JMS Hockey

Hi All! Our team is extremely excited to be part of this great hockey community! While we know we may not be able to meet everyone, we plan to attend and play many games, meet the community, listen to constructive feedback, look for new arenas to add, and keep this hockey community moving forward into the future. As we work on completing the transition to our team, please be on the look out for pickup games to restart at most locations. Please also understand that we are learning the behind the scenes efforts, so we may not be able to answer every question immediately. That said, we value your questions and comments, so we will get back with you as soon as we are able. As Barbara mentioned in the newsletter, we bring passion to the sport and diverse business experiences that will allow us to continue providing a wide variety of pickup games and league play at the many rinks you already know, and continue to expand the JMS hockey community footprint. We look forward to getting everyone back on the ice safely, and starting our JMS journey together. All the best, Jason Johnson Rick Banaszewski Jason Jelinek

You guys haven't played many JMS games? I hope some of the things I like about JMS will be kept around. Good luck to you guys.

You're right, we're still pretty new to JMS, which is why we want to understand what works and what doesn't before brings many of you here and, what keeps some away. What are some of the things you like?

I liked the $5 games and free beer served after the games. I hope you will keep those traditions. Friends little help here :)

Haha, we'll start the free beer tour tomorrow. ;)

I guess one of the things I’ve liked the most about JMS is the consistency of experience. You know that you are going to get a good hockey experience nearly every time. Some of the factors I think contribute to that are- A set maximum number of players per team. A captain that can be a moderator, balancing teams and addressing out of line behavior. I think a consistent captain helps a lot. Player accountability. A good parity system. Ease of signup and payment. Two goalies every time. A really good community. One area I think could be improved is customer appreciation. I know a lot of long time JMS users have had at least one instance where they felt their questions or participation were an irritation. Hope that helps!

Thanks for the feedback, Michael. We don't plan to change any of those positive things, but will work to improve customer appreciation. I'm starting this week going to the Eden Prairie skate Tuesday and will give away some swag before we skate. We'll continue to make the rounds over the coming weeks and months.

Maybe a free game after a few hundred games or something? Or a “refer a friend” program with incentives based on how many game a new referral plays (to avoid the incentive being taken advantage of). I’ve played a lot of JMS and have made a ton of friends doing it! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this opportunity to play hockey! Great thing about JMS is you really don’t have to do much at all to keep it great!

Thanks for the feedback and thanks for playing!. I like the ideas - they're definitely something we can look into.

Excited to see JMS back, and interested to see where things go under the new ownership. Surely not complaining about previous experiences, only looking forward to more of the same! Hope I get to cross paths with some or all of you at some point.

One other thing to remember, JMS is NOT HockeyFinder!!! At JMS, I like the consistency of skates. I like consistent captains. I like that skill levels are zeroed in as much as possible, especially breaking down the All Level skates into level quotas.

JMS is great because of the genuine parity, and the unequivocally non-aggressive attitude of the leadership team. With zero tolerance for aggressive behavior, JMS attracts and keeps boys and girls who want to have fun and still play a competitive game. Please do not compromise on the zero tolerance policy. It only takes one jerk to ruin the game. That's why many of us switched from adult hockey leagues to JMS. And I'm in favor of Bulent's free beer policy!

Thanks for the feedback guys, we really appreciate it.

I did a HF game while waiting for JMS to restart and was reminded what makes JMS so good: the parity and the captains. This game was billed as beginner to intermediate, but the majority of the skaters were the equivalent of JMS level four or five. I felt totally out of place, especially since it was my first skate in six months. And, I have no idea who the captain was. Also, I want to echo Jay’s comment about switching from “adult leagues” to JMS. The zero tolerance and laid back competition are why I left AHA for pickup hockey. So glad JMS is back, hope the new guys take heed. Thanks!

Thanks for your feedback, Cullen. We're happy to have you back!

Great feedback everyone! the GOAL is really simple for the new owners : KEEP & ADD MORE of THE AWESOMENESS ! Please, Keep Sharing feedback!!!

Why was referral award discontinued? I just brought a new guy in. Missing those free games for referrals

Are we going to see more merchandise? Just remember when we could get fancy jerseys that looked like the wild jerseys as after market option if we felt like upgrading.

Hey Jordan, that's good to know about the jerseys. We know the merchandise is lacking and are working on some things to fill that void. With 4 weeks off, we may be able to spend more time focusing on that and move the ball forward now.

Just wanted to give you guys a heads up since you said that all of you are new to the league.

Rick & co. Looks like there is a new number for waitlist notifications and potentially a need for configuring our phones in order to reply. I tried to respond to a signup message last night and wasn't able to. Has anyone had any success with the updated system? I took a screen shot of the message here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/5bkcaYycCc1AjHN39 Thanks! Darrell

Thanks for sharing, Darrell. I will pass this along to our developer for resolution asap.

Hey Rick, I just received the newsletter that said numbers are low for the winter leagues. Ever since the JMS upper level leagues went away, I have always wondered why JMS doesn’t do an intermediate league instead of only allowing the current levels 2,3 and 3-4s? You wouldn’t be cutting anyone out of the league and would only be opening it up to level 4s. Seems like the intermediate pick up games have great numbers so I would think that would be the case with the league.

I would certainly sign up for the winter league if it was open to level 4s.

Hi Matt - we have opened up our winter league to level 4s for this season and will be discussing our long-term options for leagues and levels. At this point we have cancelled the Eden Prairie league, but are getting closer to filling Woog/WSP. Feel free to connect with Jon Holtz if you have any more specific league questions.