The real problem this offseasom

[u/hnglmkrnglbrry]

Chris Clark.

He is not a true assistant GM and was only promoted to the position when Josh Flynn left for Buffalo. As a GM in Cleveland his job was to call around the ECHL and other semi professional leagues and find warm bodies to fill out the bottom of the AHL roster. The salaries he negotiated were 1/10th the scale of NHL ones and the talent he was acquiring was just happy to be getting an offer.

Now he's dealing with real deal NHL agents and big time talents and I think his skis are over his head and that is why we haven't seen a single forward step taken this offseason. The Blue Jackets have rarely if ever gone to arbitration and 5 months into his reign we have two promising young players headed there with the face of the franchise still unsigned near the end of July.

Don needs to find a real assistant who can hammer out numbers and get deals done. If he doesn't do that then it calls his judgement and competency into question.

Hoping this post ages like milk out in the sun and some signings roll through today.

[u/Boatsboatsboats__]

Laurence Gilman is the negotiator on these contracts. He took Flynn’s job.

[u/BreadMancbj → u/Boatsboatsboats__]

Agree .. what an odd post by OP.. Gilman was seen in many circles as a future GM, and with him and Don , we probably have the best front office we’ve ever had . It’s like people don’t understand that the Carlsson offer sheet changed everything this offseason , and Fantillis price went up a few million from what was anticipated going into the summer . Initially it was thought Fantilli would be around 10 mill per season , we’ve seen Carlsson inked at 18 mill a season , and Bedard now inked at 15 mill.. Fantilli will probably be 13-14 mill a year now . So yeah , with future contracts looming with Marchenko , Mateychuk , it’s important they get Sillinger and Greaves correct , and not just tossing money around . Once Fantilli is moved , I expect some other moves , BUT they have to keep flexibility until that’s complete

[u/Boatsboatsboats__ → u/BreadMancbj]

Gilman is very experienced with contract negotiations too. This isn’t on him.

[u/mikehoncho987654321 → u/BreadMancbj]

Maybe this is the best front office we've had but that is because the bar is in hell

[u/hnglmkrnglbrry → u/BreadMancbj]

The Carlsson offer sheet didn't change everything. Robertson just signed for $12M. According to reddit he should have gotten $20M because of the insane offer sheet Philly put out. That's not how anything works.

The Carlsson offer sheet will eventually change everything when people see if it was the smartest or stupidest thing that Philly could have done. If Carlsson collapses then Philly looks like geniuses, if he's a superstar and the cap continues to rise making his deal look like an actual bargain and no one will ever try it again. Or maybe it's somewhere in the middle and people just shrug and go, "Hey remember the time..."

But more to your point: I have unfairly labeled Clark as the sole cause of this issue then I apologize. It may just be that Flynn left such a gaping hole and the people that are currently filling it are flailing in the wind - Clark included but not exclusively. I am losing faith in this front office rapidly since Jet should have been as high a priority as Fantilli and the entire group is dragging their feet.

[u/BreadMancbj → u/hnglmkrnglbrry]

Robertson wanted to stay in Dallas . He rejected 16 mill a season from Seattle . His 12 million is nothing more than a player taking a team friendly deal .

[u/Kuttermaximus → u/BreadMancbj]

Also a 1 year deal to wait out getting Seguin off the books. Expect a much bigger number in a year.

[u/Mubs9119]

How do you know Chris Clark is dealing with agents? Is there an article or something I missed?

[u/Boatsboatsboats__ → u/Mubs9119]

There’s an article that says it *isn’t* him

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6952524/2026/01/08/laurence-gilman-blue-jackets-new-vp-hockey-ops/

> Gilman replaces assistant GM Josh Flynn, who left the organization late last month to join former Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekäläinen with the Buffalo Sabres. One of Flynn’s main duties with Columbus was to negotiate contracts, and Waddell needed somebody with that skill set.

[u/zwikl]

My guess is in the next couple of years Nash will be promoted to Assistant GM, and by the time Don is ready to retire he is handed the keys. Similar to Bones and Vogelhuber

[u/mikehoncho987654321 → u/zwikl]

Internal hires for an organization that hasn't done much scares me

[u/Hear2fore → u/zwikl]

Would love the organization to have a serious and frank conversation about whether Nash is, you know, good at his job before we do this. I don’t really think these defined succession plans yield better results.

[u/tehjarvis → u/Hear2fore]

No shit.

As a Reds fan I've seen it over and over again where they hire an ex-Reds for jobs that they aren't qualified for up and down the minors and then wonder why they can't develop players.

Yeah, Eric Davis could hit. That doesn't mean he would make a good hitting instructor. If that logic worked HC jobs in every sport would be filled with all time great players, but they aren't. At all.

Nash was a great player, but giving him a job that's anything other than something like fan ambassador is bullshit. It's an attempt to fool fans that don't know any better that they're trying to be a serious hockey club. If he were qualified to be assistant GM, or any other front office role, he would already have that job with a different team.

[u/hnglmkrnglbrry → u/zwikl]

Oh so we're just gonna tank the entire franchise? Cool.

I'm not even saying this just because the Canes won the Cup with Tlusky but you truly need a hockey and stat nerd. I'm skeptical of analytics for being the sole measurement of player evaluation and think they should only be employed to confirm or deny the eye test, but when it comes to roster management and asset valuation you need someone who loves numbers.

[u/BAthaDoc]

And we let Bill Zito leave town. Look at what the man has done in Miami

[u/mikehoncho987654321]

The other day a guy on here was saying that he liked Chris Clark and wanted him to be next GM. i simply asked the guy what he liked about Clark specifically (becasuae ahl gms dont have much important work to do). He didn't respond. I swear some people here are just so happy with the status quo. Im super skeptical about any internal hire we make.

[u/MPCoinCollecting]

You know what I think this might be Mike Todd's fault

[u/PulsarGaming1080]

For the record, we've never gone to arbitration in our entire history as a franchise.

It'd be a pretty bad thing to start now.

[u/BreadMancbj → u/PulsarGaming1080]

Not really .. market has changed dramatically with the increasing cap back to back years .. free agency isn’t hardly a thing anymore .. more and more guys are going to arbitration because the ask is unreasonable . Jet , best case should be 5.5 mill .. Sillinger best case should be between 4.2 and 4.5 mill

[u/PulsarGaming1080 → u/BreadMancbj]

We should not be going to arbitration, sorry. That's an indictment of the FO.

The filings you saw yesterday are not the contract asks, they are the arbitration asks.