Every Canadian hockey fan should feel the chill of Connor Hellebuyck’s trade request out of Winnipeg

OPINION Every Canadian hockey fan should feel the chill of Connor Hellebuyck’s trade request out of Winnipeg CATHAL KELLY PUBLISHED 39 MINUTES AGO Open this photo in gallery: Connor Hellebuyck has requested a trade from the Winnipeg Jets. The team should not play along with the request, Cathal Kelly writes. TONY GUTIERREZ/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS COMMENTS SHARE SAVE FOR LATER Listen to this article Learn more about audio Log in or create a free account to listen to this article. When Connor Hellebuyck re-signed in Winnipeg in 2023, it was suggested that he and the team had an understanding. He would choose them, and in return they would tailor the workplace to his needs. “I had a good talk with [Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff] before camp,” Hellebuyck told Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman at the time. “How much he wanted to win. What he was willing to do to win. Those are important conversations to have because a guy could feel that way, and if he never says it, you don’t know. Your mind starts to wander.” Every top pro has choices, but Hellebuyck made it seem that by taking almost US$60-million of Winnipeg’s money, he was doing them a favour. That impression was allowed to linger. It resurfaced this week when Cheveldayoff was in the midst of explaining why he had just suspended Hellebuyck for refusing to show up to camp. Had the Jets promised to trade Hellebuyck if the team wasn’t good enough to suit him? Hellebuyck suspension, trade request looms over Winnipeg Jets training camp Cheveldayoff denied it in strangely baroque terms – “Any notion around that would not have any merit ” – and then segued directly to a defence of the Jets’ competitiveness. The effect was to make it seem that if Hellebuyck is feeling sore, he has at least some reason to be. Except he doesn’t. The GM doesn’t skate. Only the players do. As such, how good the team is is entirely up to them. If Hellebuyck thought the Jets should have been better last year, then maybe he should’ve tried being less crap himself. Having not done that, the acceptable reaction isn’t, ‘I can’t quite reach the eject button. Can you push it for me?’ This would be a garden-variety story of entitlement, were it not for the political and civic angles. Open this photo in gallery: Hellebuyck, in front, at U.S. President Donald Trump's state of the union address, basked in the limelight given to the U.S. hockey team after it won gold at the Olympics. KENNY HOLSTON/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Hellebuyck was one…