Hellebuyck Is Gone. The Waiting Is Over.

The Jets dealt Connor Hellebuyck to New Jersey on Friday, closing out a saga that had been hanging over the organization since late August when his camp went public with a trade demand. The return includes Dawson Mercer and Alexander Command, which is a real haul — the kind that suggests Kevin Cheveldayoff at least extracted value from a situation that had grown genuinely uncomfortable for everyone involved.

I wrote twice last week that Friday was coming no matter what. It came, and Winnipeg made the move. Hellebuyck — a multiple Vezina winner, a former Hart Trophy recipient, one of the best goaltenders of his generation — will face the Jets in Winnipeg on November 10, which is the kind of scheduling quirk the hockey calendar loves to produce.

The goaltending depth chart now reads Domenic DiVincentiis, Stuart Skinner, and Thomas Milic, which is a different conversation entirely than the one this franchise was having two years ago. The Jets are going to look different for a while. Mercer is a piece worth building around, and Yager is already back up from the Moose after a strong AHL start. That's where the attention goes now.