For Columbus Blue Jackets GM Don Waddell, status quo will not suffice | Michael Arace
Blue Jackets coach Pascal Vincent was fired Monday afternoon. A part of me is sorry to see him go. Another part of me is looking forward to seeing who’s next.
Don Waddell, the Blue Jackets' new president/general manager, is an experienced hand and is forming his own ideas about how the house on Nationwide Boulevard should be cleaned. Since he was hired May 28, he has spent half his time preparing for the draft and the other half shining his Maglite under the hood of the organization.
Waddell carries himself with a gentlemanliness that should not be misconstrued as softness. Of trades, Waddell has said, “For the right price, everything is in play,” including the No. 4 pick in the upcoming draft.
Last week, there were reports that Waddell would be working with Patrick Laine to find a trading partner for the former All-Star. It won’t be easy. Laine’s time with the Jackets has been riddled with injuries, he is in the NHL/NHLPA Player Assistance Program and he’s due to make $8.5 million over each of the next two seasons. Still, Laine is 26 and remains a marquee player. A divorce is nothing to take lightly.
Monday, Waddell fired Vincent, 52, a youngish, talented coach who had professed his love for the city and his desire to remain behind the bench in Columbus. This is not piddling.
In just a few weeks’ time, Waddell has made a few things clear without saying very much: He’s going to do what he thinks is right, and if that makes anyone uncomfortable, including any of the players on the roster and/or the six pending restricted free agents, then so be it. The job he was handed was to turn around a team which has been among the league’s worst over the past two seasons.
Status quo will not suffice.
The Jackets’ first GM, Doug MacLean, got to hire three coaches ― including himself ― before ownership stepped in to put Ken Hitchcock behind the bench in 2006. When Hitchcock was introduced, majority owner John H. McConnell (R.I.P.) described the big man as “the guy we hope is going to save us.”
The Jackets’ second GM, Scott Howson, got to hire two coaches — Scott Arniel and Todd Richards — after he fired Hitchcock in 2010. Howson was a bright, up-and-coming executive, but in his effort to clean up an inherited oil spill, he made mistakes that could not be overcome. There was the Jeff Carter trade, which was a fiasco, the drafting of first-round pick Nikita Filiatov, the handling of the Rick Nash trade, and so forth. Hiring Arniel (after other avenues of pursuit were closed) was right up there near the top of the list of Howson’ gaffes.
Arniel was not ready. After his flameout in Columbus, he had to wait a dozen years before his next chance: The Winnipeg Jets hired him last month; maybe, he is ready now.
The Jackets’ third GM, Jarmo Kekalainen, was the most successful executive in franchise history. His first hire, with the help of then-president (now “senior advisor”) John Davidson, was John Tortorella. Torts won 227 games and took the Jackets to the playoffs four times in his six seasons on the job. He won the Jack Adams Award in 2017, after the Jackets won 51 games and racked up 108 points. Franchise records. He won a playoff series ― a franchise first ― in 2019.
One of Kekalainen’s mistakes was hanging onto Tortorella one season too long. Another was taking a clear rebuilding project and muddying it with big-ticket free-agent signings. His last mistake was his most egregious — he, or someone in the organization he would not obstruct — thought Mike Babcock was the answer to the Jackets’ problems.
And thus, over a span of 14 months, the Jackets have gone through three coaches ― the Brad Larsen tenure ended, the Babcock era ended before it began, and Vincent was called as an emergency replacement. Now, Waddell will search for the team’s fifth coach since May 2021, when Tortorella’s last contract ran out and he and the team agreed, tardily, that his time in Columbus had run its course.
Word is that Waddell is putting a premium on experience.
By this criterion, there are plenty of candidates out there: Bruce Boudreau, 69 (most recently with the Vancouver Canucks); Dean Evason, 59, (Minnesota Wild); Gerard Gallant, 60, a former Blue Jackets coach from back in the day (New York Rangers); Don Granato, 56 (Buffalo Sabres); Dave Hakstol, 55 (Seattle Kraken); Todd McLellan, 56 (Los Angeles Kings); Jay Woodcroft (Edmonton Oilers).
I wouldn’t mind Boudreau at all. He’s the oldest of the bunch but, in many ways, the youngest at heart. He brings an energy and a style of play that attract Columbus fans. But that’s just my knee-jerk reaction.
I wouldn’t have minded seeing Vincent get to fulfill his second and final year of his contract. He is a fine human being with a curious mind and a supple brain. He will be a wise choice to coach another team someday. It’s too bad that his first job was impossible, so much so that it forced ownership to change administrations.
Let us see what Waddell does next.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: For Columbus Blue Jackets GM Don Waddell, status quo will not suffice
