18-19 Columbus Blue Jackets: Here’s What You’ve Missed Football Fans
Here’s what you’ve missed out on from the Columbus Blue Jackets season if you’ve been too focused on football.
Let’s be honest. Columbus and the entire state of Ohio are all-in on football. From high school football on Fridays, to the Buckeyes, Bobcats, and Bearcats on Saturdays, and the Browns and Bengals on Sunday, this is a football mad state. But now that Buckeyes have won the Rose Bowl, attention turns to the Columbus Blue Jackets.
If you’re one of those fans that is now shifting attention to the ice, welcome and were here to catch you up on what you’ve missed so far. The Jackets started out their season with a solid training camp and preseason action that only saw a relatively minor injury to Seth Jones during the Kraft Hockeyville game. Jones missed seven games but has come back with a vengeance since.
The season opened with backup Joonas Korpisalo in net in what would be come an early season theme of Korpi getting a decent chunk of starts over Sergei Bobrovsky. Contract turmoil with Bobrvosky forced the team to test their backup net minder as Bob’s future in Columbus was, and still is uncertain. Joonas started four of the first 10 games for the Jackets winning all of his starts.
The first 14 games of the season were not very inspiring. The Jackets were only 7-6-1 including a terrible 8-2 loss at Tampa and a 4-1 loss at Los Angeles that was in my eye, the low point of the season so far. In their first 14 games the Jackets had a .536 winning percentage. Since then the Jackets are 16-7-2, good for a .680 winning percentage that has the Jackets well in playoff contention.
The Jackets are still struggling as a team against the elite teams in the NHL. Six of their last nine losses have come against playoff teams including two losses against the Toronto Maple Leafs who are second in the NHL.
Top Performing Players
The Columbus Blue Jackets MVP has certainly been Cam Atkinson. The star winger is forth in the league in goals with 24 and third in the league in even strength goals. Cam has two hat tricks this year which gives him the franchise record with six such performances. The three goal games came against the Carolina Hurricanes on November 17th and the Calgary Flames on December 4th. Cam is on pace to score over 50 goals this year.
His fellow top line winger has been just as impressive. Artemi Panarin has dismissed contract distractions and the uncertainty of his future in Columbus in order to perform at an elite level yet again. Panarin leads the team in points with 43 and assist with 31.
The two wingers are centered by Pierre-Luc Dubois who rounds out one of the top 10 lines in the NHL. The second year pro has 16 goals and 36 points on the year. He plays well at all ends of the ice and is making Jarmo Kekalainen look smarter every day for drafting him 3rd overall in 2016.
Other forwards that are impressing include Josh Anderson, Boone Jenner and Nick Foligno. Anderson is developing into one of the better power forwards in the league. He has scored 14 goals this year, good for third on the team, played well in his own zone, and dropped the gloves with some of the toughest customers in the NHL including a bout against Jamie Benn on November 12th.
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Jenner has been asked to take on the role of second line center this season and has played quite well. His numbers aren’t eye popping but Boone has done everything he has been asked and more as the Jackets dealt with an injury to Brandon Dubinsky and underwhelming performances from Riley Nash and Alexander Wennberg.
Foligno continues his traditional on-then-off scoring seasons. This year he is on pace for over 40 points. The captain is currently dealing with a family situation as his young daughter underwent heart surgery in Boston.
Seth Jones is doing seth Jones things and dominating in all phases. He has 23 points in 32 games, is playing a career high 26 minutes a night and alongside Ryan Murray, is shutting down opponents top lines.
Murray has been exceptional all season as well. The scoring is at Werenski (22p) or Jones level but he has become a great defender. He moves the puck very well and you can count on one hand the amount of mistakes he has made all year. Murray has been a pleasant surprise on the blue line.
Disappointing Players
After signing Riley Nash in the offseason to a three year, $2.75 million a year contract, the expectations were that Nash would come in and push Alexander Wennberg for the second line center role. That has not come to fruition. In fact, Nash is now on the fourth line as a winger and still struggling.
There are no obvious reasons for the 29-year-old’s struggles but answers need to come soon. He has only four points in 38 games for his new team. Often it can take time to acclimate to a new city and team but after 38 games you expect to see some progress and none has been shown.
Another offseason signing that started off the year well has had his season since turn sour. Anthony Duclair started off the year hot and had one of the goals of the year early on agains the Flyers.
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Since he has gone cold and even been scratched on more than one occasion. Coach Torotrella has not been happy with his defensive play and after a few games of not producing offensively, Torts thought he had no choice but to sit the young winger.
Alexander Wennberg hasn’t been pushed by Nash but hasn’t performed anywhere near where the Jackets need him to be at. Wennberg has only one goal on 37 shots this year. Wennberg is a playmaker that has racked up 17 assist but there have been stretches of games where the young Swede disappears. Wennberg has to shoot more as teams don’t respect his shot and just play the pass.
Finally we’ll throw Sonny Milano in this group who just can’t figure out how to stay in a John Tortorella lineup. While part of it is Tort’s incessant on checking, Milano didn’t help his cause with his offensive performance scoring only one goal in eight appearances.
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Milano was sent down to Cleveland where he has played in 19 games scoring 18 points but is -12. He has been scratched from the lineup as well. When Nick Foligno missed the game on New Years Eve to be at his daughters surgery, the Jackets didn’t even call up Milano, instead opting for Eric Robinson. I think we may have seen the last of Milano in Columbus.
Over the corse of 39 games there are going to be some great performances and some stinkers. The Jackets best performances have come in low scoring affairs. On Friday, November 9th the team traveled to Washington D.C. to take on the Caps for the first time all season. Behind a splendid performance from Sergei Bobrovsky and a power play that actually produced, the Jackets won 2-1 in regulation.
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Bob stopped every shot he faced at even strength only allowing a power play goal to Nicklas Backstrom in the second period. His 33 saves were enough as Oliver Bjorkstrand and Anthony Duclair scored on the power play.
Another great performance came against the Vegas Golden Knights on December 17th. The 1-0 victory was the Jackets first shutout of the season and came against one of the hottest teams in the league.
On the flip side when the Jackets try and keep up in shootout style games, they end up losing and pretty badly. The Jackets 6-9 loss against the Calgary Flames included a Cam Atkinson hat trick but an overall team performance they’d like to forget.
They’d also like to forget about the second half of their trip to California. The loss against the Kings will stick out in my mind for the rest of the year. The 4-1 loss included two Kings shorthanded goals in the third period that came one minute apart. The Jackets were 0-4 on the power play on top of that. It was a disgraceful performance that will go down as one of the worst games in recent history.
Second Half Storylines
The dominating story line will continue to be the contract situation of both Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky. There is reportedly a meeting happening between Panarin’s agent and Jarmo over the All-Star break. It’s unlikely that an agreement will be reached before the trade deadline so what Jarmo decides to do will not only be the biggest storyline for the Columbus Blue Jackets, but perhaps for the entire NHL.
Bob’s situation is a bit less in flux but still intriguing. Sergei has a no trade clause that makes moving him a lot harder. Either way, he is a top five goalie in the league and if it is clear he isn’t going to resign with the Jackets, Jarmo will take a run at trading him.
Cam Atkinson has a real chance to hit 50 goals this year as well. If the Jackets power play, which is second to last in the league, resembles anything close to a competent unit, he has a real chance to destroy the franchise mark for goals in a season.
And about that power play. The Jackets are only converting at a 13.2% so far and that isn’t going to cut it in the playoffs. The Jackets have to find a way to turn that around whether that is through personnel changes or schematic changes or both. If they don’t, they’ll be out of the playoffs in the first round yet again.
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There is plenty of other second half storylines that will pop up so stay tuned to UnionAndBlue.com. Welcome back to the Columbus Blue Jackets wagon folks. We missed you!