{"id":654532,"date":"2026-09-03T01:33:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-03T01:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/654532\/"},"modified":"2026-09-03T01:33:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T01:33:12","slug":"evening-notes-huberdeau-jets-devils-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/654532\/","title":{"rendered":"Evening Notes: Huberdeau, Jets, Devils \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jonathan Huberdeau<\/a> may not be ready for the start of the 2026-27 season. Flames GM Craig Conroy<\/a> said Wednesday<\/a> that the veteran winger suffered \u201ca little bit of a setback\u201d about two weeks ago in his recovery from hip resurfacing surgery, specifically in his skating. Speaking on QR770 in Calgary, Conroy stressed that the organization intends to be patient: Huberdeau\u2019s work in the gym has been positive, but the Flames want to be certain he can handle physical contact before clearing him. With Calgary opening the season October 1 against Seattle, Conroy said he expects Huberdeau to be \u201cpretty close\u201d to ready, though the exact timeline remains uncertain.<\/p>\n

The setback adds a wrinkle to an already difficult chapter. Huberdeau, 33, was shut down in late January and underwent the operation in March, ending a 2025-26 season in which he managed 10 goals and 25 points in 50 games. Hip resurfacing is a highly invasive procedure that has ended more NHL careers than it has extended. Patrick Kane<\/a> is a rare success story, while players such as Ed Jovanovski<\/a> and Ryan Kesler<\/a> struggled to return to form. It\u2019s a lot riding on a player still owed five years and $52.5MM on the contract he signed after arriving in the 2022 Matthew Tkachuk<\/a> trade, a deal that has tilted heavily in Florida\u2019s favor. Since arriving in Calgary, Huby has 194 points in 291 games played. The Flames, who struggled to produce offense during the 2025-26 season, will certainly be hopeful that a healthy Huberdeau can return and make an impact again.<\/p>\n

Additional notes:<\/p>\n

The Jets announced a round of coaching and medical staff updates, per Murat Ates of The Athletic<\/a>. Matt Larke joins the NHL staff as skills coach after spending the previous four seasons as a skills consultant for the Seattle Kraken. On the medical side, former Manitoba Moose head athletic therapist Zach Salmonson moves up to the Jets as massage therapist and assistant athletic therapist, while the AHL club promoted Andy Grant to head athletic therapist and added Layne Richardson as an assistant athletic therapist.
\nThe Utica Comets, the Devils\u2019 AHL affiliate, announced<\/a> Adam Pawlick as the newly appointed team president. Pawlick, who has led the club\u2019s business operations, takes over day-to-day duties from Robert Esche<\/a>, who is shifting his focus to his role as CEO of Mohawk Valley Garden, the Comets\u2019 ownership group. He\u2019ll oversee ticket sales, corporate partnerships, marketing, and fan experience heading into the new season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jonathan Huberdeau may not be ready for the start of the 2026-27 season. Flames GM Craig Conroy said…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654533,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[895,26,5294,896,5,7621,151,4,18],"class_list":["post-654532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-calgary-flames","tag-calgary","tag-calgary-flames","tag-calgaryflames","tag-flames","tag-hockey","tag-jonathan-huberdeau","tag-new-jersey-devils","tag-nhl","tag-winnipeg-jets"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117204536730175085","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}