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Jan Jenik

Coyotes Reassign Jan Jeník

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The Arizona Coyotes announced Sunday that they’ve assigned forward Jan Jeník to the Tucson Roadrunners of the AHL.

In doing so, the team has freed up a spot on the active roster, potentially indicating one of their three players on injured reserve, likely forward Jack McBain or defenseman Travis Dermott, could be nearing a return. It could also be a transaction to give the 23-year-old Jeník some playing action in tonight’s contest with the Roadrunners against the Henderson Silver Knights, as the Coyotes are out of action until Tuesday.

Arizona summoned Jeník from the minors over a week ago after announcing that center Barrett Hayton would be sidelined week-to-week with an upper-body injury. Jeník was a healthy scratch in three of four games during his call-up, making his lone appearance (and season debut) last Wednesday against the St. Louis Blues. In that contest, he logged just 8:21 of ice time, one shot on goal and a -1 rating.

He’s been used in a similarly limited role during previous call-ups this season, also serving as a healthy scratch for a couple of games last month. A third-round pick of the Coyotes in 2018, Jeník is now in his fourth professional season after making his NHL debut during the 2020-21 campaign. He’s on his second NHL contract after his entry-level deal expired last summer, inking a one-year, two-way pact with a minimum guaranteed salary of $125K after reportedly seeking a trade upon reaching restricted free agency.

In 18 NHL games, Jeník has tallied four goals, one assist and a -4 rating while averaging 10:10 per game. While not a highly-touted prospect on draft day, he had a solid finish to his junior career that positioned him as a potential top-six fixture in Arizona if things panned out the right way. That seems unlikely now, as he’s yet to come close to carving out a full-time role for himself and is off to a mediocre start with Tucson, notching two goals and three assists in nine games. His professional point production has continued to decrease from its peak in 2021-22 when he notched 47 points in 51 games for the Roadrunners.

Next summer, Jeník will once again be a restricted free agent. Unlike last year, he will be eligible for salary arbitration. He’s due a qualifying offer of $813,750 per CapFriendly; however, if things continue in their current direction, Jeník seems like a strong non-tender candidate and could find himself on the open market when July 1 rolls around.

Coyotes’ Barrett Hayton Likely To Miss Four To Six Weeks

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5:39 p.m.: The Coyotes have confirmed Hayton’s status as week-to-week in a team announcement Friday evening. Jeník has indeed been recalled from the AHL’s Tucson Roadrunners in a corresponding transaction. Jeník, 23, was recalled twice by the team in late October but did not appear in a game, serving as a healthy scratch on both occasions.

11:42 a.m.: In unfortunate news for both player and team, after leaving last night’s game with an apparent upper-body injury, the outlook on Barrett Hayton’s status does not appear to be positive. Craig Morgan of PHNX Sports reports that Hayton will likely need surgery for his injury, and the Arizona Coyotes will be without the forward for the next four to six weeks.

Although centering the top forward line for the Coyotes, Hayton has had an incredibly unlucky start to the 2023-24 season. His scoring has picked up as of late, scoring two goals in his last five games. However, over 16 games to start the year, Hayton only has two goals and two assists overall.

Averaging over 18 and a half minutes of ice time per game, Hayton is only shooting at a 5.9% success rate, all while maintaining an above-average CF% of 55.1% and a decent xGF of 9.1 while on the ice. Now, if his on-ice production wasn’t bad enough, Hayton is set to miss at least the next month with his injury.

Nevertheless, if there is any positive for Arizona through this injury, it’s that this might create an opportunity for Logan Cooley on the team’s first line. Averaging just over 16 minutes of ice time per night, Cooley is already showing off his playmaking abilities with 10 assists on the year already, with eight of those coming on the Coyotes’ powerplay.

In the meantime, Morgan indicates that Arizona will be recalling Jan Jenik from their AHL affiliate, the Tucson Roadrunners. In the AHL this year, Jenik has scored two goals and three assists in nine games for the Roadrunners.

Coyotes Assign Ben McCartney And Jan Jenik To AHL

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Sunday: McCartney’s stint with the Coyotes was short-lived as he was assigned back to the minors today.

Saturday: The recent roster shuffling in Arizona has continued as the team announced (Twitter link) that they’ve recalled winger Ben McCartney from AHL Tucson.  He takes the place of forward Jan Jenik who has been returned to the Roadrunners.

This is McCartney’s first recall in nearly two years with his only previous NHL action being a pair of appearances early in the 2021-22 season.  The 22-year-old has played in five games in the minors so far this season and is still looking for his first point.  McCartney’s best showing down there came a couple of years ago when he posted 18 goals and 17 assists in 2021-22, his first professional campaign.

As for Jenik, he is no stranger to these back-and-forth transactions; it’s the fourth one he has been involved in since Monday.  The 23-year-old served as Arizona’s extra forward last night against Los Angeles and has yet to suit up for the Coyotes this season.  Jenik has three points in as many games in Tucson so far after clearing waivers at the beginning of the month.  Players can be on an NHL roster for 10 games or 30 days cumulative without needing to clear again.  This assignment stops the clock for the time being.

The Coyotes aren’t back in action until Monday so there should be a reprieve on the day-to-day transactions tomorrow before potentially resuming in advance of their game against Chicago.

Coyotes’ Jason Zucker Out Week-To-Week

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Wednesday: The Coyotes announced that Jeník was returned to Tucson while CapFriendly reports that Sanford has also been sent back down.

Monday: Coyotes winger Jason Zucker is expected to be out for at least a few games with a lower-body injury, as the team says he’s been listed as week-to-week. In a pair of corresponding transactions, the Coyotes recalled forwards Jan Jeník and Zach Sanford from AHL Tucson, while CapFriendly reports Zucker was moved to injured reserve to accommodate two recalls. Zucker sustained the injury in Saturday’s 2-1 win over the Ducks.

With two goals in five games thus far as a Coyote, Zucker has been decent after inking a one-year, $5.3MM contract in free agency last summer. He’s averaging 2.8 shots on goal per game and is currently shooting at 14.3%, nearly two points higher than his career average. He’s been paired mostly with Logan Cooley and either Matias Maccelli or Alexander Kerfoot on the opposite wing so far, a line that’s driven a lot of scoring chances when Maccelli is the third member. However, Zucker’s usage has not been advantageous – just 36.4% of his zone starts at even strength have come in the offensive zone, far below his 52.4% career average.

Hopefully, for the Coyotes, this is not a sign of things to come for the remainder of Zucker’s tenure. The 32-year-old has become rather injury-prone, most recently missing half of the 2021-22 campaign with lower-body and core muscle injuries. He also missed a significant chunk of the COVID-shortened 2020-21 season with a lower-body injury. Dating back to 2020, Zucker has played in 157 of 220 possible games, or about 71%.

With Zucker now on IR, the 23-year-old Jeník could get the chance he’s been hoping for. Arizona’s 65th overall pick in 2018 has been on the rise since his draft year, posting a pair of strong offensive campaigns with the OHL’s Hamilton Bulldogs before turning pro in 2020. He’s posted solid numbers with Tucson since, including a career-high 47 points in 51 contests in 2021-22. A contract dispute this summer stretched until mid-September when Jeník finally agreed to a one-year, two-way deal worth $775K in the NHL with a $125K salary guarantee. Jeník was reportedly seeking trade options over the summer in search of a clearer path to an NHL role. He’s off to a strong start in the minors, posting three points in three games.

The Coyotes are off to a decent 3-2-0 start, largely in part due to spectacular netminding from both Connor Ingram and Karel Vejmelka, who’ve posted a combined .943 SV% and 1.80 GAA. Secondary scoring outside of Cooley, Maccelli, Clayton Keller, and Nick Schmaltz has been a major issue, one that will be tough to fix with Zucker out of commission for the foreseeable future.

Arizona Coyotes Extend Jan Jenik

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The Arizona Coyotes announced today that they signed forward Jan Jenik to a one-year contract for the upcoming season. This marks a drastic turn from what seemed likely a month ago. At the time it was reported that Jenik was seeking a trade after not accepting his qualifying offer, but for now, it appears that his trade request is on hold, although nothing has been reported.

The native of Nymburk, Czech Republic was drafted by the Coyotes in the third round of the 2018 NHL entry draft and has yet to make much of a mark on the NHL. In 17 career games with the Coyotes the 23-year-old has posted just four goals and a single assist while posting a -3. While those numbers don’t jump off the page, context is important as he has a very small sample size and has started almost 61% of his shifts in the defensive zone.

As you would expect, Jenik has had far more success in the AHL as last year he registered seven goals and 16 assists in 30 games with the Tucson Roadrunners.  Over the course of his AHL career, Jenik has posted 30 goals and 54 assists in 110 games all with the Roadrunners.

No financial details of the contract have been released and the deal appears to be of the two-way variety. This contract probably wasn’t Jenik’s first choice, but he has stated previously that his dream is to play in the NHL, and this will allow him to become a restricted free agent once again next summer.

Coyotes Prospect Jan Jeník Reportedly Seeking Trade Options

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Arizona Coyotes 2018 draft pick Jan Jeník remains without a contract for next season and is reportedly seeking a trade to continue his career in North America, according to a report from PHNX Sports’ Craig Morgan.

The Coyotes issued Jeník a qualifying offer before the June deadline and retained his exclusive signing rights as a restricted free agent, but Morgan says he doesn’t appear close to signing with Arizona. The 22-year-old winger was the Coyotes’ 65th overall pick in 2018 and has three years of pro experience under his belt, mainly with AHL Tucson.

He’s put up strong offensive totals on a weak Roadrunners team over the past two seasons, even finishing second on the team in scoring with 17 goals, 30 assists and 47 points in 51 games during the 2021-22 campaign. After more solid play with 23 points in 30 games for Tucson this season, though, he didn’t receive much of an NHL chance – only two games at the major-league level in 2022-23 and just 17 overall over the past three seasons.

Arizona drafted Jeník directly out of the 1. Liga, Czechia’s second-tier pro league behind the Extraliga and not at all a traditional stomping ground for draft-eligible prospects. It was after the 2018 draft that Jeník established some decent stock as a prospect, coming to North America and scoring 86 points in 54 games across two seasons with the OHL’s Hamilton Bulldogs. He looked well on his way to solidifying himself as a potential top-five prospect in the organization, but without much of any NHL experience to show for it and a crowded forward corps next season, it makes sense he’s looking for other opportunities.

He may not get the trade he desires anytime soon, though, as Morgan reports the Coyotes “seem content to let Jeník sit,” given he has very little leverage as an RFA. He’s got a few options moving forward if the Coyotes don’t move him – he can sit out and hope the team folds before December 1, the deadline by which he needs to sign to play in the NHL this season; he can sign in Europe; or he can hope another team signs him to an offer sheet which Arizona opts not to match. Teams do not need to send compensation for signing offer sheets worth less than $1.416MM per season.

It doesn’t seem likely a team would issue an offer sheet of any significance, though, as despite his wishes, few believe Jeník is ready for a full-time NHL role as things stand. Arizona will likely match any offer he realistically receives and send him back to Tucson to start next season.

Snapshots: Blues, Lightning, Coyotes

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Settling with Alexey Toropchenko today gave the St. Louis Blues come salary cap flexibility, says CapFriendly. Much like the Philadelphia Flyers did with Anthony DeAngelo, settling with Toropchenko, the Blues’ last remaining player who had filed for arbitration, opens a second buyout window for the team, which will open in three days and last for 48 hours. The rules for this unique buyout are limited, though – a player must have been on their reserve list at the trade deadline and must carry a cap hit of at least $4MM.

The Blues are cap-compliant but barely – CapFriendly projects them with roughly $290K in space with a full 23-player roster. They’ve expressed a clear desire to move out one of their aging top-four defensemen via trade, but nothing’s manifested yet, and it’s becoming less and less likely as the offseason trods on. It’s entirely possible general manager Doug Armstrong could choose to execute a buyout for someone like Nick Leddy, who’s struggled during his time in St. Louis and carries a $4MM cap hit through 2026. It would be a hefty buyout, running through 2028-29, but it wouldn’t carry a cap penalty of more than $2MM in any of the six seasons – it might be appealing.

More from around the NHL this weekend:

  • The Tampa Bay Lightning are also granted a second buyout window after settling with forward Tanner Jeannot before arbitration. The team has cut costs wherever possible, but they still have less than $1MM in cap space, even taking into account Brent Seabrook’s long-term injured reserve relief. Unfortunately for them, there are no possible candidates here – all of their players carrying a cap hit of $4MM are core parts of the team and won’t be considered for a buyout. General manager Julien BriseBois is prepping for another long season of cap management on a day-to-day basis.
  • PHNX Sports’ Craig Morgan today offered updates on a pair of Arizona Coyotes RFA forwards – Jan Jenik and Jack McBain. Morgan notes that Jenik’s deadline to accept his qualifying offer passed yesterday, meaning the team now has to negotiate a new deal with him to return to the desert. The 22-year-old was a 2018 third-round pick and notched 23 points in 30 games with the AHL’s Tucson Roadrunners last season. Morgan also notes that there hasn’t been any progress between the Coyotes and McBain on a new contract with his arbitration hearing looming at the end of the month, although they still have about two weeks to come to a deal before the hearing.

Arizona Coyotes Recall Jan Jeník

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The Arizona Coyotes have recalled forward Jan Jeník from the AHL’s Tucson Roadrunners, according to a team tweet Wednesday.

Arizona needed an extra body from the minors after Laurent Dauphin sustained an upper-body injury in Monday night’s game against the Seattle Kraken. Jeník, 22, will suit up for Arizona’s final game of the season, a home matchup Thursday against the Vancouver Canucks.

The team’s third-round pick in 2018 has battled through injuries at times in his development, but Jeník has still managed to show offensive promise when healthy for extended periods of time. This season hasn’t been smooth for him, though, with injuries limiting him to 30 games with Tucson, where he’s recorded seven goals and 23 points.

Jeník made one NHL appearance earlier this season, playing just four minutes in a December 17 game against the Buffalo Sabres. The Czech prospect has four goals and an assist in 16 career games with the Coyotes thus far.

A skilled skater who makes intelligent plays, Jeník still has top-six upside as a prospect if he can manage to round out his game in Tucson next season. He may end up limited to a fourth-line role against Vancouver, though, replacing Dauphin’s spot on the roster.

Coyotes Assign Jan Jenik To AHL

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December 18: A day after recalling him, the Arizona Coyotes announced they have assigned Jenik to the AHL once again. During his brief recall, the forward made his season debut for the Coyotes, playing just under four minutes, while recording four penalty minutes in the process.

December 17: The Coyotes have brought up some extra forward depth as they have recalled forward Jan Jenik from Tucson of the AHL, per a team announcement.  They had two open roster spots available so no corresponding move needed to be made.

The 22-year-old has seen NHL action in each of his first two professional seasons, suiting up in 15 games with the team where he had four goals and an assist while averaging just under 11 minutes per night.  He will get a chance to make that three in three with this recall.

This season, Jenik has gotten off to a quiet start with the Roadrunners, collecting just three goals and nine assists in 22 games.  Last season, he came up just shy of the point per game mark with 17 goals and 30 helpers in 51 contests.

Craig Morgan of PHNX Sports relays (Twitter link) that there are some game-time decisions for their contest tonight against Buffalo including Liam O’Brien so it appears that Jenik’s recall is a backup plan in case any of their 12 forwards are unable to suit up.

Johan Larsson Placed In COVID Protocol

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The Arizona Coyotes have placed Johan Larsson in the COVID protocol, making him unavailable for the time being. That comes just minutes after the team placed both Christian Fischer and Dmitrij Jaskin on injured reserve, recalling Hudson Fasching, Jan Jenik, and Ben McCartney in their place.

Larsson joins Andrew Ladd in the protocol, who was placed there over the weekend. The team did not confirm whether or not Larsson has tested positive, or given any indication of how long he will be out. Jaskin meanwhile is expected to miss the rest of the season, while Fischer was last listed as day-to-day with an upper-body injury. He’ll have to miss at least a week with the IR designation.

For any Arizona fans hoping for a high draft pick to build the organization around, it appears they will get their wish. The team is 1-13-1 on the season and seems destined to finish in last place in the Central Division. Losing veteran players for any length of time will only provide an opportunity for younger options, though it seems unlikely that they will be able to right the ship and help the Coyotes become a competitive team. For a franchise that has seen draft picks stripped away and others flame out quickly, a strong class in 2022 is imperative.

Luckily, the team currently holds eight picks in the first two rounds, including three first-round selections, meaning there’s at least something to look forward to on the horizon.

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