While it hasn't been a perfect start to the season, we are witnessing exactly what we've hoped to see out of this young Blue Jackets team for the last couple of years: progress. One player who deserves notice for his play is Yegor Chinakhov, who is flying under the radar a little bit, but breaking out in a big way.
The Blue Jackets have been the team to make arguably the two most surprising first round picks over the last decade or so of the NHL Draft. One of those was taking Pierre-Luc Dubois with the third overall selection in 2016. The other? When the team took Yegor Chinakhov 21st overall in 2020.
Live coverage of the draft was paused when this pick was made. They had to take a commercial break to regroup. Some "draft experts" stated they had no idea who Yegor Chinakhov was. Only Craig Button(?!) seemed to have any notes on him. But the Blue Jackets were stoked to have landed a player that then-GM Jarmo Kekalainen said was in their top-10 for the entire draft. Now, four years later, it's becoming clear that they were correct.
"This guy has Joe Sakic's wrist shot..."
Yegor was drafted from Omsk Avangard of the KHL; where he had a head coach who is well-known in NHL circles. Bob Hartley led the Colorado Avalanche to a Stanley Cup in 2001, where he had a handful of future Hall of Famers at his disposal. One of those players was Joe Sakic, whose wrist shot is nothing short of legendary. Hartley himself compared Chinakhov's shot favorably to Sakic's.
Wasting no time, Chinakhov signed a contract and came to North America for the 2021-22 season. He got into 62 games with a plucky Blue Jackets team, showing off that shot pretty often - but only scoring 7 goals and 14 points on the season. Over the next two seasons, he got into a combined 83 games, scoring 20 goals and 42 points. This year, however? He's quietly been one of the best forwards on the team. Let's break down his game on the next page.