Consider the alternatives

Still not sure what CannonFest is all about?  Click on this link for a recap of last year's festivities.

Slap Shots Summer Special

There's still 18 days until CannonFest, so let's all applaud Fox Sports Ohio for helping fill the gap:

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“BLUE JACKETS SLAP SHOTS SUMMER SPECIAL”

On FOX Sports Ohio

Follow the Jackets’ offseason moves with this 30-minute special.

Premiering This Thursday, July 28 at 9pm

COLUMBUS, OHIO – FOX Sports Ohio and the Columbus Blue Jackets are excited to announce a new summer program, Blue Jackets Slap Shots Summer Special, premiering this Thursday, July 28 at 9pm.

This 30-minute special will bring viewers up to speed on their team’s off-season news as host Ray Crawford guides fans through the Jackets’ busy summer.

What Columbus lost...and gained

With the offseason talent acquisition period largely concluded for the Columbus Blue Jackets with the signing of Vinny Prospal to take Kristian Huselius' top 6 forward slot, I figured it was time to figure out what type of scoring production went out the door.  In the same vein, it's worth checking out what was gained - and then comparing to see whether there was any improvement in scoring ability.

Why am I looking so closely at scoring, you ask?  Simple.  The Blue Jackets didn't score nearly enough last season.  Now it's easy to blame some of the lack of production on now-departed assistant Bob Boughner, but at least some of the blame goes to the whole "LOFT" issue.

So let's take a look, with the recently-departed on the left-hand side and the newly-acquired on the right:

NAME	GAMES (CBJ)	GOALS	ASSISTS		NAME	GAMES (NHL)	GOALS	ASSISTS
Chris Clark	53	5	10		Jeff Carter	80	36	30
Jan Hejda	77	5	15		Radek Martinek	64	3	13
Sami Lepisto*	19	0	5		Vinny Propsal	29	9	14
Ethan Moreau	37	1	5		James Wisniewski (NYI)	32	3	13
Andrew Murray	29	4	4		James Wisniewski (MTL)	43	7	23
Craig Rivet*	14	1	0
Anton Stralman	51	1	17
Scottie Upshall*	21	6	1
Jakub Voracek	80	14	32
Kyle Wilson	32	4	7
Nikita Filatov	23	0	7
TOTALS	436	41	103		TOTALS	248	58	93
AVERAGE/GAME		.094	.236		AVERAGE/GAME		.234	.375

*Trade deadline acquisition

Wow.  Goal scoring potential increases by over 100 percent per game, and assists by roughly 50 percent.  That's no small potatoes.  Of course, we have to keep in mind that the guys coming in aren't slotted to be scrubs, and GM Scott Howson let a lot of scrubs go.

Also, the stat differential is largely attributable to Jeff Carter coming to town (The goal differential between Carter and Voracek alone is staggering), but it doesn't look like any of the now-gone defenders could hold Wiz's skates.  I mean, Wiz appears to be better from a scoring perspective than Hejda and Stralman combined.

Could the talent level on the Blue Jackets really be improving?

(NOTE: Edited to include Nikita Filatov's CBJ stats.)

Beware the East Coast Hockey Hype Machine

I suppose I'm a skeptical guy by nature.  I've been around the block enough times to have seen fads come and go, to have seen "the next great thing" turn out to be that much sliced Velveeta.  I've seen hype.  Lots of hype.   Some of it's actually panned out.

WORD.

And I've seen the hype-makers.

With all due respect to our kind friends in the media world of the National Hockey League - you know, the folks who largely have desks in and around New York and Toronto - I'm going to suggest that a boatload of hype comes out of the East.

Let's look at the evidence:

1. The New York Rangers
2. The New York Islanders
3. The New Jersey Devils
4. The Toronto Maple Leafs

Four Eastern Conference teams.  One qualified - barely - for the Eastern Conference playoffs last season (and won a whopping single game in the first round before getting eliminated).  Yet, if you followed the Big Time Hockey Media, you'd think that they were all Stanley Cup contenders.  (Well, OK, not the Islanders. They're out on Lawng Ize-land, so they almost don't count.)  The teams get the benefit of the doubt, and their players are larger than life.

CannonFest 2011: Live The Dream

And if there was any doubt about the transformative power of CannonFest on a hockey fan's life, check out this heartfelt testimonial.

Go ahead.  Mark your calendar.  Live the dream.

Now's your chance

The Columbus Blue Jackets are making their big push with the public this week, and people who are on the fence with this team should stand up and take notice.

First, the Blue Jackets formally introduced their big two new roster additions, Jeff Carter and James Wisniewski, to the media today and the ticket package holders tonight.  Here's the afternoon press conference:




The Blue Jackets then held a conference call with ticket package holders this evening with GM Scott Howson, Carter and Wisniewski. I'd seen the presser, and the call came during dinner, so I chose to eat with Mrs. DBJ and the Dark Blue Toddler.  (Sorry, you gotta have priorities...especially in the off-season.)

The franchise relaunch - and I think it can be considered a relaunch - continues tomorrow (Thursday) from 5-8PM at Nationwide Arena, where the Blue Jackets AGAIN will hold a "Select a Seat" open house for potential ticket package holders to scope out the arena and pick the seats that best work for them.  Beyond that...well...here's the splash graphic from the CBJ's website:

Three bonafide roster stalwarts for autographs.  Free swag.  Cheap eats.  Kids stuff.  Not too shabby.

Considering that you can buy 6-game packages where you select the games for $99 per seat (not per game, per seat for all 6 games combined), there's nothing but upside for the potential ticket package holder.  It's a ridiculous value.  And it gets better for partial season ticket packages, really it does!

I'm not sure how I can say this best, so let me try this:  Columbus fans have been dissatisfied with what they've seen on the ice.  Fans have stayed away.  The Blue Jackets have clearly noticed.  They've made the effort to step up their game with the new stars and roster additions at all levels.  If you are remotely inclined to get some tickets yet still find yourself on the fence, now's the time to jump in.

Enjoy the party, everyone!  Carry The Flag!

Look good, do good: Hockey Players Union bracelets

On advice from now-Detroit Red Wing Mike Commodore via Twitter, I picked up one of these bracelets online from the Hockey Players Union:

Pretty cool idea...take a hockey skate lace, chop it into bracelet-sized pieces and attach a snappy button to seal it up.  It looks sharp - I have a white one - and is much more distinct than the legion of silicone bracelets that are out there.

Beyond that, there's the cause that's being served.  The Hockey Players Union says,

We have a goal to unite the entire hockey population and raise funds for underprivileged children wanting to play hockey by giving the profits from every product sold towards the cause.

CannonFest returns for 2011!

Not sure what I'm talking about?  Here's a link to last year's recap.

Offseason fun with graphics

Lucky me...the Dark Blue Toddler decided to take a nap today (no longer a given on any given afternoon), so I found myself with a little time to work on a graphics project I intended to do during this offseason...

Handle with care

The Juice won't be loose until sometime
around Thanksgiving at the earliest

If you haven't heard by now, Columbus Blue Jackets winger Kristian Huselius tore a pectoral muscle while lifting weights and will be out of commission for 4-6 months.

Is it the end of days?  Should we CBJ fans be looking over the edge of the LeVecque Tower and wondering if life is really worth living now that The Juice will not be with us until 2012?  I mean, really...what do we have to live for?

These are tough times, to be sure, and they're especially hard on a fanbase that's been through the emotional roller-coaster since Douggie MacLean told us that draftee Rusty Klesla was the second coming of Bobby Orr.  At age 18...or 13, or whatever he was.  Yeah, we're downright bi-polar after 10 years of this stuff.  Yet we keep coming back for more, which means that we need to embrace our madness and figure out how to work with it.

As a result, the Dark Blue Jacket blog offers this brief outline on how a normal, diehard CBJ fan might be handling the loss of Kristian Huselius.  As a context, we'll use Elizabeth Kubler-Ross' model outlining the five steps of grief (or dying).  This respected process has helped many a person work through the complicated feelings involved in dealing with crushing disappointment and loss.

If you personally are disaffected by the Huselius injury, please remain understanding that your fellow fan may be deep into a personal meltdown.  Knowing the signs might be the difference between having a buddy cheering the CBJ at your side this season and witnessing yet another lost soul sit on the couch for yet another 10:30PM start in Vancouver while muttering things like "Goal scorer's goal" and "Thank you, Jim Day" into their applesauce.