The 2015-16 NHL season has started in troubling fashion for the Columbus Blue Jackets. After struggling through a difficult 2014-15 season that saw the franchise lose a record number of man games to injury, most NHL pundits expected a healthy Jackets team to finally realize their potential and find their way into the upper echelon of the league's teams. But through six games, Columbus remains winless and rumors have begun to swirl that Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen is considering any number of changes to the roster and the coaching staff.
ESPN's Pierre LeBrun on Monday reported, via Chris Nichols of TodaysSlapShot.com, that Kekalainen and the Blue Jackets are currently "working the phone hard, trying to get a defenseman at least." The Blue Jackets, through six losses, have allowed an abysmal 30 goals, far and away the worst mark in the NHL and nine more than the closest team, the Boston Bruins. They currently sport a 65.0 penalty kill percentage, good enough for second-to-last in the league. And while they average about 31.2 shots per game, the 11th-most in the NHL, they also allow 29.7 shots a game, good enough for 15th.
In short, what was supposed to be a strong puck possession Blue Jackets team that could contend with the league's best has instead been undone by a defense that can't keep anyone out of their net. It's a development that has head coach Todd Richards "walking a fine line," and has made an "early-season roster shakeup" a "very real possibility," according to Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Post-Dispatch.
Richards, per Mitchell, has not received assurances from Kekalainen, but while many of the team's issues can be be laid at his feet, it seems silly to suggest that Richards is on the proverbial hot seat. After leading the Blue Jackets to relevancy and two playoff wins in 2013-14, Richards was rewarded with a two-year contract extension that carries him through the 2016-17 season. Last year's sting likely wiped out pretty much all of the good will Richards had built up, as has the slow start this season, but the injuries Columbus sustained last year were insurmountable and it's still too early to tell if Richards, who took over an abysmal Blue Jackets team in 2011-12 and has now led them to three-straight winning seasons, is part of the problem or the solution.
