We NEVER expected to hear this...

We never expected to hear this as Clay Stevenson faces the media for his first time as a Winnipeg Jet and says some very interesting comments. We also hear from head coach Scott Arneal on Braden Yeager. We're gonna break all this down coming up on this episode of Winnipeg Jets Digest before diving into everything here. Just want to say we're on the road for 2,000 subscribers here before the season starts. Stuff new here you want to stay up to date on the latest news around the Winnipeg Jets where you're home for it here on YouTube. Subscribe below, hit that subscribe button. It's completely free to do so but yes today we hear from Clay Stevenson for the first time as a Winnipeg Jet and he had some great things to say here and let's start it out on a great note here talking about what he thinks about playing in front of the amazing Winnipeg Jets fans. This is what he had to say here in this interview. He said the fans have here seem incredible and I can't wait to start maybe building more relationships with them. This is what he was talking about. You know getting to play in front of this Winnipeg Jets crowd as we all know a very devoted fan base within the NHL. Winnipeg Jets fans are going to show up for their players and it's great to see a new goaltender come in here and know what kind of atmosphere happens within the arena. How close-knit the fans are to this organization and it's just great to see him come in and be excited about being here, playing here. As we all know one goaltender is not excited about playing here, being here anymore. We're waiting for an update on when he is going to be traded but it's great to see Stevenson come in here. A guy who has been playing very well at all levels of hockey over the last year. I mean he had was 3-1 last year with the Washington Capitals, had a 9-1-7 save percentage and then had a 9-20 save percentage with the Hershey Bears last year. So it's great to see Clay Stevenson come in here and just know what he's in for and excited to play in front of this Winnipeg Jets fan base and I thought he had a very interesting nickname here in mud. Obviously a playoff his name being Clay so we're gonna have to get some mud chants going in the stadium this year which would be great to hear as well. But let's talk about the opportunity for playing here in Winnipeg and he's very grateful for it. It means the world just to have this opportunity and to be able to showcase myself a little bit more. It's a blessing to be here that's for sure. He's excited to come here. He talks about how excited he is to be back in Canada. A guy from Alberta so kind of back on the west coast of Canada. He's very excited to be here. He said when he was traded or when the waiver claim happened his girlfriend was flying into Washington at three o'clock. He got the news at two p.m. so they quickly had to turn around and head to Winnipeg and he's very excited to be here. Showcase his talent at the NHL level. Get this opportunity to ride the tandem with Stuart Skinner and really show the NHL, the Winnipeg Jets fan base as well. What he could do and how good of a goaltender he can be for us going forward which is great to see. He also talks about the relationship he had with Stuart Skinner before actually coming here. I'll bring it up a little bit bigger for you guys. He said I've been pretty good friends with Stuart Skinner for the past few years. We've been training together in Kelowna. We've solidified a pretty good relationships. I was super stoked to get here and and tandem with him. That's crazy. I was really not expecting to see that. You know the title of this video was we never expected to hear this and I never expected to hear that Clay Stevenson and Stuart Skinner had a tight bond. I was not expecting that at all. My jaw kind of dropped to the floor when I was listening to this interview but it's great right. Great to hear these guys have had a great friendship over the last couple years. Now they're kind of going to be riding side by side in you know taking starts from each other and just riding the tandem and just trying to out-compete each other. Have that friendly kind of competition between them which will be great and these guys are around the same age so they've been training together for a few years now and I think obviously having him now in the organization with Stuart Skinner who has so much experience within the NHL at the NHL level to kind of rub off on Clay Stevenson will be great as well and be great for his game because Stuart Skinner knows stuff that he doesn't know yet. He hasn't encountered those problems yet because he hasn't been a full-time NHLer yet. Now he gets an opportunity to do that here in Winnipeg and now one of his buds here in Stuart Skinner will be able to show him you know the ropes and I think that's going to be great for the development of Clay Stevenson and hopefully we'll see a big season out of him and hopefully we'll get to see him and Stuart Skinner both have great seasons here in Winnipeg this year. He did also have to talk about how he's feeling. He said I feel like I'm in the best goaltending that's supposed to be shape of my life that's great news right hearing that he's in the best shape of his life that he feels like he talks about training with his trainer and how well he's been how well he's been like just being good at the intricacies of his game and you know closing off those angles being more quick and more agile and putting himself in the right position to be successful but hearing that he's in the best goaltending shape of his life is great news for us because I mean he had obviously a tremendous year last year a breakout year and obviously Washington Capitals had no use for him up at the NHL level they threw him on the waivers and we were lucky enough to get this guy and he's very excited to be back in Canada he's very excited to get going here with the Winnipeg Jets get his first start under his belt and now hearing that he's in the best shape of his life I think this is the best the best case scenario out of a bad one right we had a bad one hell about you know throwing it out there that he doesn't want to be part of the organization requesting a trade and now we get a guy back luckily in clay Stevenson knew we didn't have to give anything up for who I think is going to be a great backup for us this year and a great secondary optional option alongside sports as short Skinner if he does you know start to fall off this year we have Stevenson there who's ready to pick it up for this guy so great news on the Stevenson front today can't wait to see him get his first start here in Winnipeg I'm sure short Skinner is going to start the opening game of the season but after that we know we will get to see play Stevenson don't know when but maybe it'll be on the first back to the back of the season or maybe we'll just see Stewart go and then we'll see Stevenson go but it'll be interesting to see how our Neil kind of navigates their tandem as well and we'll have more information on that as it comes out for you guys here on the channel as well but I do want to talk about what Scott Arneal had to say about Brayden Jaeger you know yesterday if you guys tuned into that video I was talking about how I how devastated I was to see Jaeger be sent down to the AHL because I like this player and I really think he has a lot to give for the future of this team but this is what Arneal had to say about the sending down of Brayden Jaeger he said he's an NHL player he said the numbers game for now said it was a tough decision but made it clear he expects Jaeger to play a role within the team this season so Jaeger fans like me out there are rejoicing today getting to hear that Jaeger will have a role on this team later this season I think this guy obviously is one of the greatest two-way guys you know at the American League level right now a great prospect that we had coming up and he's ready now to make his start in the NHL won't be at the beginning of the season but he said he does have a role later in this season which is great to hear I do think having a great two-way center like Jaeger who has put up some great points across his career I'll just bring him up a little bit bigger for you guys want to get into it these are actually Clay Stephenson's but let's talk about Clay Stephenson again for a second like I said I look at those numbers a 9-12 a 9-21 had a great year last year but let's go back to Braden Jaeger who we're here on right now he had 30 points with the Manitoba Moose last year 10 goals 20 assists about a half a point per game player just over he had four points in their playoffs as well and that got into three games with us last year where he didn't get any points but that but he still looked good and he had 52 points with the Lethbridge Hurricanes in his last year in the WHL this guy I think has a lot of promise here for this team going forward and I really do think that Braden Jaeger is going to come up and get into this lineup and when he does he will never be sent back down because I think he just has that you know it factor and you know you don't see that come around every day he's a great two-way guys great defensive player great at winning faceoffs he can put points on the board this guy's just a great mills has a great middle six player written all over him it's just very unfortunate that right now if we look at the Winnipeg Jets lineup they're so deep at the center role after drafting Vigo Bjork they have Lowry and Nemesikov here on this third and fourth line and you really don't want to bring up Jaeger put him on this fourth line because then you're kind of just stunting his development you kind of want to make room for him here on this third line where Lowry is so maybe there is an instance this season where maybe we see him uh call up in case of an injury or maybe uh Arniel has a plan for him to maybe test him out playing left wing it'd be interesting to see if some point this year with the Manitoba Moose if we do see that kind of experiment because if he plays well down there in that experiment we could see him called up and play wing up in with the big club but i'm i'm excited uh to see Brayden Jaeger up this season it's great news to hear that Scott Arniel uh wants uh to have him a part of his plan going forward and a guy who we've been anxiously waiting and patiently patiently patiently waiting for to come up this season but as you can tell i'm very excited i can barely talk right now but i want to hear how you guys are feeling about clay stevenson's comments today how are you feeling about Brayden Jaeger how are you feeling going into this season if you made this far in the video drop a comment on what you think our finishing record will be at this point uh at the end of the year so let me know down below in the comments while you're down there leave a like subscribe to the channel we'll keep you up to date on the latest news around the wind and big jets as always i've been your host kc keep your stick on the ice