When the Blue Jackets began to turn the corner this season, their young players were leaned upon more heavily to carry the load offensively. By the time the season was finished, head coach Dean Evason had a specific top and bottom six amongst his forwards. As a result, veteran 4th line center Sean Kuraly fell back into a more suitable role.
It seems like the Blue Jackets just signed Kuraly to his four year contract yesterday. That's not the case, however. We're now through all four years of his $10 million dollar deal, with the Central Ohio native currently slated to become an unrestricted free agent this summer.
Unfortunately, Kuraly's time in Columbus looks to be coming to an end without a single postseason game. If he doesn't get a new contract to remain in his hometown, we'll look back upon his tenure here as mostly forgettable. Which is too bad; he was brought here in part because he's a playoff type guy. We may never find out how much he could help this team in a postseason run.
Still, I think Sean has been a good soldier in his time here. We can debate whether or not he lived up to the full value of his contract, but the reality here is that this contract didn't really alter any of the plans for this team anyhow. They were only close to the cap for one season, and that was in part because of the surprising addition of Johnny Gaudreau in the summer of 2022.
Added to the team to be its fourth line center, Kuraly was expected to bring hard work, physicality, penalty killing, leadership, and some faceoff prowess. He did most of that in his entire time in Columbus. In four years here, he accrued 292 games in the Union Blue, scoring 40 goals and 85 points. He also posted a -35 rating and added 209 penalty minutes. Taking all of that into account, he was a serviceable fourth line player.
The issue is, that's not how he was used by two of the head coaches he played under. Far too often in his tenure here, we saw him rolled out in offensive zone situations; with the team needing a goal to tie the game up. In that regard, under Brad Larsen and Pascal Vincent; Kuraly became a bit of a crutch, even if it was just for an important faceoff. Which doesn't make much sense, if you look at his faceoff percentages in his time in Columbus (he was below 50% in his first three years).
This year, playing under Dean Evason, he found himself back in a more comfortable role. And, the team benefited from having #7 on the ice for the fewest minutes of his four-year stay here. Sean played just 11:46 per game for the Blue Jackets this season, the lowest average of any forward who played more than 34 games.
I thought he looked less engaged this year than we've seen throughout his time here, so unfortunately; this reduction in ice time seems well deserved from all perspectives. Despite playing in 82 games for the first time since signing here, Kuraly scored just 6 goals and 17 points - the fewest in his tenure in Columbus.
His advanced stats weren't bad. In fact, from a possession perspective; he had one of the best seasons of his career, with a 46.1% CF rating. But, he was still spending more time playing defense than he was playing offense - and this was against secondary competition on a lot more occasions this year.
Will the Blue Jackets re-sign him?
All of this means that the writing is probably on the wall here. I think the Jackets are going to look to improve their team by finding another fourth line center this summer. It's not that Sean Kuraly was bad this year. He just didn't do enough to help this team win; really until the threat of becoming a healthy scratch was presented to him as the team got healthy late in the year. For me, it's a "D" grade for the veteran forward this year.
I would be surprised to see Sean come back to the Jackets next season, even at a hometown discount. He fell out of favor with Evason this season, and there won't be any coaching change coming to Columbus any time soon.