The signs are all there. The “back to school traffic jams” are in full flower, the pools are closed, and the hockey players are returning to Nationwide Boulevard, just as the swallows to San Juan Capistrano or the buzzards to Hinckley. The youngest among them will head north to Traverse City late this afternoon (where our own @CBJProspects is also headed), while training camp awaits in just a week’s time. Hockey is in the air, without the foul stench of a lockout, and its time to start taking a critical look at the key questions confronting the Blue Jackets as they wind down the final 30 days to the season opener, and the club’s Eastern Conference debut.
So, as the month-long countdown proceeds, I’ll be providing new installments of this Inquiring Minds series, focusing on specific questions that hold special significance for the organization as we eagerly anticipate the curtain rising on a new season. This first installment focuses on scoring — Who’s going to do it? How often does it need to happen? How likely is it to occur?
East is East and West is West
At the most basic level, any team sport is all about putting more points on the board than the opponent, and hockey is no different. There are different ways of approaching it, of course. You can simply try to score your opponents into submission, and defense be damned — think Denver Nuggets & the Air Coryell San Diego Chargers. Alternatively, you can try to strangle your opposition, and try to pitch a shutout every night. Think any Ken Hitchcock team… Ideally, you find some sort of balance, but that’s the essence of the challenge.
Make no mistake about it, there is a difference between East and West when it comes to style of play and scoring. In 2011/2012, the last full season of play, only five of the 15 Eastern Conference clubs failed to reach the 220 goal mark, while only five of the Western Conference teams reached that level. Three Eastern clubs had over 260 goals, while no Western squad exceeded 250. It was a similar story last season, when play was confined to intra-conference opposition. In the East, only one playoff team — Ottawa — failed to reach 130 goals (approximately 2.7 GPG), and only six in the conference fell below that benchmark. Only four teams in the West scored 130 goals or more, and five of the eight playoff teams missed the mark. So, the East is the “run & shoot” conference, and the Blue Jackets will need to keep pace.
So, what does “keep pace” really mean in the Eastern Conference? From the numbers above, it suggests that something more than 220 
goals is certainly in order. At the 230 goal level, the odds become much better for a playoff run. While it falls significantly short of a guarantee, the numbers support a confidence level of something around 230. Between 2000 and Lockout I, only one Eastern Conference club with 230 points failed to make the playoffs. In the immediate aftermath of the labor turmoil, and the resulting rule changes, scoring went nuts for a period of four seasons. In 2005-2006 , every Eastern Conference club scored more than 230 goals, so seven failed to make the playoffs. That number dwindled to five the following season, and a total of seven clubs with 230 points failed to make the playoffs in the East in the next two years combined. Since then, sanity has returned, with two failing to clear the bar in 2009-10, one in 2010-11 and two in 2011-12. Almost by definition, those teams that did not make it surrendered a horrific volume of goals. For example, in the 2011-12 campaign, Toronto (231 goals scored) surrendered 264 tallies, and Tampa Bay (235 goals scored) gave up a whopping 281 goals. Both were worse than the 262 goals Columbus surrendered in one of its worst seasons as a franchise.
Climbing the Ladder
So, 230 (or 2.8 GPG) seems like a rational target to shoot for. One problem — the Blue Jackets have never done it. They came the closest in the playoff year of 2008-09, when they scored 226 times. They also notched 223 goals in 2005-06, but that accomplishment is equivalent to the Harlem Globetrotters notching 100 points against the Washington Generals, given the rampant scoring coming out of the lockout that year. Of course, those numbers were posted against the stingier Western Conference opponents. Against Eastern clubs, the Blue Jackets have fared somewhat better. Since Lockout I, Columbus has played 102 games against Eastern Conference foes, claiming 282 goals in the process. That’s a 2.76 GPG clip, translating to just over the team record of 226 goals in a season. So, the bar is tantalizingly close, but some work remains to clear the height.
Naturally, this is a vastly different Blue Jackets team that will face the East this season, and a squad that has yet to play an 82-game season as a unit. While defense is customarily referenced as the key attribute, the fact remains that the franchise has never been deeper at forward than it is this season. Let’s see where those goals might come from.
In looking at the statistics from last season, projected to 82 games, and the totals from the previous two years, it’s clear that the Blue Jackets have a number of legitimate candidates for 20-goal seasons. Gaborik, Horton, Comeau, Dubinsky and Umberger have done it within that time frame. Letestu, Foligno, Atkinson and Calvert have shown that they have what it takes to get there as well. Johansen has 
the skill, and this will likely be a key year for the young man. His game could flourish in the East, where he can leverage his size and skill to greater advantage. Since Horton is out for roughly half the season, let’s just put him down for 12 goals, and give 20 each to Letestu, Umberger, Gaborik, Anisimov and Atkinson. Give 15 to Dubinsky, Foligno, Johansen, Comeau and Calvert. MacKenzie, Skille and Boll chip in 20 between them. That’s 207 goals among the forwards. Add 14 from the Tyutin/Nikitin pair, 24 from the Johnson/Wisniewski tandem and 4 from Erixon/Prout. That’s an additional 42, for 249 goals. Over the bar with room to spare. As I’m sure some of you have already noticed, these estimates only account for 20 skaters, so a vacancy exists. Notably absent among the names mentioned are Boone Jenner and Ryan Murray, who can likely bury a few themselves.
Naturally, to take such projections literally is to assume significant risk. In the real world, there are injuries, down years, up years, unknowns emerging and veterans fading. Nobody knows what the year will hold along those lines, and if you told the front office that the breaks would even out over the year, they would probably take it in a heartbeat. What the analysis does show is that the Blue Jackets have the firepower to easily put themselves in the thick of things from an offensive standpoint. Dubinsky, Letestu, Foligno, Anisimov, Umberger, Horton, Skille, Tyutin, Wisniewski, Erixon and Comeau all have significant playing experience in the East. Horton is easily a 30 goal guy over a full season, as is a healthy Gaborik. Dubinsky could return to his mid-20’s goal production, and Anisimov looks poised to break out.
Part of the fun, of course, is the anticipation and the unknown. Who will surprise? Who will disappoint? For those wringing their hands over the loss of Vinny, be assured that there are lots of arrows in the quiver this year. They just need to find their mark.
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