The Winnipeg Jets Need to Fire Paul Maurice

Paul Maurice has failed as the head coach of the Winnipeg Jets. Winnipeg's second bench boss has driven the Jets into the ground, and with no indication that he is capable of bringing them back to their conference finalist ways, it’s time to fire him.


A year after being knocked out of the 2019 Stanley Cup Finals to the eventual champions, the Jets have taken several steps back in the early portion of the 2019-20 season. They currently accompany the Stars in the middle of the Western Conference and have allowed the seventh most goals against in the league.

Fans have grown apathetic for the second time since this franchise returned to north of the 49th parallel; boos may rain down from the stands of Bell MTS Place on a regular basis these days if it isn't otherwise disturbingly quiet, and “Mo Must Go” tweets have been sent en masse this season.

When Maurice addressed the media following the seemingly lifeless shootout loss to New Jersey, he had no answers for his team’s medicore play.

“I think the game probably played out exactly the way I thought it would. They have a good, quick team, and I didn't think we would have all of our quickness there, I think that was fair. I think nothing was easy in terms of moving the puck, part of that is that they play that kind of game, part of it was that we were just going to grind this one, that's just the way it looked and it did.”

He then decided it was a good time for a cop-out for his top line's performance.

“The guys that we ran the hardest over the course of the last four games showed it the most. They worked at it, but I didn’t think they had a whole lot in the tank.”

Excuses, excuses. This team has been average to bad all year, long before their top line appeared tired.

Maurice’s deficiencies have become transparent. Veterans seem to get a free pass with him, as Dmitri Kulikov and Anthony Bitetto (along with Blake Wheeler and Mark Scheifele at points) continue to log big minutes despite their blatant inadequacies while younger players take a back seat. His constant line-juggling has given the Jets very little chance to develop chemistry with one another. Maurice actually made the right call in moving the struggling Blake Wheeler to the second line, only to push him back to top line merely a game later despite the top line's improved play. The “Young Guns” line of Kyle Connor, Andrew Copp, and Nikolaj Ehlers was far and away the most productive line Winnipeg’s had this year, but they’ve been broken up.

The biggest issue with firing Maurice is the lack of available replacements on the market. No one is going to come in and save the day a la Craig Berube, but a foundation can be established for the future and a fresh face could bring a much needed spark to this organization.

Regardless of the replacement they choose, firing Maurice would be considered progress. He’s never going to bring the Stanley Cup to Winnipeg, and the sooner he’s gone, the faster everyone can move on.

Stop me if you have heard this one before - because you already have.

Nearly eight years ago on The Hockey Writers, Andrew Hirsh (@andrewhirsh) wrote essentially this very same article on why "The Carolina Hurricanes need to fire Paul Maurice (again)". All I've done was change a few of the players' names, made some of the statements or facts more relevant to the current day, and took out a few paragraphs to shorten it a bit. I know this article gets copied and pasted around a few times around Twitter threads and message boards, but actually wanted to see how it would read if it written in 2019 about the current iteration of the Winnipeg Jets.

Whether you interpret this as a damning fault of Paul Maurice or just generalized tropes about the coach to portray him in this negative context, it's interesting to read this again with updated names and wonder about the constant rehashing of coaches or styles within the NHL. Again, Hockey Operations (including coaching) is probably a market inefficiency ready to be tapped, and already has started to be tapped by the likes of teams with financial war chests (Toronto) or the new kids on the block (Carolina, Seattle). Just think: why is it that in terms of coaching, teams have been extremely hesitant to even look at the likes of the most successful coaches across the North Atlantic Ocean such as Rikard Grönborg since before 2001?

I'll likely be writing a longer form piece myself around the 20 game mark about my actual thoughts on the 2019-20 Winnipeg Jets, hopefully with the Coordinate Crisis (TM) fixed by then for the earlier games for a better understanding of things like xG earlier on in the season. Until then, I'll still be posting regular after-game stats and (hopefully) funny memes.