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Sportsnet: Aaron Portzline on The Jeff Marek Show talking about the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Marek: “Let me ask you about Jakob Chychrun. No secret he’s available. We’ve been following this story for a year now. The teams that pop up mostly, last year there was a whole bunch, a whole lot of smoke between Arizona and the Florida Panthers. Now they’re capped and probably don’t have the assets to make that deal anymore.
But we think of teams like the Los Angeles Kings and we think about teams like the St. Louis Blues and we think about teams like the Islanders. I think the Islanders are right in on Chychrun as well.
And the name that keeps popping up whenever I make the calls about Chychrun, and the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Do you think given that the deal Arizona is looking for is essentially, I combination of picks and players/prospects, it’s like two firsts plus, plus, plus. I can be a former first-round pick, can be a first-round pick, a combination of both, plus something else.
A) do you think Columbus has the desire to bring in someone like Chychrun, and B) are willing to part with what it would take to bring in Jakob Chychrun.
Portzline: “So we’ve done some reporting on this. It got really interesting at the draft last year, when, last summer, when it was said that the Blue Jackets had a deal in place for Chychrun to go to Columbus.
Now, the Blue Jackets say this is not true. There are people in the Chychrun camp who say it’s true.
Again, there are differing reports on this but that Chychrun did not want to come to Columbus. He does not have the ability to stop a trade but teams do take in mind if a player wants to come somewhere or not, especially Columbus given what they’ve been through with certain players.
He didn’t want to come to Columbus, and so Columbus backed out. That’s one side of the the other says not true, we just inquired, it went no further. And then this summer, as the summer moved along and Johnny Gaudreau became a Blue Jacket, I’m led to believe that Chychrun decided if it’s okay for Johnny, maybe is should be, yeah, I’d go there.
Now if Columbus wants the player, they’ve got the opportunity to get him and they’ve got the pieces. He’s not a perfect fit on this team. He’s mostly a left side guy, which means he’s probably a second-pair guy cause Werenski’s the top dog on the back end. I don’t think he’s comfortable on the right side, which is where they desperately need a high-end type talent. They’re top four on the right side does not really make a lot of sense.
So I think the Blue Jackets soured on, if that deal were true that a deal was in place and that he said, ‘na, not really.” They soured on him. I think they feel the price back then was awfully steep too. I’ve heard maybe the price has come down a bit. That maybe there’s one less element going back to Arizona than there would have been at the draft.
It doesn’t surprise me if they make a trade like that, and maybe it include some of their defensemen. You mentioned certain teams being at the cap. The Blue Jackets gave up Bjorkstrand when they signed Gaudreau. That’s the best deal they thought they could find to get back under the cap. They’d have to clear some money out to get Chychrun in here as well.
It’s a reasonable contract but something would have to give. Do the Coyotes want Jake Bean? Do they want Boqvist? What else do they want? One of those young defensemen from Columbus? I don’t think Columbus would part with Jiricek or Mateychuk. Maybe Ceulemans could be part of it.
It wouldn’t surprise me if a deal came to pass. I don’t think there is tremendous excitement from the Blue Jackets to make that trade at this point but maybe that changes if they continue to (struggle?).
Marek: “One of the interesting things and this may sound like an insult but it’s really not. I don’t think the Arizona Coyotes really care the nature of the position of the players coming back.
Because as someone said to me recently, Arizona’s not good enough to care right now. Right now Arizona is just in the, let’s accumulate players and eventually once this team actualizes, we’ll sort all of it out.
I think right now they’re just, how many good young players regardless of the position. They can accrue before they finally start to put the team together, you know what I mean. And that’s why if I’m them, I’m looking at the Columbus roster, front and center I’m looking at David Jiricek. I don’t think you’re going to get him. That’s, considering what you’re giving up and how cost control he’s at, what the number is. Arizona can still swing for the fence here. There’s other teams interested, I think Columbus, I know he’d play a second-pair behind Werenski, take Gavrikov’s spot, but kind of does from that point of view, it kind of makes sense to me.