Culture Change<\/p>\n
With Bowness only signing a deal for the rest of the season when he was first hired, he didn\u2019t know his immediate future when, after the final game of the year, he let his team have it:<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know if I\u2019m back, but if I\u2019m back, I\u2019m changing this culture. These guys, they don\u2019t care \u2013 losing is not important enough to them. It doesn\u2019t bother them. Like, how can you go out and play like that?<\/p>\n
Well, now he knows that he\u2019s back as he signed a one-year extension not even 48 hours after the season ended.\u00a0 So, Bowness is going to get a chance to really reshape the culture but it\u2019s not going to just be on him.\u00a0 This summer, it\u2019s largely going to be on Waddell to make the types of changes that Bowness is likely seeking and model the roster to better suit that style.<\/p>\n
One big decision that needs to be made (and frankly, might already have been made) is the fate of captain Boone Jenner<\/a>.\u00a0 The 32-year-old has been with the Blue Jackets for 13 seasons, captaining them for the last five.\u00a0 When healthy, he has a quality power forward and defensive anchor.\u00a0 But he has dealt with a significant injury pretty much annually and his scoring touch has dipped a bit as of late.\u00a0 He\u2019s a pending unrestricted free agent who has changed agents while Bowness has already signed Coyle to a six-year extension, potentially pushing Jenner more towards being out the door.<\/p>\n How aggressive of an overhaul Waddell will look to make is the big question here.\u00a0 Bowness is 71 and on an expiring contract already; he\u2019s not the long-term voice behind the bench.\u00a0 But with the public vote of confidence in the form of that one-year extension, Waddell seemingly has to make meaningful changes beyond a player or two.\u00a0 We\u2019ll find out just how big of a culture change they\u2019ll be looking to make soon enough.<\/p>\n Re-Sign Key RFAs<\/p>\n While Waddell has already taken care of one of his key pending free agents, he has a few important restricted free agents to re-sign over the coming months.<\/p>\n The most prominent one is center Adam Fantilli<\/a>.\u00a0 The third overall pick in 2023, his entry-level deal will officially expire at the end of next month.\u00a0 With the market for impact young centers jumping up considerably in recent years plus the projected increases to the Upper Limit, it\u2019s fair to say Fantilli\u2019s market value is going to jump considerably.\u00a0 If they want to sign him to a max-term eight-year contract (still legal through mid-September), they may have to go higher than Zach Werenski<\/a>\u2019s current price tag of $9.58MM.\u00a0 AFP Analytics pegs<\/a> an eight-year pact at just over $10MM per season despite the fact he has yet to reach 60 points in a season.\u00a0 But to get him to give up four years of UFA eligibility, it\u2019s going to be a hefty price tag.\u00a0 If they\u2019re not willing to go that high yet, a bridge contract could still land in the $6MM-$7MM range.<\/p>\n The other RFA of note is Cole Sillinger<\/a>.\u00a0 His bridge deal has now come to an end and if nothing else, he has been consistent.\u00a0 Over the past three seasons, his lowest point total is 32 and his highest is 33.\u00a0 He has two years of club control left and is arbitration-eligible as well.\u00a0 It\u2019s doubtful either side would want to do a long-term agreement so the options are more likely a one-year deal that allows for a bit more evaluation, or a three-or-four-year pact that buys up a bit of UFA eligibility.\u00a0 The former would be in the $3.5MM range and the latter more likely around double his current $2.25MM price tag.<\/p>\n Add Offensive Forward<\/p>\n One of the challenges this season for Columbus was primary scoring.\u00a0 They only had two players surpass the 60-point mark and one of those was Werenski, who led the team in points once again.\u00a0 The other was Kirill Marchenko<\/a>, with 67.\u00a0 Fantilli and Coyle were just shy of 60 which doesn\u2019t sound too bad.\u00a0 However, they\u2019re also the only four players to reach 40 points on the campaign.<\/p>\n The silver lining is that their secondary scoring was fine.\u00a0 Eight additional players had between 30 and 40 points, including Mason Marchment<\/a>, who had 32 in just 39 games after being acquired.\u00a0 He\u2019s a pending unrestricted free agent and is set for a big payday on the open market.\u00a0 The Blue Jackets would undoubtedly want to keep him around but even if so, that\u2019s only maintaining the status quo, not improving the roster.<\/p>\n While there is a young nucleus of players that they\u2019re hoping for continued development from (with a bounce-back from Kent Johnson<\/a> being first in that regard), it\u2019s also quite evident that the Blue Jackets have a win-now mindset.\u00a0 While contention might not be realistic just yet, getting to the postseason should be the next step for this group.<\/p>\n That makes it more important for them to add an impact scorer to deepen the attack and take some pressure off the younger players (which might ultimately help them offensively).\u00a0 Of course, this is not a particularly deep UFA class \u2013 Marchment is one of the top forwards available \u2013 so this is something Waddell may have to accomplish on the trade front.\u00a0 But if Columbus wants to take that next step forward, more primary firepower will be needed.<\/p>\n Add A Shutdown Defender<\/p>\n With Werenski anchoring the back end, the emergence of Denton Mateychuk<\/a>, and Ivan Provorov<\/a> showing flashes of above-average offensive ability at times, the Blue Jackets quietly have one of the more talented back ends in the East from an offensive perspective.\u00a0 But their other regulars \u2013 Damon Severson<\/a> and Dante Fabbro<\/a> \u2013 aren\u2019t known necessarily for being shutdown players.\u00a0 They can certainly contribute but aren\u2019t necessarily defensive anchors.<\/p>\n One of their top-used defensemen shorthanded this season was Erik Gudbranson<\/a>, at least when healthy.\u00a0 However, he\u2019s also a pending unrestricted free agent and at this point, it would be somewhat surprising to see him return.\u00a0 That\u2019s a spot in the lineup that needs to be filled.\u00a0 Ideally, that one isn\u2019t filled internally, either by Jake Christiansen<\/a> or a prospect like Corson Ceulemans<\/a>.\u00a0 Again, if the goal is getting to the playoffs, they need to aim higher.<\/p>\n In a perfect world, the goal would be to get someone capable of playing on the top two pairings, logging over 20 minutes per game with primary penalty kill time.\u00a0 That player would also be matched up against top lines from other teams.\u00a0 It\u2019s the type of player that a lot of teams could use although, again, there aren\u2019t many unrestricted free agents who fit the bill.\u00a0 This is another spot they may have to try to acquire in a trade instead.<\/p>\n But this one is of particular importance from a culture standpoint as well.\u00a0 As Bowness wants to reshape things there, getting that gritty defender willing to go the extra mile to contain top players from other teams would be an anchor of that reshaped culture.\u00a0 A lot of good teams have a true shutdown piece on the back end and if they want to take the next step, the Blue Jackets need to get one too.<\/p>\n Photo courtesy of Jeff Curry-Imagn Images.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The offseason has arrived for half of the league\u2019s teams that aren\u2019t taking part in the playoffs plus…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":586040,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5108],"tags":[3644,5180,897,230,5179,5,4,63047,697],"class_list":["post-586039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-columbus-blue-jackets","tag-blue-jackets","tag-bluejackets","tag-columbus","tag-columbus-blue-jackets","tag-columbusbluejackets","tag-hockey","tag-nhl","tag-offseason-checklist-2026","tag-pro-hockey-rumors-originals"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116655351729431159","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586039\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/jet-greaves-columbus-200x300.jpg\")
<\/a>Goaltender Jet Greaves<\/a> also happens to be up for a new deal.\u00a0 While he wasn\u2019t going to come close to sustaining his late-season hot streak in 2024-25 over a full season, he locked down the starting job.\u00a0 He played the seventh-most minutes in the NHL while posting the 12th-best SV and 13th-best GAA on a non-playoff team.\u00a0 Traditional stats are still dominant in arbitration filings and the 25-year-old is arbitration-eligible for the first time.\u00a0 However, the small sample size makes this one a little harder to peg.\u00a0 The comparables here would be players like Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen<\/a> ($4.75MM) and $5MM but the financial market is a little different now.\u00a0 The comparable now would be four or five years around the $5.75MM range.\u00a0 But if one or both sides want to see one more year before making that commitment, they can get away with it as he\u2019s two seasons away from UFA eligibility.\u00a0 The price tag would be more in the $4.25MM territory in that scenario.<\/p>\n