Blue Jackets testing NHL axiom that no amount of defensemen is enough
MONTREAL — The Blue Jackets are putting an old saw about NHL defensemen to the test.
After selecting David Jiricek and Denton Mateychuk with the sixth and 12th picks in the 2022 NHL draft, they’re about to find out if a point exists where there are simply too many defensemen in one developmental system. Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen clearly doesn’t believe it's possible and proved it Thursday by adding a pair of high-caliber defensemen into a system already stocked with promising blueliners.
“We always talk about ‘best available,’ and those were the guys that we thought were the best guys at the time,” Kekalainen said. “I think we got two really good defensemen. And you can never have too many of them.”
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The Blue Jackets have filled their organizational depth chart with defensive prospects the past three years through trades, draft picks and signings.
Last year, Kekalainen got the draft started with a trade that removed one star defenseman from his roster, Seth Jones, and added two more with high ceilings, albeit less experience.
Adam Boqvist, the eighth overall pick in 2018, was part of the return package from the Chicago Blackhawks. Kekalainen also flipped a second-round pick he'd acquired in the deal to the Carolina Hurricanes for Jake Bean, a puck-moving defenseman taken 13th overall in 2016 by Carolina.
They were soon joined by four more defensemen taken consecutively by the Jackets in rounds one, three, four and five last year.
Corson Ceulemans, now a rising sophomore for Wisconsin, went 25th overall. Stanislav Svozil, a friend of Jiricek’s who has played for Czechia’s U20 national teams, was taken in the third round (No. 69). In the fourth round (pick No. 101), the Jackets selected Guillaume Richard, a rising sophomore for Providence, and Nikolai Makarov, a stout Russian in the mold of Blue Jackets defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov, rounded out the four defensive picks in the fifth round (No. 132).
The Blue Jackets had previously added Jake Christiansen as a free agent from the Western Hockey League in March 2020 and three defensive prospects in the 2020 draft: Samuel Knazko (third round, No. 78), Ole-Julian Bjorgvik-Holm (fifth round, No. 145) and Samuel Johannesson (sixth round, No. 176).
The Blue Jackets relinquished their signing rights to Johannesson on June 1, but still have a backlog of young blue-liners.
At the NHL level, Zach Werenski, Boqvist, Bean, Andrew Peeke and Nick Blankenburg are all under 25, followed at lower levels by Tim Berni (2018 sixth round), Christiansen, Knazko, Svozil, Bjorgvik-Holm, Eric Hjorth (2019 fourth round) and free-agent signee Marcus Bjork out of the Swedish Hockey League.
Combined with Ceulemans, Richard and Makarov – who've all made significant progress – that’s 15 defensemen under the age of 25 plus Gavrikov, 26, Gavin Bayreuther, 28, and 2Gabriel Carlsson, 25.
So how much is enough?
Kekalainen isn’t budging on his opinion.
“If you have too many good defensemen, there’s going to be 31 teams calling us (for trades), so that will give us a lot of good options in all of the other areas,” Kekalainen said.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: CBJ overflowing with defensive prospects after NHL draft
