About Columbus Blue Jackets
The franchise came to life in 1997 and joined the NHL in 2000 as a part of the league’s expansion. With the Minnesota Wild the Blue Jackets are the youngest NHL teams and the Jackets are yet to make some serious noise in the league.
The franchise has been to playoffs twice since its first season and never managed to progress through first round so there’s still plenty of team building required for the franchise to establish itself as a stronger opponent in the NHL.
The team is a member of Metropolitan Division in Eastern Conference and their colours are union blue, goal red, capital silver and white and their mascot, Stinger, a “Bug with an Attitude” is a symbol for the city citizen’s pride for their team and hard work.
The team’s head coach is well known for his outspoken and very often explosive nature, John Tortorella who joined the Blue Jackets in 2015 after having coached several NHL teams since 2001 and leading the Tampa Bay to the NHL championship in 2003-04 which helped him to secure Jack Adams Award for the coach of the year.
Goaltending duties are mainly Sergei Bobrovsky’s job. He went undrafted in 2006 year and first years of his career he spent playing in Russia after which he signed with the Flyers, to be traded couple of seasons later to the Blue Jackets where he was awarded Vezina Trophy four the best adjudged top goaltender in season 2012-13. His great talent was widely recognised as he was also a finalist to be a model for a cover of very popular video game EA NHL 14, he also was selected to NHL All-Star game in 2015. Not bad for an undrafted talent.
The franchises captain’s duties belong left wingman, Nick Foligno who started playing in 2006 for the Senators and was traded to the Blue Jackets in 2012 where he made a name for himself scoring a notable goal in 4th game of Eastern Conference Quarterfinals in 2014; the goal that gave his team a come from behind win in overtime. His great production was noticed league wise and he was selected to NHL All-Star game in 2015 where he was also named a captain of Team Foligno, unfortunately his team came out defeated.
To his help come two young and promising athletes in Brandon Saad and Ryan Johansen, a duo the franchise hopes that’ll take them that step further.
Saad plays on left wing and has two Stanley Cups to his name with the Blackhawks, his agent rights were traded to the Blue Jackets in off season 2015.
Johansen joined the team in 2011-12 where he quickly acclimatized himself and in 2013-14 he had breakout year becoming the only third Blue Jacket to score over 30 goals in a season.
The franchise has not had a lot of success but with the right mix of explosive youth and experience there will be time to turn things around.
