On Saturday night Elliotte Friedman disclosed that Mark Scheifele had not requested a trade. Today he provided some further thoughts which runs from the 9:11 mark to 13:11.
Jeff Marek asked for more clarity on Scheifele.
“On Scheifele it’s been tough. The Jets have been trying to be really careful about this but it was a story that really had to be followed-up after Scheifele’s comments and when Kevin Cheveldayoff met with the media he made a point of saying that he hadn’t yet met with Scheifele and he was still going to talk to him. But basically spent a lot of the rest of the week trying to figure out what had happened here. From what I understand Scheifele and Cheveldayoff, after having a conversation, Scheifele did not ask for a trade. Now this is still kinda in the Jets court, what do they want to do here, does that change their feelings, how do they go about this? The point that somebody made to me was they have two more years of Pierre-Luc Dubois before he’s got unrestricted free agency, they’ve have two more years of Mark Scheifele before he goes to unrestricted free agency but if they are not gonna know if they can keep Dubois long-term, does it make sense for them to trade Scheifele now? I think that is part of the process that they’re going to be going through in the next little while. I think in some ways Scheifele dialed down the pressure on them by not coming out and specifically asking for a trade. I think what this does is it gets the Jets some breathing time, Dubois said it could be awhile before his situation is sorted out, it just gives the Jets some room to breath without a Scheifele situation hanging over them in addition. To figure out what they want to do. The Jets got two pieces of pretty good news. One is that from Scheifele and one I understood that Connor Hellebuyck told them the similar things. If the team is not rebuilding, if the team is willing to trying to keep winning, Hellebuyck is ok with staying and I think they were a little worried about what he might say to. Just in the aftermath of a bad season they’ve been given some good news from Hellebuyck, some good news from Scheifele and it just allows them to breath and ponder their situation a little bit. Like you know Jeff, I think it’s good for the Jets to be in a situation where a couple of their cornerstones have given them a little bit of a vote of confidence here. I think that is good news for the Jets too. Now I still think they have a big job this summer and I still think they have some tough choices to make but I think what Scheifele did was buy them some time.”
At this point Marek interjects and asks about whether the “vote of confidence” only applies if the Jets are not going the rebuild route. Friedman answered:
“Yes and I am not convinced that they want to do that anyway.”
Marek then asked if Friedman expects Dubois and Scheifele to be in the Jets lineup next season:
“I don’t want to make any predications like that. I think the safest way to say it Jeff is at this point in time I don’t think the Jets have made any decisions. I just think what this does is allows them to breath a little bit and figure out what they want to do. Or what the proper path is.”
