laine’s the far more interesting one.

Laine and the Jets have hit a huge wall. Before last season, everything was going great. Laine was the top-notch goal scorer he was advertised to be, scoring 80 goals in his first two seasons. He got off to a slow start in October (five points in 12 games), but all was forgiven thanks to a November to remember.

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During November of 2018, Laine scored 18 goals and had 19 points in 12 games. He had as many goals on the first day of November (three) as he had in all of October. The peak came against the St. Louis Blues when Laine scored five goals. All three of his hat tricks for the 2018-19 season came in the month of November.

Everything started going downhill following the month of November. Laine had just nine goals after it. On paper, his 30 goals looks impressive. But half of them came on the power play. At even strength, Laine was invisible for long stretches at a time.

At a time when Laine was expecting to be negotiating a big deal, both sides appear interested in a bridge deal. And not just because they want to get something done. It might be because neither side is interested in a long-term commitment.

On Elliotte Friedman’s latest 31 Thoughts podcast (July 11), at the 37:30 mark, he starts discussing Laine.

“[Laine] didn’t leave happy last year and we’ve talked about this, some of that was his own fault, he wasn’t as good as he could be and I think he chafed under some of the leadership there. The guys at the top of that food chain are hard driving guys. They expect you to buy into the program and I think that they felt he didn’t buy in enough and I think he felt that some of the things that they wanted were ridiculous. So you got to bridge that too.”

As great as Laine can be, he can be very frustrating. He struggles to impact games consistently if he’s not scoring goals. Laine is a one-trick pony, but his one trick happens to be a very rare one. Goal scorers tend to be streaky (unless your name is Alex Ovechkin). Ergo, Laine can be extremely dominant at times, like he was in November, but he can also go invisible for long stretches.

The Jets salary cap situation could force Winnipeg to make a very tough decision. According to CapFriendly, they have about $22.8 million of cap space. If we assume the Jets have the same roster The Athletic has, with Mason Appelton, Sami Niku, Tucker Poolman, and Kristian Vesalainen joining the team, they have roughly $20.5 million of cap space to re-sign four RFAs. Those RFAs are Laine, Connor, Andrew Copp, and Neal Pionk.

Evolving Wild, an analytics site run by twins, has projected the contracts for each UFA and RFA. Let’s take a look at what they project for each player.

• Laine – $7,074,053 AAV for seven years
• Connor – $6,814,995 AAV for six years
• Copp – $2,176,861 AAV for two years
• Pionk – $2,934,707 AAV for two years

If you add all those projections together, you get $19,000,616. This would leave the Jets with about $1.5 million of breathing room, which isn’t much. So, as you can see, a long-term deal for both Connor and Laine is probably not feasible. The Jets are going to have to choose and they’ll probably go with the easier of the two to sign long-term (Connor).

No one could have predicted Laine and Winnipeg would be here a year ago. The negotiations have turned into a giant staring contest, with each side waiting to see which side blinks first. It wouldn’t be surprising if this holdout continues into the season.