The Funny Thing About Loyalty in the NHL

There’s something a little funny about how people are reacting to Connor Hellebuyck wanting out of Winnipeg. And I don’t mean funny like Jets fans shouldn’t be upset. They have every right. Hellebuyck’s been their guy for 11 seasons. They watched him turn into one of the best goalies on the planet, and now he wants to play somewhere else. That stings.

But here’s the part that gets me. A lot of those same fans have spent years telling the Jets exactly which players to trade because they weren’t good enough, were too expensive, or just weren’t working out anymore. That’s not a knock on anybody. It’s just kind of the funny contradiction of being a sports fan.

In the NHL, Loyalty Depends on Which Side You’re Standing On

Fans want their players to be loyal. I totally get it. We buy the jerseys, learn the backstories, watch our favourite become part of what a team even is. But the second a player stops performing or his contract gets inconvenient, that same loyalty tends to fly out the window fast.

Trade him. Move him. Do whatever it takes. We’ve all said some version of that. And honestly, there’s nothing wrong with it. Fans aren’t running the team. They just want to win.

But players are looking out for their own careers in exactly the same way. Hellebuyck gave Winnipeg 11 years. That’s most of a career. So if he’s sitting there wondering what he actually wants out of what he wants from the rest of his career, whether that’s a real shot at a Cup or just a different life somewhere else, I don’t think that makes him a bad guy. It just makes him human. And it’s not that different from what we do as fans every time we’re begging the GM to blow it up.