The NHL has released odds for its draft lottery May 5, and the Blue Jackets have a scant 1.5% chance of winning the first of two draws.
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After finishing 3-9-1 to drop out of the playoffs in the Eastern Conference, the Jackets head into the lottery 14th in the picking order. The highest they can move up is to fourth, since lottery winners are capped after gaining 10 spots. The lowest they’ll pick is 16th, since the most teams can drop is two spots.
General manager Don Waddell and Blue Jackets enter the 2026 NHL draft lottery with the 14th pick. They can move up to as high as the No. 4 pick or drop to No. 16.
The NHL lottery is conducted with two draws of numbered balls that can form 1,000 combinations assigned to 16 non-playoff teams. Odds are weighted by reverse league standings order, and the Blue Jackets get 15 of those 1,000 combinations for a 1.5% chance to win.
In other words, they’re likely picking from the middle of the first round again.
Last year, the New York Islanders overcame long odds with a 3.5% chance of winning to get the first overall pick. They selected defenseman Matthew Schaefer after moving up from 10th to first to get a player who’s expected to win the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s top rookie.
The Utah Mammoth, then still known as Utah Hockey Club, also overcame long odds last year to move from 14th overall to fourth by winning the second draw. That pushed the Blue Jackets down from 13th to 14th, where they selected defenseman Jackson Smith from the Western Hockey League.
Smith spent this season as a defenseman at Penn State, where he skated on the top pairing and quarterbacked the top power-play unit.
The Blue Jackets have never won the NHL’s draft lottery.
They’ve only picked first overall once, trading up in 2002 to select power forward Rick Nash out of the Ontario Hockey League. Nash, whose No. 61 hangs in the rafters at Nationwide Arena, is now in the Blue Jackets’ front office.
Blue Jackets reporter Brian Hedger can be reached at bhedger@dispatch.com and @BrianHedger.bsky.social
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: NHL draft lottery odds give Columbus Blue Jackets 1.5% chance at top pick