Sunday, October 24, 2010

Your 2010-2011 Columbus Blue Jackets??

4 workman-like wins, 2 UGLY blowout losses, and squeaker loss in the Swedish home opener. That's the better part of the first month of the season for the CBJ. It's enough to make even the most experienced CBJ fans, accustomed to befuddlement at that helter-skelter play of this club over 9+ seasons to sit back and scratch their heads. 

So who exactly are this seasons Blue Jackets, and more importantly, what will they become? It's way too early to say for sure, but there might be some hints in how this team has performed in certain situations. Specifically, the Jackets have won following every loss and are 3-0 on the tail ends of the 3 back-to-backs they've had already this season.

It's a small sample but I think it says a few things about this club:

- As Aaron Portzline likes to put it, this team has a "high boiling point". Several folks have asked why, including the past 2 head coaches, and I think it comes from Rick Nash. And before anyone starts calling for the team to take the captaincy away from him, I don't think a letter on his sweater is going to matter. Rick Nash is the best player on this team, and the players take a lot of their cues from him. One of his best aspects is that he's very laid back; a guy who is usually pretty cool under pressure. 

The only time this is a problem is when the rest of the team may be looking to him to take charge, and he doesn't feel the game has reached a point where he needs to be more than laid back. This is where players like Ethan Moreau and most specifically RJ Umberger come in to fire up the troops while Nash does his talking with his play. Nash's lieutenants are going to have to play a sizable roll if this team is going to learn to win and win regularly.

- Steve Mason has looked solid and at times spectacular thus far into the season. Mathieu Garon has only played in a single game, but looked good as well. This is incredibly important because the defensive personnel of this years team is not what Coach Arniel would consider a dream match to his system; a system that puts a lot of pressure on defensemen to play up with the puck. There will likely be a lot of reliance on the goaltenders to be strong early and often as the D corps continues to feel their way through the decisions they'll be asked to make.

- There seems to be some resiliency in this club that may have been lacking last year. Much of that is likely a manifestation of the club having tuned Coach Hitchcock out prior to his dismissal. To this point, the message from Coach Arniel is either fresh or being delivered in such a way that it is falling on receptive years; perhaps both. The two blowouts sure don't show it, but coming from behind and winning in Chicago was a big game, showing the team wasn't willing to be a part of the kind of embarrassment it had received just a day earlier.

- Arniel is starting to figure his club out. The learning process isn't just on the players side of the relationship; the coach is getting to know more about this club than can be seen on video or from watching a few pre-season games. Coach Arniel was quoted as saying there were several things he was learning that he "doesn't like very much". It would seem that one of those things is the fact that as much as Voracek and Brassard seem like a natural pairing, all that creativity on one line begs for someone to execute. 

With Hitchcocks seemingly overwhelming need to protect his team from his rookies mistakes, he would never have taken the leap Arniel did in putting the pair on the top line with Rick Nash. It paid dividends on Saturday night, and perhaps putting the two up against the other teams top line, and giving them the space that Rick Nash provides his linemates, they'll be able to take advantage of the chemistry that has been so tantalizing to CBJ fans for the past couple years.

It's a lot of supposition, I know; but with seven games into the season and with fans jumping on and off the bandwagon already, I think it's best to focus on the long term while we wait to see where this team is going.

No comments:

Post a Comment