Jim Toth

And then he had a chance to win.

It was one of those situations where, like, if it worked out, it wouldn't surprise me.

But the fact that it didn't work out, it didn't surprise me at all either.

And I think that they were looking for maybe somebody a little bit bigger, a more quote-unquote playoff performer, which is bizarre because he's performing now.

And he did it in the last year as well in the playoffs.

I want to give him credit for that.

But looking back now with how the team went, not so much what Nick Gielers is.

To me, Nick Gielers is the exact same player as he was here.

Nothing's changed.

What has changed is they desperately needed him, A, because he was a guy that was willing to stay here and they can't get guys to come here.

And that was obvious in the offseason, right?

Like Gus Nyquist was an absolute bust here, but I don't think he was at the top of the list.

I think it was Nick Ehlers.

And when Nick Ehlers tried to leave, they looked at Brock Besser.

When Brock Besser stayed, they looked at what was left of players that wanted to come here.

And what was left was

you know, the Tanner Pearsons and the Gus Nyquists.

And that's just the situation Winnipeg's in.

Winnipeg's in that rare situation when a Nick Ehlers leaves, there's nobody else coming.

And that's why I think that the mistake on management was thinking that a Brad Lambert or maybe somebody else like a Nyquist could get lightning in a bottle until Brad Lambert was ready a year later.