Is the market heating up for Winnipeg Jets’ Connor Hellebuyck?

Tyler Yaremchuk was joined by Frank Seravalli on the eve of the NHL Entry Draft to discuss the trade market for Connor Hellebuyck on the latest episode of Daily Faceoff Live.

Tyler Yaremchuk: The Winnipeg Jets are a team that everyone in the hockey world is watching very closely. They have all those guys in the top five of your trade targets board. Mark Scheifele is one, Connor Hellebuyck is another. I’m surprised we haven’t heard more about this. A guy who is a perennial Vezina contender is clearly on the block, why hasn’t there been more interest in Connor Hellebuyck?

Frank Seravalli: The big question I’ve been asking myself over the last week has been, okay it’s great that teams like Connor Hellebuyck and crave that consistency in net that maybe only five or six netminders in the entire league can provide you that kind of security as you put your head on the pillow if you’re an NHL GM.

The thing for me is, who can afford to pay him $9 million for the next eight seasons or whatever the number ends up being on their cap. I think the list is very small and I also think that because Connor Hellebuyck by virtue of the situation that the Jets are in with Pierre-Luc Dubois and Mark Scheifele. They control the trade destination because they’ll only go somewhere where they’ll sign a contract.

I think the pool is already very small for the Jets but then for the Jets to extract significant value from that is going to be very difficult for Kevin Cheveldayoff to pull off.

You can watch the rest of the episode here…