Columbus Blue Jackets Hire Don Waddell As President of Hockey Ops and GM

Columbus Blue Jackets Hire Don Waddell As President of Hockey Ops and GM

it’s officially official the blue jacket have a brand new president of hockey operations and general manager in Don woodell what does this mean for the Blue Jackets what does this mean for the future we’re going to talk about all of that on today’s lock on Blue Jackets you’re locked on Blue Jacket your daily podcast on the Columbus Blue Jacket Part of the locked on podcast Network your team everyday hello and welcome to locked on Blue Jackets part of the locked on podcast Network your team every day I am as always your host Joe Foster here to give you the Good the Bad and the Ugly about your favorite team and mine the Columbus Blue Jacket before we get started I want to thank everyone for making this your first listen of the day every single day locked on Blue Jackets is free and available on all podcast platforms and over on YouTube I also have to let you know that today’s episode is brought to you by Game Time download the game time app print account and use code locked on NHL for $20 off your first purchase terms apply we’re talking about Don woodell who uh it came out late last week that he was going to be uh named to the Blue Jackets front office there was a speculation about what his official title was going to be um and then I believe all of this happened at like 3 pm on Friday before a holiday weekend so we’ve been sitting here for three days waiting for everything to be official but it’s official he’s going to be the president of hockey operations and the GM for now uh which means I think he’s going to be in charge of hiring a new GM which is uh which is fun and and exciting and I’ll I’ll get into why that is in in a minute um in terms of other news just to like wrap it all up um he’s also going to be serving as an alternate governor and uh it’s a multi-year contract so he’s going to be around for a while unless things go extremely badly extremely fast um this is the the future decision maker for the Blue Jackets uh John Davidson has been the club president of hockey operations for 10 over the past 12 years he took a brief break to go to New York for two years uh and then and then stepped down in New York and came back here uh has agreed to serve as senior advisor and also alternate Governor so he’s kind of moving a little bit sideways a little bit down or a little bit up I guess technically but I think it’s it’s pretty clear Don woodell is still going to be the main guy um which I think is good news I I feel pretty pretty okay with this higher um he was not one of my top choices he wasn’t even really on my radar at first until the Hurricanes got kicked out of the playoffs and then all of a sudden um things started moving very very fast so I guess he was like at the top of their list right from the very beginning um you know and I know we all had conversations about you know we want tulsky we want Dash uh we want maybe Mark hunter from the London kns uh there was a lot of talk about Ken Holland Mark bersan interviewed uh but apparently didn’t do a good enough job um I mean you know I shouldn’t say that I should knock on wood about that but because I think the the desire is that that um wal is going to probably hire a GM at some point down the line whether that’s when he the guy that he wants is available whether they’re looking for someone to kind of move up in the organization I know a lot of people have mentioned like Rick Nash as an AGM to be groomed for becoming actual GM obviously he was just GM of Canada the world championship so like he’s moving in those kind of steps you know so but the point is I I’m pretty happy with this like I said wasn’t first on my radar wasn’t first on my list but having talked to a handful of people who you know are kind of tapped into the the Hurricanes uh media circles couple of like fans um couple of smart general hockey people like everyone seems pretty pretty optimistic about this higher um and uh we’ll get into we’ll get to a couple of reasons for this uh the first one for me is this is a man who obviously we talk a lot about oh he doesn’t do any work in Carolina all of his work was done by uh tulsky or uh the the AGM or um Darren York is the head of scouting and so everyone says that he handles the the draft and Don wadell is just kind of there to be officially in charge or whatever it is and like I get that as as a thought process I can see being underwhelmed by this when you won you know potentially the real decision maker and I guess we’ll see um in in the season to come whether how much Eric tosy was doing for Carolina and how much Dell was doing for Carolina you know it reminds me a little bit of seeing what um how much Andrew brette did for New Jersey in that year that he was their um assistant coach and they were really good and then obviously he left and I think Lindy Ru kind of didn’t really have anyone to fall back on in that regard so it’s not exactly the same situation but I think we’ll be I think I’m interested to see what those two are like separate from each other you know um and of course Eric toy might not get the job in in Carolina he’s been named interim GM but there’s some speculation that he’s going to be um not the not the new GM which is an interesting choice I don’t know that I would make Carolina but uh you do you um anyway the reason I bring all of this up is uh that Dom wadell is a guy that has hired smart people and has hired good people you know um he has been he he you know he brought tulsky into the mix his head of scouting is very good um Rod brinder more has been a very good coach for a very long time I know there was a lot of people speculating that like oh man what if he what if the the Blue Jackets got the GM of the hurricanes and they brought he brought the head coach with him and then we got rod bridgemore for for the blue jacket as well that’s not going to happen he has um signed his extension in Carolina so you know that pipe dream is over but he was uh he was put in place by um he was put in place by wadell so he’s got a track record of hiring good people and hiring smart people and that feels pretty I feel pretty optimistic about this for that reason um the other reason that that um this is not so much a a good like a reason that this hiring is good but a reason that this hire interests me um Carolina Hurricane’s management or ownership excuse me is notoriously handson and um has hard lines that they play with money being spent and I think that the Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon being cheap is kind of ere exaggerated a little bit but I am interested to see what woodell does now that he has an owner in John McConnell who is notoriously hands off and kind of just lets the hockey team run itself you know he’s he’s not super involved he’s not I think a lot of things was and um let me pull up a text that I got from my friend about this I think that was uh yeah Dundon is pretty Hands-On and they do take a pretty hard line on player value but they do pay if they think someone is is worth it so a lot of you know um I think one of the criticisms of of wadell which is not necessarily wal’s fault is um you know letting guys let Vincent troch walk um because they they he wanted more money than the ownership was willing to give him and I think that that’ll be interesting to see what the with a bunch of rfas coming up for the Blue Jackets I think it’s going to be really interesting to see what wadell does to all of this and I hope that he is ready and uh he’s going to hit the ground uh immediately because he has got a lot of work to do um and we’ll talk about a little bit about what some of that work is in a second um I also want to talk about what this means for other front office staff so um people like uh Mike priest who is currently the president for the Blue Jackets people like Pascal Vinson is not really front office staff but I guess management staff is is what I want as opposed to front office stuff so we’re going to talk about those guys and what this p means for them in just a second here on lock on Blue Jacket first I got to tell you about game time uh the NBA finals are soon I think they just got decided recently uh which is really really exciting obviously the NHL playoffs are going strong and uh if you want tickets to any of these things don’t go to any other ticketing service go to game time prices on the game time app actually go down the closer it gets to tip off they’ve got last minute deals all in prices vi from your seat they’ve got a lowest price guar guarantee so game time is taking the guest work out of buying tickets uh and it’s not just Sports they’ve got comedy they’ve got theater they’ve got music they’ve got all kinds of things if you want to buy a ticket for something you can get it at game time I mentioned the lowest price guarantee if you find tickets in your section and row for Less game time is going to credit you 110% of the difference which is just so good you can get a panoramic view from your seat in the app before you buy so you don’t get surprised by giant concrete pillar in front of your seat and they’ve got the most flexible customer service policy in the ticketing industry take the guesswork out of buying tickets with Game Time download the game time app create an account and use code locked on NHL for $20 off your first purchase terms apply again create an account and redeem code l o c k e d o n NHL for $20 off your first purchase download game time today last minute tickets lowest price guaranteed welcome back to locked on Blue Jackets uh we’ve talked a little bit about what I like about this this hire for the Blue Jackets Don wadell new president of H operations and GM I want to talk a little bit about what this means for other front office staff um a couple of of the more notable ones uh Mike priest who is currently the president of uh the Blue Jackets organization there was some speculation that he would either be stepping away or moving or like moving to a different department or maybe even stepping down completely that hasn’t happened yet I wonder if Don woodell is is thinking about moving up as he stays with the blue jacket I think there’s there’s a real desire here for him to be the guy in Columbus which I which I do think is interesting you know there was a lot of speculation that W if woodell comes in takes priest’s job and then they bring in somebody else for the president of hockey operations someone else for the GM I know there was speculation that Ken Holland and Brad Holland uh would be would be joining the Blue Jackets I hope that’s not the case I think it’s less likely now because I don’t think Holland would leave a cushy situation like Edmonton where he is he makes all of the decisions for somewhere like Columbus where he would only be the GM so I think that that has really kind of put put put that rumor to sleep which is great 10 out of 10 for me um the other the other guy that I think his job might might be a little bit in Jeopardy although I’m not 100% on this is Pascal Vincent um I could see a world where Don wadell has come in he’s got a guy that he wants to bring in as coach and that’s goodbye to Pascal Vincent I think it would be easy to to shunt him off I think it would be if it’s gonna happen it’ll happen sooner rather than later I think I don’t think they’ll drag it out that might even be that might even be his first thing is like right okay get rid of this guy bring in a coach that he wants um which I don’t necessarily think is a bad thing um I was kind of interested to see what year two of Pascal Vincent is like um I think he got deal dealt a bad Hand by coming in suddenly and not having time to prep uh I think last year was a bit of a shock to the system for him and uh I I would be interested to see what he does after a summer of being able to actually prep as the head coach and knowing what didn’t work last year um so to speak that being said I could see I could see I could see a world where they keep him um he’s got one year left on his contract ra the Blue Jackets are not expected to contend next season I wonder if he stays and again wadell has someone in mind for coaching that isn’t AA that has already been hired by somebody else that isn’t available this year and or you know maybe maybe he has someone that he wants to move in uh next season you know so we’ll we’ll kind of we’ll see how the Pascal Vincent news goes but I am expecting that to be he’ll either say one way or the other I suspect in his press conference tomorrow someone will ask the question um so yeah he at 11: a.m. eastern tomorrow I believe there’s going to be an introductory press conference I am 100% sure that someone will ask about the coaching staff uh and I think we’ll get our news one way or the other um if he says yes he’s staying then he’s staying and if he says literally anything else like oh we’re going to look at all of our options and we’re going to keep our options open or you know I haven’t talked to Pascal yet I’m going to talk to him and see what he think like get get a read on him if he says literally anything other than a point blank yes he’s staying my guess is he’s gone um and we we’ll see who’s available it’s going to be weird because there’s a lot of coaching positions open but there’s not a lot of head coach positions open I believe with the announcement of Dan BMA um Disco Dan returning to the NHL he’s going to be the head coach up in Seattle I think the San Jose Sharks are the only team that doesn’t have a a head coach right now um so it’ll be if they fire binson it’ll be us and uh the Sharks the Sharks seem pretty close to hiring their guy um there’s a handful of guys that are still out there and available like Todd mlen was was one guy um there’s there’s a couple of other guys I’m going completely blank on the name of literally everyone right now but most of the coaching staff like most of the bigname coaches have been shifted around so like um Char ke’s gone Craig baru’s gone um just a bunch of a bunch of names that I wasn’t super enthusiastic about Harry for the Blue Jackets anyway so I’m interested to see if woodell has someone in mind or not I wouldn’t be heartbroken if Vincent left I wouldn’t be heartbroken if he stayed um but I do think that he’s going to have a very tight leash this season I think if the Blue Jackets start to look like they’re having a truly disastrous season um then I think he might get the get the hook like by genuinely Maybe by December um and I and this is not the Blue Jackets I don’t think are going to be in a playoff spot or if they do it’ll be you know a wild card spot that they’ll have to fight to get into because the Metro is stupid um but if the Blue Jackets are you know if they hit American Thanksgiving for example and they are still um hanging around you know seven or eight in the Metropolitan Division then I could see I could see Vincent getting the hook then I think he’s going to be on a very short leash so we’ll we’ll see how it goes honestly um I I I keep thinking about like what my my knee-jerk reaction is one way or the other towards Vincent staying and I think my kneejerk reaction is him staying um like I said I think he’s going to have a short leash I don’t think he’s gonna um I don’t think he stays past next year anyway unless like a miracle happens and the Blue Jackets like suddenly magically turn into a contender like they did in what was it 2017 where they went from picking third overall to finishing with like 104 points in in the space of a in the space of like a SE like a season or two seasons um but I don’t think I don’t think he stays past next year if if he man if he makes it to October I don’t think he stays to next October you know um and I feel fine about that um I was enthusiastic for his hire um and I think it’s it’s a little bit unfair to judge a guy based on like one season of work so like that’s why I’m kind of hedging my bets here but there was a lot of traits last season that made me worried that like this wasn’t a guy floundering because he didn’t know what to do this was a guy whose methods weren’t working if that makes sense so I’ll be interested to see what he what it looks like if he does in fact make it to October and the blue jacket start playing hockey are we going to see a different coaching style from Vincent are we going to see a different brand of Blue Jackets hockey on the ice um I kind of hope so uh they don’t even have to they don’t have to be particularly good I would just like them to be not miserable to watch um you know my standards are so low right now but um we’ll see obviously that’s that’s all going to be up to Don woodell like I said I would be I would be surprised if it wasn’t mentioned at the press conference tomorrow uh which I will be watching and uh will bring some some little tidbit of that into uh into the conversation this is probably going to be us for for most of the rest of the week is going to be talking about woodell and uh his his new position so uh we’ll finish up today’s episode um just kind of going over again and I know I’ve talked about this a handful of times over the past kind of a couple of weeks so just a a list of things that woodell needs to sort out he’s got a very long to-do list on his desk and he hasn’t even moved it into his into his office yet so we’re going to talk about that in just a second here on lock on blue jets welcome back to lock to Blue Jackets we’re talking about Don woodell we’re talking about everything that he has to do now because he’s got a very long to-do list on his uh on his desk right now um obviously we we covered the the Vincent thing um I think the the expectation is that he’s going to bring someone in as GM Maybe not immediately but that’s definitely I mean it’s it’s on his list and I don’t know whether that’s that he wants to bring maybe he wants to bring tski over from Carolina that would be very fun um whether he wants whether again whether he’s got a candidate that he likes that he wants to bring in and is just waiting for them to become available whether there’s someone that he wants to promote from within um I’ll be interested to see who the agms are um you know there’s there’s obviously there’s a lot of talk about Rick Nash Trevor Timmons was uh the AGM in Montreal for a long time and was a guy that I was kind of enthusiastic about getting the job um but he obviously he wasn’t even I don’t think he was even considered I remember there was a thing that came out that was like there were no internal discussions about promoting from within for this job which fine whatever um but he’s an interesting name for potentially taking that that next step um he’s the director of Player Development right now I believe so he could be up for a job title Shuffle um so I don’t think it’s high on his list but it’s definitely on his list um in terms of finding finding a GM and then we move on to potentially the biggest part of his to-do list which is uh player contracts so just to do a quick rundown of players that don’t have contract right now youo chikov cro marchenko Alex nander co singer Alexander texier uh Carson Meyer Jake Bean Kent Johnson moving on to guys that aren’t on the roster Tyler angle Josh Dunn Brendan G Marcus Bor Jake Christensen Nick blankenberg Billy Sweezy Jacob soral Jack grees Malcolm suban I imagine some of these guys are moving on like I imagine Jacob zoral moves on Malcolm suban probably moves on um Carson Meer might move on um but going back to and just looking at kind of those the core players chikov maeno neander uh cylinder texier bean and Johnson that’s a lot of players that need new contracts I would expect most of if not all of those guys to sign um you know question marks on Jake Bean who obviously struggled with his contract extension in Carolina with woodell again I don’t know how much of that was the was woodell and how much of that was Dundon but that’s an interesting name to watch suddenly especially as the Blue Jackets want to try and make space on the back end for um guys like yich and betuk to uh to come up in the ranks um kachenko we we I kind of talked about this in the season review he is the the priority resigning for me I think you want to get him signed to a longish term deal and just be done with it and then everyone else I could see getting kind of bridge deals or one-year deals especially you know neander is going to get a one-year show me contract um Tex will probably get a one-year contract I could see chov singer Johnson all getting two maybe three years um well uh and then most of the guys that are not like off Rost just like angle done blank and Christian Etc they’ll probably get one one year at a league Min or you know a two-way contract um but lots of lots of work for for him to to get started with it’s not like it’s a hey we’re going to you know have an easy summer now he’s gone from well he’s gone from looking at all of the Carolina Hurricanes contracts that need signing and was like well I don’t want to do this this is someone else’s job to oh actually I’ve moved to somewhere that has uh that has potentially even more important contract to resign because a lot of the Carolina Hurricanes are ufas and older guys um and now he’s like well I’ve got to resign 50% of this team’s young RFA core um the other thing that is not necessarily a wadell decision but I’ve seen Elliot Freedman was talking about it on on his podcast a couple of days ago what do they do with Patrick lion obviously he’s in the NHL pa player assistance program right now um it was announced on well not announced but someone found out on Instagram that he’s had shoulder surgery very recently ly which he broke his collar bone I think um in the middle of the season so I wonder if it’s just going in to clean out some of stuff that from that uh but he he went into the player assistance program like Midway through the season and then they didn’t see him again for the rest of the season so like is he going to be ready to return is he going to stay in the player assistance program is he a part of this team moving forward like there’s there’s a conversation that has to happen there I don’t know that I would trade L A away but I know that I’m potentially the minority in uh in all of that which I’m fine with um but I think it’ll be very interesting to see if this team if this team knows what they have in line and whether they can use that $9 million I wonder if the thinking is that they can use that $9 million of caps base on players like which I would to issue a correction by the way which which someone on YouTube very kindly pointed out um I thought that the Patrick Li’s 9 8.7 million was not covered in the cap hit right now it is so instead of what I think I said that they have $4 million to resign all of those rfas I mentioned above they do actually have the full 23 million which makes me a lot more comfortable in terms of resigning everyone um petrick L the 8.7 is actually on the boook right now because I forgot that when the offseason hits all of the like buried cap penalties and longterm AR and things like that all go back on the books so a ton of teams are like over the cap right now like Montreal has um Carry prices $10 million on the cap right now and they’re over but the point is they could decide that if they want to move on there’s another $9 million that they can use on player contract and you know we talked about all of those guys that are rfas this year next year they’re going to have to figure out uh does de ronov get a new contract um does Adam Bist get a new contract Neil tasov is up for extension next season um you know there’s a bunch of guys that are going to be for up for contract extension then the year after that you’ve got to figure out Brindley and fanelly so like there’s a lot of a lot of decisions that need making for this cap and I wonder if Pat Patrick l is going to be not necessar a cap casualty but I do wonder if the team kind of maybe moves on from him which is not a thought that I expected to finish the episode with when I started but is kind of where where I’m at um that’s kind of what I’ve got for today tomorrow uh we’re actually going to talk to Zack Martin host of lock on hurricanes um and get his kind of inside view of Don woodell as a GM how he feels about this hiring um just some kind of a little bit of not inside baseball but some uh a little inside view on on Don woodell leaving the hurricanes and coming to Columbus so that’s going to be tomorrow’s episode thank you for listening to this episode for making us your first listen of the day every single day locked on Blue Jacket is free and available on all podcast platforms and over on YouTube uh thank you once again for listening you can find me on Twitter _ jaob Foster JK B FD e r you find the show at lore blue jacket on Instagram and on Twitter you can email me if you have comments questions criticisms at lockon Bluejacket gmail.com and until tomorrow make sure you stay locked on

It’s officially official! Don Waddell is the new President of Hockey Ops and GM for the Blue Jackets! We break down why this ia good thing, why it’s an interesting hire, and what comes next for the Blue Jackets organisation this summer!

Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!

eBay MotorsFor parts that fit, head to eBay Motors and look for the green check. Stay in the game with eBay Guaranteed Fit at eBayMotos.com. Let’s ride. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply.

GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNHL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.

FanDuelFanDuel, America’s Number One Sportsbook. Right now, NEW customers get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS with any winning GUARANTEED That’s A HUNDRED AND FIFTY BUCKS – with any winning FIVE DOLLAR BET! Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started.

FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)

Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…
🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOBlueJackets?sid=YouTube

Locked On NHL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Prospects & More
🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNHL

#ColumbusBlueJackets #BlueJackets #NHLHockey #NHL #Hockey