There was little love lost Thursday between Jeff Carter and fans of the Columbus Blue Jackets as he was shipped off to Los Angeles in a trade with the Kings that brought the 18-35-7 home team offensive defenseman Jack Johnson and a first-round draft pick in either 2012 or 2013, depending on the Kings’ postseason.
General Manager Scott Howson said the Blue Jackets could never really get it to work with Carter, particularly on a line with captain Rick Nash, as both players wanted to score.
“I think Jeff struggled with this right from the outset,” Howson said. “We decided it might be the right thing to try to make a move with him.”
It wasn’t the first move made in a race to reshape the team before Monday’s trade deadline. Center Antoine Vermette was shipped off to Phoenix on Wednesday. And while Howson wouldn’t address whether Nash might be the next to go, he made it clear the changes are just the beginning.
It’s been another in a series of rough weeks for the Blue Jackets. And it shows no sign of stopping anytime soon.
“I think there’s a lot of good friends in this room so what’s going on right now it’s tough to see a guy like Vermette go. He was a good addition to our room. But that’s the nature of the business,” the Blue Jackets' R.J. Umberger said Thursday morning before Carter was traded. “What I hope, at times like this, in a tough season, is that everybody still here gets stronger from it and our chemistry becomes better because we went through something like this together.”
But who will be left when it’s all said and done come September, including interim head coach Todd Richards, is anybody’s guess. Richards, too, is auditioning for a role next season. “This is, I think, it’s an interview of some sort. Absolutely,” he said of his status. “Where it goes, I have no idea.”
Having players also audition for their futures has created a bittersweet ending to the season. The Blue Jackets, who play Friday at home versus the Colorado Avalanche, seemingly improved in the days leading up to the trade deadline, including a 6-3 drubbing of the San Jose Sharks Tuesday night, but Columbus is a distant also-ran in the Western Conference standings.
“You see these guys when they’re getting healthy, guys are playing at their best or at their peak performance level and you’re seeing how good guys could be and can be,” Richards said, adding it was frustrating to watch. “There’s all different types of motivation. I have my thoughts on, obviously, certain individuals, but there are different motivations that, I think, inspire each player.”
While the trade deadline is certainly a motivating factor for players playing well right now, the work that Richards has done behind the scenes can’t be ignored. The team’s ability to compete has increased a notch. And that can be attributed to Richards' coaching style, according to the players.
“You know it was a tough job for him to come into the situation we’re in and keep the energy positive and keep us focused and everything,” Umberger said. “And I think he’s done a very good job of it.”
Keeping morale up was a top priority when he first took over, said Richards.
“I’ve been in other situations as a player where it wasn’t a lot of fun coming to the rink for whatever reason," he said. "What I wanted to do was just try to lift the spirits a little bit and have guys make it a place that they wanted to come to, wanted to spend time at, make it fun to come sit next to your teammate, make it fun as best you can,” he said. “I think if you’re able to do that, you don’t really have to force guys or beg guys to work because they want to be there, they want to work, they want to do the extra things you’re asking them to do as a coach because they believe that’s helping their game.”
But, warned Richards, this isn’t a "ha-ha" kind of fun. Rather, it's fun because you’ve worked hard.
“You want them to work and you want them to enjoy doing their work, which to me is the fun part, but you can’t have the fun before the work,” Richards said.
That’s been evident in the team’s practices as of late. The three-on-three practices battles were played out on just half of the ice at Nationwide Arena Thursday morning. The Blue Jackets looked fast. Competitive. They were vocal when a teammate missed a play, calling them out loudly. They banged their sticks on the glass and ice when someone scored. When the blue jerseys lost to the white jerseys, they skated laps as their consequence. Umberger, a white jersey, taunted the losers with a smile from center ice as they skated by. Other white jerseys took his cue and taunted the blue team as they circled around.
“This game is meant to be fun. You’re never going to get the best out of yourself or your team unless you’re having fun, in any situation. There were long stretches this year where it wasn’t fun for us. Losing isn’t fun,” said Umberger. “(Richards) has brought that atmosphere into practice where we’re having fun but everything is meant to be extremely competitive.”
The tighter practices have paid off, particularly for players like Brassard, who said he’s seen his share of sleepless nights this season over a string of healthy scratches for reasons he didn’t understand.
“I was just wondering, ‘Why am I not in the top six?’ I was just, ‘Why? Why? Why?’ in my head,” he said. “Everything went downhill. I didn’t know what to do at that point, but I think I learned from it.”
“It’s been a (lousy) first part of the season,” said Brassard. “I just tried to have fun and show everyone I’m a great player to my teammates and to myself and at the end of the season I could really help my team.”
Under Richards, he’s been given the chance to show what he can do. The most notable thing Richards has done, said Brassard, is hold every guy accountable.
“Guy plays seven minutes or 20 — he’s treating everybody the same way,” said Brassard. “He doesn’t yell at you; he teach and that’s one of the good things.”
Richards said he holds guys accountable with ice time and equal treatment.
“If somebody makes a mistake and then somebody else makes the same mistake, you’re holding both guys accountable,” he said. “You’re not just picking on one guy and letting the other guy get away with it. To me, that’s the accountability part.”
But it goes beyond that to the skills part. While Richards maintains that, systematically, he didn’t change much from what Scott Arniel had been doing before being fired in early January, there were some small tweaks.
“I think there’s some different philosophies in how you want to forecheck. I think we have made changes and put more emphasis maybe in penalty kill situations and D-zone coverage areas that I felt we had to get better at as quick as we can. So those really became points of emphasis,” he said.
He also said the coaching staff tweaked how they went about their business, particularly leading up to going out on the ice, as well as in preparation for a game.
“It’s just sitting down and talking more and just spending time together talking about previous games and our day coming up, what we want to accomplish. What we want to do,” said Richards.
Brassard said Richards is also very good about making changes in the heat of a game to adjust to the other team.
“Guys have been pretty good as far as buying into the system and the identity we’re trying to build here,” said assistant coach Dan Hinote. “Everybody’s done a good job following that line.”
Where Richards as made the most impact on the team is in practice, said Hinote, saying the coach has concentrated on increasing the compete level in drills. Driving a better practice has been a priority for Richards, who said he learned form one of the best.
“I learned early on from (former Blue Jackets interim head coach) Claude Noel, having spent time with Claude, how a coach can drive practice. He got the most out of his players through his practices and him driving a practice,” said Richards. “So I’ve seen it first-hand. I know that a coach can get into a practice and he can demand things and get things out of players.”
It’s setting the bar and making players reach and exceed it, said Richards.
“It’s whatever you expect as a coach. And then you have to demand that. But players have to understand that, too. That takes a little bit of time as far as what the expectations are every day,” he said. “As a coach it’s no different than how I expect my kids to act when we go out to dinner; they know how they need to act, they know that it’s please and thank you, because that’s how it is. And it’s no different in practicing. If you want certain things out of practice, then that should be your standard. You have to get to players to expect that standard every day. “
