Scheifele shocked at Jets decision to strip Blake Wheeler.

The Winnipeg Jets made what was arguably the most impactful announcement of the National Hockey League's offseason this week when they announced their decision to strip veteran Jets forward Blake Wheeler of the captaincy.

Prior to being stripped of the 'C' on his jersey, Wheeler had inherited the role after the departure of former Jets captain Andrew Ladd and served in the role for 6 seasons prior to this week's announcement. While Wheeler himself no doubt has a lot of strong feelings about the decision made by the organization this week, he will be far from the only player impacted by this decision.

This week Jets forward Mark Scheifele, a longtime teammate and personal friend of Wheeler's, had the chance to share his thoughts on the decision, one that he admitted came as a shock.

"It definitely caught me by surprise," admitted Wheeler on the 32 Thoughts podcast.

"I was definitely shocked, I didn't see it coming," added Scheifele. "Blake's a really good friend of mine and I just wanna be there for him and the team. "

The news may have caught members of the Winnipeg Jets' locker room by surprise, but it sounds like the timing of the decision may prove to be a good thing for the Jets roster. Scheifele pointed to the fact that the players will all soon be back in Winnipeg and as a result they will have to tackle this together.

"When I get back to Winnipeg we have a team weekend this weekend which will be good to get together as a team," revealed Scheifele. "You just wanna talk to the guys and get their thoughts and see how they are feeling. We all gotta work through this together and we're all here for Blake and we're all here for the team. Obviously it's a team decision and we'll go from there."

Scheifele was asked if he had petitioned to be captain himself, but the veteran forward said that the thought hadn't so much as crossed his mind due to his respect for Wheeler. He did however go on to suggest that there are several players on the team that could take on that role moving forward.

"I definitely look at myself as a leader, I think we have a lot of leaders on our team," said Scheifele. "I think me and Josh are the As on the team, we're younger and we have a little bit of a different voice. I think this gives the opportunity for other guys to step in... I think it has to be a collective, it has to be multiples of us. We have Nikolaj Ehlers, Kyle Connor, Connor Hellebuyck, Adam Lowry, we have so many guys on this team that have big voices and I think we all have to do it together."