The Blue Jackets have placed defencemen Gabriel Carlsson on the injured reserve. Carlsson suffered an upper-body injury in Friday’s game against the Rangers. In a corresponding move, the team has recalled defencemen Markus Nutivaara from Cleveland.

#CBJ has made two roster moves:https://t.co/tgAlODi0a1

— ColumbusBlueJackets (@BlueJacketsNHL) October 16, 2017

Carlsson did not play in Saturday night’s win over Minnesota; Scott Harrington made his season debut in his place. Nutivaara should see the majority of playing time while Carlsson is out. Nutivaara played three games in Cleveland and while he was held pointless it sounds like he played well and is fully recovered from his hip injury.

Markus Nutivaara shows he's ready to return to Columbus by @Aportzline https://t.co/tYs50heoht #CBJ #NHL

— The Athletic (@TheAthleticCLE) October 16, 2017

Nutivaara will slide right into Carlsson’s spot on the third pair with Ryan Murray. The two were a pair last season for 44 games and 400 minutes of 5 on 5 ice time. Looking at the line combo tool on Corsica Nutivaara and Murray as a pair had a below average 46.69% Corsi, but they didn’t completely hurt the team as the put up a 57.14% Goal For percentage thanks to a 102.92 PDO.

This pair should be better this season. Nutivaara improved as the season went on and played very well in the second half of last season. The numbers agree, in 35 games from October to December, Nutivaara had a 46.65% Corsi, and in 31 games from January through April he had a 50.2% Corsi. That’s an increase of 7.6 percent, the third highest change on the team. Murray’s poor possession stats stayed with him all last season. This year the stats are still not good, Murray is last on the Jackets at 48.23%, but he's been much more noticeable in games. He’s been aggressive jumping into the play, trying to create more offense. So far it’s worked, after putting up just 11 points last season, Murray already has a goal and an assist in five games this season. Hopefully this aggressiveness keeps up playing alongside Nutivaara.

The Jackets practice today in Minnesota, before heading north to take on the Jets in Winnipeg. Nutivaara was conveniently already in Winnipeg as the Monsters were in town taking on the Manitoba Moose. Nutivaara should make his season debut Tuesday.

You can follow me on Twitter @PaulBerthelot

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