Confirmed with Link: CBJ hire Don Waddell as President of Hockey Operations and General Manager. JD to serve as Senior Advisor

[Monk]

Agree on Bean but I disagree about Boqvist.

The coaching staff need to stop putting Werenski on the top PP unit. Replace him with Boqvist who is much more adept at getting shots through from the point. At ES he should be the #4/5 guy instead of on a pairing with Werenski.

To expand on this point, my takeaway from the various things Waddell has said about fixing the defense (goals against) was more that he wanted to make structural (coaching) changes, and less that he wanted to make trades to fix the problem.

 

[cbjthrowaway]

Didn't Jarmo try to do that by adding Gudbranson, Severson, and Provorov the last two off seasons?

three defensemen who are objectively (and significantly) better than bean and boqvist?

i get why people complained about the gudbranson contract but he was genuinely solid this year.

i get why people complain about severson's term, but he's a legit top four guy who played very well after settling in.

i get why people complain about provorov – pazzy certainly overused him – but he did better in his role than bean would have, and has value as a deadline flip.

 

[Xoggz22]

Or maybe he has scouted Columbus pretty extensively , and knows what the biggest issues are that needs fixed … legit Center to play alongside Gaudreau while they give Fantilli time to grow into #1… Notice , last week it was Columbus will be quiet in FA this summer to a few days later , Friedman says Columbus will go after a center …. Also , clearly the word is out Columbus wasn’t thrilled with the job PV did .. Portzline has hinted at it .. National media types have speculated they make a change … not hard to understand why .. his player utilization , and lineup juggling every game is pretty indefensible…

I'm sure it's already been said but I'm not through the full thread yet. In Waddell's conversation with Bobby Mac, Waddell indicated he hates July 1st and free agency. His least favorite as you waste money and term for underperformance (I'm paraphrasing/ad libbing from what I heard). I don't see any center coming from ufa market, however, I do think he would trade for a center if he can. He indicated there are players that will become free agents and that a lot of those discussions come at the draft and prior to July 1st. Sounds like he would look to do a trade and sign type approach but stil sounds like he wants to stick with building this core but knows we need to add. Anyway, that was his interview with Bobby Mac. I have not heard his presser.

 

[cbjthrowaway]

Agree on Bean but I disagree about Boqvist.

The coaching staff need to stop putting Werenski on the top PP unit. Replace him with Boqvist who is much more adept at getting shots through from the point. At ES he should be the #4/5 guy instead of on a pairing with Werenski.

therein lies the biggest problem with the late jarmo-era management regime:

1. too many young players who need specific deployment to utilize their strengths
2. lack of alignment between FO and coaching that keeps the young players out of those deployment spots

young players are inconsistent, and the coaching staff was too scared to get burned by that inconsistency rather than viewing it as a teaching opportunity. which i get, since it's the NHL, which isn't supposed to be a development league.

but that created a situation where the young players got unfavorable deployment (KJ in the bottom six, boqvist not getting to run the top PP, etc) in favor of veterans who were out of their depth (jenner playing 24+ minutes some nights, provorov/severson getting power play time, the kuraly line getting 7 minutes in the third period, etc)

that path led to the end result – a bad team that finished last in its conference – that simply playing the young guys would have, but without any of the long-term benefits.

 

[Monstershockey]

therein lies the biggest problem with the late jarmo-era management regime:

1. too many young players who need specific deployment to utilize their strengths
2. lack of alignment between FO and coaching that keeps the young players out of those deployment spots

young players are inconsistent, and the coaching staff was too scared to get burned by that inconsistency rather than viewing it as a teaching opportunity. which i get, since it's the NHL, which isn't supposed to be a development league.

but that created a situation where the young players got unfavorable deployment (KJ in the bottom six, boqvist not getting to run the top PP, etc) in favor of veterans who were out of their depth (jenner playing 24+ minutes some nights, provorov/severson getting power play time, the kuraly line getting 7 minutes in the third period, etc)

that path led to the end result – a bad team that finished last in its conference – that simply playing the young guys would have, but without any of the long-term benefits.

I really don't think the coaching staff was too scared to play the younger guys. Playing them more to get experience could just as easily have a bad effect on them, then people would bitch the they were played too much.

KJ should have been bottom 6 because that's where he belonged. In the short time he was in Cleveland, he did play some center, but there were times late in games they were having Bemstrom taking face offs. KJ didn't have a good year, and ended up injured, taking a face off. He was probably out of his depth there.

As far as guys playing out of their depth, I don't think they were. Jenner played 24 minutes 3 times, and had less 20+ minute games last year than each of the 2 years before. Provorov and Severson had their lowest PP time of their careers, so they weren't out of their depths.

Basically the problem is that Vincent didn't handle the roster the way you would have, hence he coached scared.

I am sure there were things coaching and management could have done differently, but the team was what it was, not very good.

 

[Xoggz22]

I don't know why Waddell is doing a press tour talking about what he'll do in Columbus when he's only a few hours into evaluating the team.

This is the guy that supposedly works well with good advice from those working under him. So I hope he doesn't get backed into saying anything that he can't walk back later when the FO really gets to work.

I don't see an issue with anything he's doing or saying. The reality is he damn well better know enough about the players and team to know where the gaps/fixes need to take place. There is plenty of flexibility with his approach as he can pivot if he lets the coach go to say it wasn't the players but the system or he can pivot to the players to say what we had didn't match what the coaches needed.

I don't think it's breaking news to look at the CBJ as any outsider and know where the warts and gaps are. Saying those need fixed and what might be easier... makes sense (to me). He's still speaking like a GM and can twist the words to match his future actions. I'm glad he's out talking already and think he's pointed out these decisions take some time and need to know all the pieces.

 

[MoeBartoli]

I'm sure it's already been said but I'm not through the full thread yet. In Waddell's conversation with Bobby Mac, Waddell indicated he hates July 1st and free agency. His least favorite as you waste money and term for underperformance (I'm paraphrasing/ad libbing from what I heard). I don't see any center coming from ufa market, however, I do think he would trade for a center if he can. He indicated there are players that will become free agents and that a lot of those discussions come at the draft and prior to July 1st. Sounds like he would look to do a trade and sign type approach but stil sounds like he wants to stick with building this core but knows we need to add. Anyway, that was his interview with Bobby Mac. I have not heard his presser.

I’m hoping Waddell pays low for the FA market for the reasons cited. In my mind the teams who make the best use of the FA market are those who are playoff contenders with advancement potential and use that time to fill specific roster needs - often not top 6 and rarely top line.

Most teams - especially ones in the Jacket’s position - are best build thru sound drafting and astute trades. In the past I’ve cited those I’d consider trading among a pool of a half dozen guys and that pool doesn’t include most of or younger roster forwards. I still believe it the best approach.

 

[CBJWerenski8]

Sorry to say to some but Waddell was pretty complimentary of Rick Nash and his future prospects as an executive in his interview with Marek, so I don’t think he’s going anywhere. But he did say his role going forward is to be decided later.

 

[cbjthrowaway]

I really don't think the coaching staff was too scared to play the younger guys. Playing them more to get experience could just as easily have a bad effect on them, then people would bitch the they were played too much.

it's not solely a matter of "give them more minutes" it's specifically "put them in situations where they can do the things they're good at" such as boqvist being on the power play, or kent johnson playing with smart/skilled players.

KJ should have been bottom 6 because that's where he belonged.

nothing about kent johnson's build or skillset is suited to play a bottom six role, though.

smart organizations take young, skilled players and put them in situations where they 1) have support, 2) can make mistakes and 3) can use their strengths to make positive impacts. the jackets did none of that with KJ this year.

kent johnson is young. young players are inconsistent. rather than living with a young guy being inconsistent in a skill-aligned scoring line role (i.e. KJ in the top six), they put him in the bottom six, where he's destined to be ineffective. in doing so, they then put guys who are skill-aligned to the bottom six (danforth, texier) on scoring lines where they're less effective.

in practice, doing that:

1. limits the upside of your scoring lines
2. stunts the development of players who are skill-aligned to scoring lines
3. limits the effectiveness of your checking lines

in layman's terms, it makes your scoring and checking lines worse, while also being worse for developing your young guys. it's a lose-lose-lose.

In the short time he was in Cleveland, he did play some center, but there were times late in games they were having Bemstrom taking face offs. KJ didn't have a good year, and ended up injured, taking a face off. He was probably out of his depth there.

idk how you got "they should've made kent take more face-offs in the NHL" out of "they should put players like KJ and Boqvist in skill-aligned roles" but oh well

As far as guys playing out of their depth, I don't think they were. Jenner played 24 minutes 3 times, and had less 20+ minute games last year than each of the 2 years before. Provorov and Severson had their lowest PP time of their careers, so they weren't out of their depths.

jenner averaged more ice time per game this season than sidney crosby.

provorov played the most minutes of any skater on the team.

severson was one of their most-used power play defensemen.

with jenner in particular, they knew their roster didn't have a 1C, and instead of deciding to get creative in terms of player deployment and ice time management, they decided to just deploy jenner as one because he's the closest thing they have. but he's still out of his depth in that role.

Basically the problem is that Vincent didn't handle the roster the way you would have, hence he coached scared.

no, the problem is vincent's myopic focus on limiting mistakes being incongruent with a roster full of young players.

I am sure there were things coaching and management could have done differently, but the team was what it was, not very good.

right – they could have achieved the exact same outcome (losing a lot of games) while actually putting some kind of effort into positioning the young players to succeed, or empowering them to make some mistakes in the name of development.

but they didn't. so instead of being interesting and bad, they were boring and bad. that was a choice.

 

[Double-Shift Lasse]

Maybe

I fooled you by posting just possibilities and ideas and asking about them on a message board instead of making everything a hill I’m dying on.

 

[majormajor]

young players are inconsistent, and the coaching staff was too scared to get burned by that inconsistency rather than viewing it as a teaching opportunity.

This is just pure fiction that is being passed around.

Pascal told us when he was hired that he believed that young players need to start with easier more limited roles, that the worst thing you could do is give them too much too soon.

You can disagree with that and make a good argument against that development approach. I might agree with you on it. Instead you continually portray Vincent as a scared, cowardly figure. And yeah Jack Han said it, but there's been zero evidence presented by you or him. I think that's really unfair.

nothing about kent johnson's build or skillset is suited to play a bottom six role, though.

smart organizations take young, skilled players and put them in situations where they 1) have support, 2) can make mistakes and 3) can use their strengths to make positive impacts. the jackets did none of that with KJ this year.

kent johnson is young. young players are inconsistent. rather than living with a young guy being inconsistent in a skill-aligned scoring line role (i.e. KJ in the top six), they put him in the bottom six, where he's destined to be ineffective. in doing so, they then put guys who are skill-aligned to the bottom six (danforth, texier) on scoring lines where they're less effective.

Bottom six isn't that different of a job. In terms of minutes there isn't necessarily a big difference between second and third line roles, and in terms of playstyle and linemates it can be the same thing. Johnston and Stankoven, by the way, were the 3rd line for Dallas after Stankoven got called up. The difference there was that they were ready to play, not that Dallas gave them a bigger role.

Have a look at KJ's main linemates:

Cole Sillinger
Emil Bemstrom (both of which he achieved slightly positive goals results with)

Marchenko
Fantilli
Voronkov (all of these guys can make plays)

Danforth - all the way down at 6th most common linemate is the comparatively unskilled Danforth. Not a lot of minutes together with him or the 4th liners.

I'd say Sillinger is the least skilled of those guys and holds back his linemates, but last I checked you think Sillinger should also be playing with talent. So it's a no win with your preferences and how many young players we have. That's not on Vincent.

Kent didn't struggle this year because of linemates, he just wasn't ready for it. He didn't get stronger or quicker and lost a lot of battles. He should have been in the AHL not any line in the NHL, especially not top minutes against top NHL opponents.

 

[Fred Glover]

I fooled you by posting just possibilities and ideas and asking about them on a message board instead of making everything a hill I’m dying on.

Maybe you did
Maybe you didn’t

 

[Monstershockey]

it's not solely a matter of "give them more minutes" it's specifically "put them in situations where they can do the things they're good at" such as boqvist being on the power play, or kent johnson playing with smart/skilled players.

I know it isn't about just giving them more minutes, while I think Johnson is skilled, I believe he needs more work in the smart and strength area of his game.

nothing about kent johnson's build or skillset is suited to play a bottom six role, though.

smart organizations take young, skilled players and put them in situations where they 1) have support, 2) can make mistakes and 3) can use their strengths to make positive impacts. the jackets did none of that with KJ this year.

kent johnson is young. young players are inconsistent. rather than living with a young guy being inconsistent in a skill-aligned scoring line role (i.e. KJ in the top six), they put him in the bottom six, where he's destined to be ineffective. in doing so, they then put guys who are skill-aligned to the bottom six (danforth, texier) on scoring lines where they're less effective.

in practice, doing that:

1. limits the upside of your scoring lines
2. stunts the development of players who are skill-aligned to scoring lines
3. limits the effectiveness of your checking lines

in layman's terms, it makes your scoring and checking lines worse, while also being worse for developing your young guys. it's a lose-lose-lose.

Putting a young inconsistent player in your top 6 could make 1 and 2 also happen. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, he should have been in the AHL. 10 games is nothing. People were talking about Dallas and how they develop players, Robertson (60 games), and Hintz (120+ games, including playoffs), spent plenty of time in the AHL. Johnston coming off a 124 point season in the OHL earned a look, and made the most of it.

idk how you got "they should've made kent take more face-offs in the NHL" out of "they should put players like KJ and Boqvist in skill-aligned roles" but oh well

I don't remember saying KJ should have got more faceoffs in the NHL, just that in Cleveland they were having him play center sometimes, but as the game went on to the 3rd period, he was being moved to the wing and Bemstrom was taking the face-offs, which tells me they weren't trusting him later in games. With his skill again, I can remember at times where using his skill in the AHL, players were still taking the puck from him. IBM brought it up in another thread where he got his pocket picked on his own blue line trying to be too fancy, and it turned into a shortie the other way and cost the lead late. I remember that play clearly. He did get benched for it, but seeing how you didn't like Marchenko getting benched for globetrotting, you probably would have had a problem with Vogelhuber sitting him.

jenner averaged more ice time per game this season than sidney crosby.

provorov played the most minutes of any skater on the team.

severson was one of their most-used power play defensemen.

Jenner averaged one more second per game than Crosby. Not sure why this even matters, but Jenner played even strength, PP, and PK. Crosby just even strength and PP. The reason it was as close as it was is because Crosby doesn't kill penalties. Hockey reference has him at 7.5 minutes for 82 games on the kill. Different players on different teams in different situations. Irrelevant.

You had Provorov and Severson lumped together for PP time in your original post so that's why I said both had their lowest time on ice for PP ice time, Actually Provorov had a lower time his last year in Philly, but he had already fallen out of favor there. Provorov most likely would have the most overall time as he was the only guy to play 82 games, and is a d-man that gets more time. Werenski averaged more per game though.

Not sure how Severson was their most used PP defenseman at 76.1 PP minutes, but maybe hockey reference is wrong.

 

[Viqsi]

This is just pure fiction that is being passed around.

Pascal told us when he was hired that he believed that young players need to start with easier more limited roles, that the worst thing you could do is give them too much too soon.

You can disagree with that and make a good argument against that development approach. I might agree with you on it. Instead you continually portray Vincent as a scared, cowardly figure. And yeah Jack Han said it, but there's been zero evidence presented by you or him. I think that's really unfair.

Good counterpoint and I'd legitimately forgotten about it. It's easy to lose track of that stuff when everything seems to be going to crap.

 

[NotWendell]

Columbus Blue Jackets - Trying to add a center since 2000.

 

[Johansen2Foligno]

Columbus Blue Jackets - Trying to add a center since 2000.

This explains why I can only find LR and not LCR when I go to the game store.

 

[EDM]

I happen to think that KJ deserves to accept some of the responsibility for they way his second season panned out. He hardly gave the appearance of a "rink rat" during that off season.

I do agree, however, that Jarmo rushed his young draft picks into starting roles at the NHL level before they were ready.

 

[Cujorulesdtown9]

The entire vibe in getting off Waddell based on interviews is "Dont expect much"
as in, most of the turnover will be in the staff, but not so much on the ice, so potential results are a few years away, at the very least.
I also said most, not all, so probably 2-3 minor moves on the roster.
.
Rookies will actually get to develop instead of getting early callups. Of course, it remains to be seen if we have a third straight year of a roster wiped by injuries.

 

[Xoggz22]

Does the GM or the coach pick the team to ice? I know the GM has input and I'm sure there is pressure but the coach is responsible to win games. I'm really curious about this and the GM impact on the on ice team beyond the moves to bring them in.

Yes, I'm aware of decisions on who to send down for contract reasons but I would think the coach should have a lot of leverage on who to ice to win. And I'm only saying this because we seem to be blaming Jarmo for pretty much everything and while he had his issues, I don't know that it was forcing players to be kept. Maybe he just didn't pursue vets that forced the hand to bring up the young guys?

 

[CBJWerenski8]

The entire vibe in getting off Waddell based on interviews is "Dont expect much"
as in, most of the turnover will be in the staff, but not so much on the ice, so potential results are a few years away, at the very least.
I also said most, not all, so probably 2-3 minor moves on the roster.
.
Rookies will actually get to develop instead of getting early callups. Of course, it remains to be seen if we have a third straight year of a roster wiped by injuries.

 

[MAHJ71]

First thought in seeing this was new as in "new new" faces or is someone who has played just a few games (a prospect) still considered as new?

Edit- either way, I'm intrigued.

 

[CBJWerenski8]

Friedman and Marek talked about Don Waddell today on 32T. They mentioned that while on their show Waddell says he plans to keep the GM job for himself. Marek also thinks he plans to "shepherd along someone like Rick Nash." Friedman says that he heard Waddell will be the GM "for a while."

 

[CBJWerenski8]

So much for slow playing the rebuild

 

[GoJackets1]

That reads more like a nothing comment to me than anything about a near-term plan. Getting the defense and coaching figured out I’m sure are the top priorities and if those two things succeed, maybe playoffs could be within reach, also assuming solid growth from the young guys.

 

[Aaaarrgghh]

So much for slow playing the rebuild

That reads more like a nothing comment to me than anything about a near-term plan. Getting the defense and coaching figured out I’m sure are the top priorities and if those two things succeed, maybe playoffs could be within reach, also assuming solid growth from the young guys.

Yeah, didn't he say something like to the fact of getting down the GA would be the easier quick thing to fix, by improving the D and "getting a few saves here and there"? If I remember correctly, he believed that doing that should already bump them up a few places in the standings.