COLUMBUS BLUE JACKETS

Blue Jackets Q&A: GM Jarmo Kekalainen on a challenging offseason and 'reset' plan

Going into his 10th season, the Jackets' man with the plan is approaching this season with optimism, excitement and patience ... a whole lot of patience.

Brian Hedger
The Columbus Dispatch
Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen had a busy offseason.

The NHL might have had another abbreviated offseason because of the pandemic, but the Blue Jackets didn’t. 

They missed the playoffs, ending a four-year run of postseason appearances. They parted ways with former coach John Tortorella, promoted assistant Brad Larsen to take over the bench, hired new NHL assistants, traded stars Seth Jones and Cam Atkinson — after already pawning off franchise stalwarts Nick Foligno and David Savard at the trade deadline — and Jakub Voracek was re-acquired from the Philadelphia Flyers in the Atkinson deal. 

Patrik Laine also aired complaints about Tortorella while in Finland, the top two goalies stayed put, despite a strong notion that one would be moved, and now a new wave of talent is coming as part of an organizational “reset” centered on high draft picks. 

There’s a lot to digest, and it doesn’t even include the tragic fireworks accident July 4 that took goalie Matiss Kivlenieks’ life at the home of goaltending coach Manny Legace. 

Going into another training camp, The Dispatch caught up with general manager Jarmo Kekalainen to discuss the upcoming season. 

Here is that conversation: 

Looking ahead to the Blue Jackets' next season

Every year around this time, you’re excited about the season ahead. Looking ahead to this one, what excites you most? 

JK: Well, I think the changes we made. It’s going to be interesting to see how our team’s gonna gel together. We’ve got a new coaching staff and a lot of new faces, a lot of new opportunities for guys to get a job, get a big role in our team and grow from there. And I think we’re in that phase right now that we had to do the reset, as we talked about. Now it’s time to start gelling together as a team and for young guys to take advantage of the opportunities that are in front of them because of the changes we made.

Speaking of the reset, that segues right into the next question: Has the definition of success, in a big picture way, changed at all? 

JK: No. I mean, we’re building what we’ve talked about. We’re building the right way and building towards winning the Cup. And every move we try to make and the ones that we made in the past are now leading into this season are for that reason. I’ve talked about it many times, that we felt that we were pretty close two years ago (2019), but close doesn’t count. So, we felt that we weren’t getting it done with the core group that we had and had to make the changes so that we can start to do the reset and start building towards the ultimate goal, which is to win the Cup. And that’s why we make those changes.  

It’s going to be a growing process here a little bit, but I think there’s also a lot of guys that have waited for this opportunity to come. It’s ahead of them right now, so that’s why we’re not calling it a ‘rebuild,’ because we have a lot of good pieces that are ready to make an impact in the league, grow into bigger roles and take advantage of the opportunity soon.  

It seems like a tricky thing because you're never going to tell a team, ‘Hey, if we lose, we lose,’ but in this process, is it possible to have a ‘successful’ season even if this team doesn’t make the playoffs?   

JK: I think we’ve always talked about identifying things behind the results, and when the process is right, the results will come. Sometimes it will take a little time before it comes to fruition, but we’ll evaluate every day. We'll evaluate starting in training camp from the results the guys have built up to their testing and see how prepared they are, what kind of shape they’re in, and we go from day one to exhibition games through the regular season to see where we’re at.  

And, as I’ve said, we’re going to keep building and get towards that goal. Making the playoffs is always a goal. Even if a team’s going through — you know, some teams have announced they’re going through a bit of a rebuild — their goal is still to make the playoffs, and then who knows what can happen when you make it to the dance? But it’s never going to be, ‘Well, we want to finish 20th.’ A playoff spot is always something that we’re aiming at, but the process is the most important.  

As we’ve seen here (in Traverse City), we have some really exciting prospects, but they might take some time to grow into being an NHL player, and not only being an NHL player, but being an impact player. And I think some of these guys here, they have that kind of potential. They have potential not just to make it to the NHL, but also make an impact, make a team better and get to the next level. That’s exciting and we have a few of them that are not here.  

It’s exciting. Kent Johnson, as a college player, can’t attend here. But he had a great Team Canada camp (this summer) and he’s a player that we’ll be watching very closely this year, his development, and see when he’s ready to turn pro. And then we’ll have another exciting piece. And we’ve got two more first-round picks next summer and so forth. We have a lot of good things going for us.

Kekalainen: 'I've got a job to do' to build a Stanley Cup contender

How challenging was this offseason from both a professional standpoint and personal perspective? 

JK: Yeah, but I think you have to put the personal feelings aside. You obviously become close with the guys that have gone through the battles for you and for the team, but at the same time, I’ve got a job to do and my job’s to try to build a winning team that can win the Stanley Cup. And when we have to make those tough choices, that’s part of the business. I understand that, and the players understand that too. The more veteran they are, the more they understand it, and I’ve got nothing but respect for those guys that left.  

And we’ll remain … hopefully we’ll remain friends, even after their hockey careers are over because we experienced a lot together. I still stay in touch with some players that have now finished their careers and I helped get drafted and helped their development, and was part of that process somehow. And then when they’re done playing hockey, well, some of them are working for us now, and some of them, we stay in touch. So, you try to build those relationships and build the trust in between, being open and honest about there being a business side to it too, and isn’t always pleasant. You’ve just got to put your personal feelings aside and move on. 

How challenging was the Matiss Kivlenieks situation to deal with from a personal standpoint? 

JK: Yeah, it was a shock. Obviously, you never want to experience anything like that again. But unfortunately, that's life. Accidents happen and tragedies happen, and you deal with it the best you can. I think that we, as an organization, dealt with it as well as we could. We provided help for everybody and tried to do it as respectfully as possible for Matiss, his family, his friends and teammates, and paid our respects to him … and tried to move on with life because we have to. It’s just so sad and tragic that it’s somebody who’s gone at that age. But we can be stronger for it too. 

Goalie Elvis Merzlikins (pictured) and Joonas Korpisalo are both still members of the Columbus Blue Jackets' roster, despite the expectation that one of them would be traded this offseason.

As we talked about this summer, that situation affected the goaltending situation too. You didn’t wind up trading either of the co-starters, Elvis Merzlikins and Joonas Korpisalo, and both were expecting one of them to be moved. Have you spoken with them about the situation at all and what they should expect this season? 

JK: You don’t want to get into too much of those discussions because you never know what’s going to happen. Some opportunity might pop up a week later, and all of a sudden, your thinking changes completely. And that’s the business side that I talked about. We're always discussing with the other teams and sometimes there’s an opportunity you can’t turn down. So, you can’t really get into too much detail about what the future holds, because even we don’t know it always. I mean, we have our plans for our guys that we want to grow with, but then something could happen that changes it. 

If it’s possible to do safely, how much are you looking forward to getting full buildings again? 

JK: It’s huge. I mean, we just saw the difference between having an empty building and having 4,500 or 5,000 fans. And even that made a huge difference for everybody, not just us on the management side, but for the players in particular. We can’t wait to get in front of the fans and have full buildings. That’s what pro hockey is all about. These guys are not just athletes. They’re entertainers, and they live for it. They enjoy it. The best ones, that’s their biggest strength. They’re not afraid of the bright lights. They embrace it. And without it there, it’s just different. 

On Chinakhov, Sillinger in the NHL Prospects Tournament

In the 2020 draft, you guys pulled a surprise name out with the 21st overall pick. Many were stunned, either because they didn’t not know who Yegor Chinakhov was or they expected him to go later. He’s been great in this prospects tournament and people are quickly learning about his shot now. How nice is it just to get him here this soon? 

JK: Well, we’ve seen plenty of it, so it doesn’t come as a shock to us. And that’s why I think that maybe it shouldn’t be such a shock when you haven’t seen him play. (laughs) That’s the beauty of all the experts in the draft is that our staff watched all those guys that we were drafting, especially high in the draft. They watch them over and over and over and over again before we make that decision, where some of the people that talk about our decisions may see the highlights or some sort of film here or there. It’s completely different for us and that’s why you can’t really pay a lot of attention to it. You respect everybody’s opinion and let it be the outside noise and do your job. 

What did you think of Cole Sillinger’s performance in the tournament? 

JK: I think he’s been great. He plays just like we evaluated him. He’s tenacious. He’s hardworking. He’s gritty. He plays with pace. He can see the ice, make plays and he’s got a great shot. He’s got a great edge to him, the way he plays and carries himself, but he’s all character. So, you couldn’t be asking more from an 18-year-old guy. It’s not very easy to come to this tournament and be as good as he’s been as an 18-year old. 

One more to wrap this up. You guys typically have a young roster by average age, but this year, it might be going to another degree. How much patience will be required in this ‘reset’ process from coaches, the front office and fans?

JK: I don’t like to use the word 'patience’ very often, but we want to build the right way. And that’s the thing. We could stack our team with some older free agents and not be a young team, we want to win the Cup. And quite frankly, there aren’t players available for us in the free-agent market that would take us over the hump. So, we’re gonna have to build patiently with drafting players and growing with them and have them grow into the roles where they can make an impact on a Stanley Cup-winning team. 

bhedger@dispatch.com

@BrianHedger

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