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What Was, What Is, What Will Be |
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By Tom T
Wow, that title sounds so profound. It is not, obviously we are not talking philosophy, but rather CBJ hockey.
What Was:
A bit of a roller coaster last week as the Jekyll and Hyde Blue Jackets performed well against WAS, very poor against NYI and as expected at CHI. Great game against WAS, completely dominating in every aspect up and down the line up. To say that Columbus had ‘no jump’ against NYI would be an understatement. Scoring in the CHI game was a little too top heavy for me, especially given the likelihood of trading Panarin.
What Is:
What is this Jackets team? Are they a playoff team? Yes, currently they are IN. They have 69 points and trail WAS by only 2 points with 2 games in hand. While PIT, MON and CAR are closing in, CBJ have 2 games in hand on all those teams as well. Not to mention that 3 of the four teams mentioned should make the playoffs (PIT, MON, CAR and CBJ).
C-Bus is also the team with 2 of the biggest trade deadline pieces and have decisions to make. I have been on both sides of this fence. On one hand you hold on to your leading scorer and top goaltender to make a run into the playoffs this season. This is the team that has been built over the last 5 years and is meant to perform now. Let it ride and see how they do. On the other hand, there is the future to think about. Letting Bob and Bread walk at season’s end yields you $13M in cap space. But, trading them before the deadline could bring back valuable picks and the same cap space. Would they be sacrificing the present for the future? I talked to one season ticket holder this weekend and his take is paraphrased below:
We are in the playoffs, for the most part playing well, have exciting players to watch and are talking about trading away guys at the deadline. Hard to swallow as a season ticket holder who just got their renewal packet in the mail this week. I am on board with keeping the Russians and seeing what we can do in the playoffs.
Not an exact quote but the gist of a 30-minute conversation. This from one fan’s perspective.
What Will Be:
My perspective is this. What stops this team from winning in the regular season, making the playoffs and possibly winning in the playoffs if Artemi and Sergei are dealt at the deadline? Get some assets, keep fighting toward the playoffs AND build for the future. This debate will rage on for at least a few more weeks and probably longer no matter what Jarmo does.
The more immediate future for Columbus is a 4-game week starting tonight with TBL in Columbus. This is a rough week with 2 back-to-backs: TBL/@MON and @OTT/vSJS. What is the likely outcome of this week’s games? Given the teams involved, travel and multiple back-to-back games a 2 – 2 record would be a successful week. Especially if one of those wins was tonight over TBL. At 1 – 3 people begin to question the playoff-worthiness of this team and at 0 – 4 everyone asks why we haven’t traded away half the team and fired Torts. Three-and-one this week makes fans believe we can win in the playoffs and the unthinkable 4 – 0 has people chanting ‘we want cup’ at every home game left in the season. While I would love that outcome, I don’t believe it is realistic.
I have stated it before in this blog, I believe the future is bright in Columbus. The core is here, with Atkinson, Jones, Werenski, Dubois, Jenner, Anderson and Korpisalo likely to be under contract for the next 3 – 5 years how can you not be optimistic? The management is here as Davidson and Jarmo have managed this team well. Starting in 2013 these are just some of the draft picks they have selected: Wennberg (#14 in 2013), Bjorkstrand (#89 in 2013), Milano (#16 in 2014), Elvis Merzlikins (#76 in 2014), Werenski (#8 in 2015), Nutivaara (#189 in 2015), Dubois (#3 in 2016), Texier (#45 in 2017) and Liam Foudy (#18 in 2018). Not all these guys will pan out, but some of them already have and there are more that were not mentioned. People outside of C-Bus are starting to take notice.
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