COLUMBUS, Ohio — A collection of notes, insights, ruminations and did-you-knows gathered throughout the week that was for the Columbus Blue Jackets:
When Kirill Marchenko signed a new contract last summer, Blue Jackets general manager Don Waddell challenged him to become a more physically engaged player, especially in the defensive zone. A month earlier, when Kent Johnson signed his new deal, Waddell pressed him to keep getting stronger and better maintain possession of the puck.
And so it was this weekend with towering winger Dmitri Voronkov, who has been both a tantalizing talent and a simmering frustration for the Blue Jackets.
Voronkov signed a two-year contract worth $8.35 million Saturday, a deal that will pay him $4 million this coming season and $4.35 million in 2026-27. The contract does not include any no-move clauses, but it does come with some demands.
Waddell, in this case, has been more pointed than he was with Marchenko or Johnson.
“It’s the conditioning factor,” Waddell said. “I was adamant with his agents about it. The problem is, if he doesn’t take it seriously himself, he’s punishing the team, and he’s punishing himself because he’d be leaving a lot of money on the table.
“This guy has the chance to be a 30-plus scorer and a physical force. I mean, there’s a lot of money to be made for a guy like that. So, yeah, we talked about it.”
It’s likely one of the reasons the Blue Jackets weren’t willing to discuss a long-term contract with Voronkov. They discussed a one-year term before settling on two years, which leaves him as a restricted free agent when the deal expires after the 2026-27 season.
Voronkov is listed at 6-feet-5, 227 pounds. He was significantly heavier when he arrived in Columbus before the 2023-24 season, but in each of his two NHL seasons, he has lagged badly in the second half. Last season, he had 19-16-35 through 44 games, but put up only 4-8-12 in his final 29 games.
“The reports we’ve had this summer are that he’s been working out five days a week,” Waddell said. “He’s skating every day with Marchenko. So far, the reports are very positive.”
Blue Jackets coach Dean Evason found a fit last season with Voronkov joining the top line opposite Marchenko, with Sean Monahan in the middle. It was one of the NHL’s most effective lines for long stretches of the season.
On one hand, it’s impressive that Voronkov has 41-40-81 combined in his first two seasons. But it also makes the Blue Jackets wonder how dominating a force he could be if his conditioning allowed him to move faster and respond quicker.
The assumption is that Voronkov’s notorious physicality — he was known for throwing around his body in the KHL before coming to North America — would reappear if he could get on top of opposing skaters a half-step quicker.
That’s the Voronkov they want to see before this new contract expires.
For the second time in a decade, the Colorado Avalanche have turned to the Blue Jackets’ organization, specifically the coaching staff at AHL Cleveland, to make a coaching hire.
The Avalanche hired Mark Letestu, who has been an assistant in Cleveland the past four seasons, to coach their AHL franchise, the Colorado Eagles, which play in Loveland, Colo., about 50 miles north of Denver. In 2016, Colorado hired Jared Bednar, who had been Cleveland’s head coach, to succeed Patrick Roy.
“(Letestu) is very well respected in the industry, and he did a great job for us,” Waddell said. “I’m not even really concerned about (a person’s contract) in that situation, if it’s an opportunity for them. I’ll never hold a person back from an opportunity to learn and to grow.”
It was that process — career advancement — that opened the position for Letestu to fill. Aaron Schneekloth, who had coached AHL Colorado, was hired last month as an assistant coach on Lane Lambert’s staff with the Seattle Kraken.
Letestu, who had an 11-year NHL career with Pittsburgh, Columbus, Edmonton and Winnipeg, should be able to relate to all different types of players in the AHL. He played in both the AHL and ECHL for four seasons before reaching the NHL.
In Pittsburgh, he played alongside Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. In Edmonton, he played with then-rookies Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. In both cases, the crafty Letestu worked his way onto the power play with the future Hall of Fame players.
“Everybody wants to be hard to play against. Everybody wants to play fast, right?” he said. “The challenge in coaching is how you get there, the teaching aspects, and explaining why I think that’s what I want from a certain player.
“I want my teams and my players to know exactly why they’re doing things, why they’re in certain spots, why they need to compete the way they do, why are the systems structured the way they are, that kind of thing. If it’s done the right way, you’re going to see a team that looks structured and competes really hard.”
Letestu spent the last three seasons in Cleveland under head coach Trent Vogelhuber, who is 108-82-26 behind the Monsters’ bench. Vogelhuber, who turns 37 later this month, has started to gain traction as a candidate for recent NHL jobs, but it’s unclear if he’s had official interviews. That seems inevitable, though.
Waddell said his staff met Sunday to discuss Letestu’s replacement on the staff in Cleveland. Vogelhuber and associate coach Chris Bergeron are expected back, Waddell said.
The Blue Jackets finished their annual development camp with a scrimmage Saturday morning. Forward Jack Williams, who was signed out of Northeastern University last spring and made his NHL debut in the Jackets’ last game of the season, led the way with a hat trick.
It was an unusual development camp compared to others in recent years. There were several NHL prospects on hand, but none expected to make the Blue Jackets out of camp in the fall.
We asked Blue Jackets director of player personnel Chris Clark for a brief thought on five players from this year’s camp: the three first-round picks — center Cayden Lindstrom (No. 4) in 2024, and defensemen Jackson Smith (No. 14) and Pyotr Andreyanov (No. 20) last month; and two players of his choosing.
He chose forward Oiva Keskinen, a seventh-round pick (No. 194) in 2023, and forward Luca Pinelli, a fourth-round pick (No. 114) that same year.
Here’s what he said:
Cayden Lindstrom: “Aside from what he’s doing on the ice, just him being on the ice and having fun doing it, was great to see (following Lindstrom’s back surgery last year). He was always in great spirits whenever we’d talk with him when he was going through (rehabilitation). He’d have a smile on his face, but I know it was eating at him to play and there were a lot of uncertainties.
“There’s some rust to shake off because it’s been a while, but he’s young and he’ll get back in form really quickly for this season coming up. To see him skating like he can skate and smiling was really good to see. He was having fun out there.”
Jackson Smith: “The biggest thing, for me, (in this camp) is getting to know guys and talking to them off the ice, just seeing what kind of people they are. It’s easy to know them as players from what you can see them do on the ice. There’s video of every single second of every shift. I want to see how they interact with the other players.
“Some guys are shy. Some guys are outgoing. He’s one of those outgoing guys that’s easy for anybody to get along with. He’s a good kid and he’s got some personality, and the players really gravitate to those guys.”
Pyotr Andreyanov: “I didn’t get to him much at all (before he was drafted), just a little video here and there. (Goaltenders) are not my area of expertise. But seeing him on the ice and in the goalie drills quite a bit, understanding his technique … yeah, impressive. He can move the puck. We heard he could do that, and he really did that in the (scrimmage).
“He was having fun out there, and it’s got to be really, really hard for him because of the language barrier. He was the only Russian in camp, but he was hanging out with the guys, trying to speak and interact with them, which I thought was really cool. He wasn’t off by himself, not at all.”
Oiva Keskinen: “It’s good that he’s going to come over for training camp. If he doesn’t make the team (the Blue Jackets) in the fall, he’s going to head back to Finland. But he’s on the radar now to come over, which is good. He’ll go to Buffalo (for the annual prospects tournament).
“I was kind of keying on him. He’s a good player. If he does go back to Europe and his season ends early, he’ll be with us for the end of our season. So it was good to get a look at him and where he’s at this summer.”
Luca Pinelli: “We had Pins at the end of the year (in Cleveland). He’s a fun player to watch. He’s a spark plug. He’s fearless, and he fits right in. I’m interested to see him in (training) camp, and with his confidence building, I want to see where it goes.
“He has a lot of skill, and it’s in the middle of the ice, too, it’s not on the outside. Some guys with his skill, they’re doing everything on the outside. He’ll do it between the dots, and he doesn’t worry about being hit.”
* For Blue Jackets fans, this development camp provided their first chance to see Lindstrom skate. He took the ice for the first day of camp last summer, but sat out the rest of camp, perhaps the first sign that his back wasn’t healing. But, after returning to play late last season for Medicine Hat, Lindstrom is not back in the groove of a hockey player. He’ll attend Michigan State in the fall. Asked how it felt to be “100 percent,” Lindstrom said: “I’m not sure. I don’t even know if I’m fully there yet. I’m close. It’s step-by-step every day. Things take time to heal, right? You’re not going to feel 100 percent right after surgery. I’m feeling good and working hard every day, training as hard as I can. That’s all that matters. One hundred percent will come pretty soon.”
* Jackson Smith admitted being a bit flustered in meeting two of the three fellow prospects who share the name Luca. That would be forward Luca Pinelli and defenseman Luca Marrelli. Here’s Smith: “I kinda got ’em mixed up at first. I thought they were brothers, honestly.”
* Waddell and several of his scouts traveled to South Florida in the week leading up to the draft to attend a camp for Russian players staged by agent Dan Milstein. The Blue Jackets came away from that camp impressed with Andreyanov, drafting him at No. 20. It changed their thinking. “We all left there very impressed,” Waddell said. “One or two days later, when we all got together, we had him clearly as the No. 1 goalie. We always have a special category for goalies, a separate list. And that put him at the top of the list.”
* It didn’t help swing the deal, but the fact that Ivan Provorov’s younger brother, Vladimir, will play at Ohio State beginning in 2027 was a nice little wrinkle. By then, Provorov will be two years into the seven-year, $59.5 million contract he signed with the Blue Jackets just hours before free agency opened on July 1. “It’s exciting,” Ivan Provorov said. “Whether he comes the following year or two years from now, having him close will be really fun. I’ll be able to go to his games, or he’ll be stopping by for dinner once in a while. I’m excited for that.”
* The Blue Jackets hired Paul DeFazio as their new equipment manager, replacing longtime manager Jamie Healy. DeFazio spent five years as the head equipment manager with AHL Scranton before working as an assistant with the Pittsburgh Penguins for the last six years.
* It wasn’t a free-agent signing that sent shock waves through the NHL, but the good fans of Cleveland, Ohio, took notice. Trey Fix-Wolansky, drafted by the Blue Jackets in the seventh round (No. 204) of the 2018 NHL draft, has played 289 of his 315 pro games with AHL Cleveland, becoming a fan favorite and a franchise record holder for goals (112), assists (147) and points (259), along with several other offensive categories. Fix-Wolansky, who is 5-feet-7, 193 pounds, signed a one-year, two-way contract with the New York Rangers.
* Clark, who oversees the Cleveland roster, said of Fix-Wolansky: “He was awesome. The player he became, and the player he was … he became a Cleveland legend. But it’s time for him to see something else. It was his timing and our timing … it’s going to work out really well for him. I spoke with (Rangers assistant GM Ryan Martin) and they’re really happy having him in there and seeing what he can do.”
* We asked Fix-Wolansky what he wanted to say to AHL Cleveland fans and the city of Cleveland, his hockey home for the past six seasons. In a text exchange with The Athletic, he didn’t hold back: “To the city of Cleveland, the Monsters organization, and especially the fans: THANK YOU. Thank you for supporting me every step of the way over my six years in ‘the land.’ From playing my first game as a Monster in the (AHL) playoffs as a 19-year-old, to my last game as a 25-year-old, you’ve been there, supporting me every step of the way. Moving to Cleveland full-time as a 20-year-old, I never would have expected the support and love I felt. You made my time in Cleveland so enjoyable and I will always cherish every memory I made with my teammates and with the fans. You supported me and our team through ups and downs and that’s why I will always say Cleveland has the best fans in the AHL. Thank you for everything, Cleveland.”
* As noted in this space last week, Blue Jackets prospect forward Jordan Dumais had two charges for driving under the influence dropped earlier this month when the arresting officer in Halifax, Nova Scotia, failed to show up to provincial court for trial. Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada asked for an investigation, according to the Chronicle Herald. A public relations manager for the Halifax Regional Police later told the newspaper that an investigation is underway. “There is an expectation that officers take their duty to appear in court very seriously,” the spokesperson said. “The officer had a duty to appear in court (on June 27) and did not. There are consequences under the Police Act that are being explored now.”
Read more on The New York Times
