Winnipeg Jets Suddenly Dump 6-Year NHL Veteran

The Winnipeg Jets have placed forward Walker Duehr on waivers, according to reporting from Mike McIntyre of the Winnipeg Free Press.

The 28-year-old began the 2026-27 season on the club’s opening injured reserve list after suffering a lower-body injury during the preseason.

Head coach Scott Arniel has since confirmed that Duehr has been medically cleared and that the waiver move is intended to assign him to the American Hockey League’s Manitoba Moose, provided he clears.

Duehr is entering his second year in the Jets organization after first signing a one-year, $775,000 deal ahead of the 2025-26 campaign.

He spent the bulk of that season with the Moose, where he produced 17 goals and 34 points in 62 games while posting a plus-4 rating.

Winnipeg recalled him for a brief three-game stretch in early March; he went scoreless in limited duty, averaging roughly nine and a half minutes of ice time per contest.

Despite that modest NHL sample, the Jets moved quickly to retain him.

The day after the Carolina Hurricanes captured the Stanley Cup, Winnipeg signed Duehr to a two-year extension worth $1.75 million, carrying an average annual value of $875,000 and running through the 2027-28 season.

The deal was framed as depth insurance for a bottom-six role.

Before arriving in Manitoba, Duehr built his professional résumé with the Calgary Flames.

Undrafted out of Minnesota State University-Mankato, where he was a secondary scorer, he signed as a college free agent near the end of the 2020-21 season.

Over the next several years, he appeared in 84 NHL games with Calgary, recording nine goals and 19 points while averaging under nine minutes of ice time.

Though the offensive numbers were modest, he registered 150 hits in that span, underscoring the physical, checking presence he can offer in a depth role.

Waivers for a player of Duehr’s profile are a common late-roster maneuver as clubs finalize their 23-man rosters.

If he clears, he will rejoin the Moose and provide experienced scoring depth in the AHL while remaining under contract to Winnipeg.

Should another club claim him, the Jets would lose him without compensation, a risk teams routinely accept when shuffling depth forwards early in the season. For now, the move simply returns a recovered player to the minors after an injury-interrupted start.