Quarter Season Report Cards for the Columbus Blue Jackets Goalies

The Columbus Blue Jackets are through 23 games of the season. Let’s hand out some letter grades for every goalies performance thus far.

The Columbus Blue Jackets goalie tandem has been the talk of the town through the first quarter of the season. Sergei Bobrovsky‘s contract dispute and his slow start to the season opened the door for Joonas Korpisalo to start more games, including the season opener, than he normally would. Korpi let up a chunk of goals but played well enough to keep the Jackets in games until Bob found his way.

Which of course he did eventually. In the last five games Bobrovsky is 4-1-0 with a .952 save percentage. After a rough start, Bob’s numbers are climbing closer to his career averages. In his 14 starts Bob’s save percentage is up to .915 and he has a goals against average of 2.63.

There are still are too many defensive lapses coming from the third and fourth lines as well as the bottom defensive pair that leave Bob exposed for him to have an elite season. But if the team can start playing more consistent defense, especially against the elite teams in the league, Bob can put himself back in the Vezina conversation.

Not a great start to the year for Bob but he has turned it around.

Joonas Korpisalo has nine starts on the year and only one regulation loss technically speaking. He was pulled in the Detroit game but the Jackets battled back to a tie with Bob in net but then lost the lead so that one was pinned on Bob.

Korpi is 5-1-2 but the putrid .886 save percentage is worrying. If the Jackets lose Bob at the end of this season there won’t be a ton of confidence in Korpi’s starting ability next season. He has had some spectacular performances including the second period against the Florida Panthers a week ago, but overall Korpi’s performance needs to step it up.

He should get a handful of starts between now and New Years Day but after that, I expect Bob to get 99% of the starts until the playoffs.

1/4 Season Report Card Forwards Part 1

1/4 Season Report Card Forwards Part 2

1/4 Season Report Card Defenseman

Let us know what you think of these grades, and the rest of our 1/4 season report cards in the comments.