For the past two years, the Blue Jackets have just missed out on the postseason. It's been painstaking for a team that wants to exit their rebuild and start contending. Meanwhile, a team that never quite bottomed out as hard, is seeing the fruits of their rebuild pay off.
I'm talking about the Montreal Canadiens. The Habs marched all the way to the Stanley Cup Final in the 2021 playoffs, before losing to the Vegas Golden Knights in 5 games. After that point, they fell into a bit of a rebuild of their own-one they have since bounced out of, finding themselves right back in contention.
The Habs had three seasons in a row where they finished at the bottom of the Atlantic Division. But, their pain has been far more brief, as they've book-ended those three years with a Stanley Cup Finals run, and another run into the Eastern Conference Finals.
Of course, all throughout that up-down-up course of the Canadiens, the Blue Jackets have been trying to forge through a rebuild of their own. So far, they have not had the same level of success.
In 2024-25, they missed the playoffs by just two points, beaten out by-you guessed it-the Canadiens. Last summer, they used their momentum to go out and get the best available player on the trade market.
Which had me wondering: what if the Blue Jackets had snuck into the playoffs that season? Would it have been enough to convince Noah Dobson that Columbus would be a better fit? How much different would things be?
Noah Dobson chose Montreal.
We will never know the answers to those questions, unfortunately. With two very similar offers on the table, the Islanders opted to send Dobson to the Canadiens in a rare sign and trade. This season, he scored 12 goals and 47 points for them, finishing 6th on the team in scoring (2nd amongst defensemen).
That kind of production in Columbus would have certainly been helpful for the Blue Jackets, whose second most productive defenseman (Damon Severson) scored 8 goals and 32 points. Though, to be fair, the team did not exactly struggle for offense from the blue line.
I do think that Dobson's presence might have helped them balance out the pairings. The top pairing of Zach Werenski and Damon Severson was very effective. But, they struggled to find consistency in both of their bottom two pairings.
Imagine Dobson alongside Denton Mateychuk, who was a positive contributor all season-regardless who he played with. That would have given the Blue Jackets a true top-4, that could have certainly made a difference.
You might notice one name that I omitted from this list: Ivan Provorov. Had Don Waddell been able to acquire Dobson, it's highly likely that the team would not have re-signed Provorov last summer. Would they have been better off?
The verdict.
Taking all of the facts into account, I'm not sure Dobson would have been worth it for the Blue Jackets. They would have had to trade picks #14 and #20, along with Dmitri Voronkov; in exchange for the RFA defenseman.
Those picks became Jackson Smith and Pyotr Andreyanov, arguably the top two prospects currently in the team's system. Meanwhile, Voronkov scored 17 goals and 32 points last season, in what felt like a down year.
The real question becomes this: would Dobson have been enough of an upgrade over Provorov to necessitate losing all of those assets? My answer: no.
They weren't in a position where Dobson's presence would have vaulted them over the top and into contention. He would have been a nice piece, but not the final piece of the puzzle. I think the Jackets are better off not having made this deal.
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