Morrow Sidelined With Injury, Niku Called Up

As one gets healthy, another goes down with injury. It’s been a battle to stay out of the infirmary this season as the Jets have had their fair share of injuries. Joe Morrow was the latest casualty as he seemed to injure his leg during his late game fight against the Avalanche.

Unlike other injuries, after this one happened, it was tough to tell exactly what was going on or what the damage actually was. We might never know, although Maurice announced at the next practice that Morrow will be out for a few weeks. The interesting part about this injury is that Morrow was likely going back to the pressbox anyway with the return of Dmitry Kulikov from injury.

The timing of everything worked out well for the Jets as Kulikov will slot back into the third pairing with Tyler Myers. This gives Winnipeg arguably their best lineup of defenders.

While the timing helps the Jets, it doesn’t help Sami Niku who was spent tons of time at the NHL level but has barely cracked the lineup. Had Morrow gone down a few games ago, Niku likely could have suited up for a few games until Kulikov’s return. Now that Kulikov is likely back right away, Niku will have to go back to the pressbox once again.

There were some people hoping that Tucker Poolman would actually be the Moose player to get recalled purely because Niku has spent so little time actually playing this season.

This makes sense from an organizational standpoint as Niku will likely benefit from playing rather than sitting in the pressbox. On the other hand, it could also be argued that practicing with the Jets will actually help him more due to the increased intensity. In my opinion, if Kulikov is fully healthy, the Jets should have called up Poolman to sit in the pressbox and let Niku play some more games for the Moose. Alas, the management disagreed with me as they announced Niku was the one being called up once again.