Columbus Blue Jackets: Trade Candidates Who Would Help a Cup Run

The Columbus Blue Jackets are hot to start the season, but we shouldn’t assume it’ll be an easy year. There’s always room to improve, especially for a team still looking to win its first playoff series in franchise history.

A young, fast team is a good way to describe the current Columbus Blue Jackets. They have offensive and defensive weapons, as well as a reliable goaltender.

It seems as if they’ll be able to make the playoffs, but nothing is guaranteed. Jarmo Kekalainen and the front office won’t settle for just being good in the regular season.

Jackets fans were begging for Matt Duchene all summer, but a trade never happened. This leaves some thinking a trade will be necessary to make a deep playoff run.

Duchene talk aside, there are plenty of candidates that could come to Columbus via trade. I’m not including Duchene in this list, because we already know about him and how he could help this team.

With players like Ryan Murray stepping up and Nick Foligno filling in nicely at center, the Blue Jackets probably won’t want to give up too much. A trade would shake up the lineup, but the Jackets have appealing pieces so who knows what to expect.