‘He’s going to get a rough ride’: Jets fan on Hellebuyck’s return

For more on this story, I want to welcome Drew Mindell. He is the host of the Illegal Curve Hockey Show and watched today's press conference. Drew, so much to unpack there. Just tell me, that was the main clip, I think, that stood out. Well, that was the main clip that stood out to us. But you listened to the whole press conference. What's your key takeaway from what you heard there from Connor Hellebuyck? You know, I thought that he was at best vague in a circumstance that almost required more specifics. If you're going to come out and make a very bold proclamation that, you know, what has happened to your family goes beyond online vitriol, Which, of course, nobody should ever have to be subjected to. I think it's incumbent to... provide some amount of evidence and he had plenty of opportunity to do so, Andrew, and he elected not to. So I think people in Winnipeg, well, they're already upset. But then you come out and you say that this happened. You provide no evidence to that effect. You say, in fact, that you didn't even inform the team. You didn't inform the ownership. I think a lot A lot of people heard that. And really have a sour taste in their mouth in the manner in which Connor Hellebuyck handled that situation that he's alleged to have occurred. So let's get to tonight, because a lot of people, I think, wanted to see him play. Mm-hmm. And then the front office, he says, decided that he would not play, but that he wanted to play. What do you make of that? I don't believe him. I don't think anybody really believes him on this one. Connor Hellebuyck in Winnipeg, his time in Winnipeg, was legendary for wanting to play every single game possible. It would have taken a team of stallions to keep him out of the net. Yes, he's gone to a different organization that may do things a little bit differently, but if Connor Hellebuyck... If he truly wanted to be in net tonight for the New Jersey Devils, he would be in net. He is elected not to be in net, whether that's because it's too emotional of a circumstance for him, whether it's, I mean, I don't want to speculate as to why, but nobody really believes for an iota of a second that Connor Hellebuyck wouldn't be in net for the New Jersey Devils tonight if he really wanted to be. If he was in that tonight, what kind of reception do you think Jets fans would have given him? He's going to get a rough ride. Even without him in net, he's going to get a rough ride. On my own broadcast this afternoon, we were talking about how this is going to be the most anticipated warm-up for an NHL game in years. Simply because that's going to be the only time that Jets fans are going to be able to see him to express their presumably displeasure with how he has departed Winnipeg. The fans are... They're excited. They are going to be vocal. They are going to make their feelings hurt. They are going to get their catharsis out of them. And it's going to happen before the game starts. It's also going to happen during the game. I don't doubt it. But it's just a very odd scenario that you have this goaltender electing to, you know, basically hide in the dressing room rather than face the verbal wrath of a fan base. And so I understand you've been talking about this today. I mean, what are Winnipeggers saying about this and the fact that he's not going to be in net tonight and just the, I guess, pretty bad taste in their mouths around all of this, right? Yeah, a lot of the words would probably not be suitable for air, so I won't even say those. But there's people who are, I mean, people look around the NHL and they see other players that have returned to markets that they've jilted. It happened in Ottawa. It happened in Vancouver already this year. And fans in Winnipeg are really disappointed that Connor Hellebuck isn't going to experience the same reaction. They think that he is, you know, Cutting and running, if you will, you know, I described him on my programming as a bit of a Fabergé egg in that he's too fragile to handle what, you know, which are really just going to be verbal commentary directed to him. I don't think it's going to be anything beyond that, but he has elected to let his teammates bear the brunt of that. And I think there's a lot of disappointment in Winnipeg and among all of the other 30 or 31 franchises in the NHL that are looking at what he's doing as not really standing up when he needs to experience what the fan base would hand out. What was the reception like? I mean, if we want to go back, you know, to when the Team USA won the gold medal after the Olympics and they went to the White House and all of that. I mean, what was the reaction like in Winnipeg to that? To their star goalie, you know? Go ahead. The star goalie? And I'm only... The only, you know, reception that matters from my perspective is what the fan base did. Never mind online people who are anonymous, the proverbial keyboard warriors. When he was introduced in Winnipeg at the arena as a gold medal winning hockey player for Team USA, he received the standing ovation. So that is what the fan base in Winnipeg truly did for him. Anybody, you know, that's the real Winnipeg Jets fan base. They were able to separate. By and large, the political controversy from the athletic achievement and that sort of got lost in the shuffle. And I think Connor Hellebuyck himself has sort of maybe forgotten about that, that when he was introduced, as I said, he received an ovation. Fans, you know, Canadian hockey fans were proud of Connor Hellebuck for winning gold medal. For all the achievements he's had here in Winnipeg, sure, they may not have loved the Presidential Medal of Freedom and all that nonsense, but by and large, I think people were able to separate the two factors. And so for him to... Respond in the manner that he has chosen to do so is disappointing for a lot of people. He said, I still have love for the city, I connect with the city, all my career accomplishments are here, I don't want all of this to sort of taint it. Do you think he succeeded in doing some damage control, or maybe not? There's nothing in the immediacy. I mean, time will heal all wounds. So I think that, you know, 10 years from now, 15 years from now, you know, Connor Hellbuck will return to Winnipeg and people will be able to probably acknowledge, maybe even 20 years, will be able to acknowledge his accomplishments as a member of the Winnipeg Jets. But I don't think anything that he has said today or any of the manner in which he has handled himself since the. Trade demand was made, and then the trade was ultimately culminated in him going to New Jersey. I don't think he has managed to mitigate that negativity just yet. Give it another 20 years, and probably the answer will be different. All right, Drew. Thank you, Drew. Mindell is the host of the Illegal Curve Hockey Show, and he joined us today in Winnipeg.