The Blue Jackets are in an interesting situation. They are right in the thick of things in the incredibly competitive Western Conference, led by standout performances from Danny Briere, Travis Zajac, Kimmo Timonen, Trevor Daley and of course starting netminder Tomas Vokoun.
Yet none of those players are likely to be considered in the top 3 at their position, even in the Western Conference.
The closest would probably be
Vokoun, whose stats are phenomenal - 24 wins, .928 save%, 2.35 gaa - but those stats make him only the 4th or 5th best goalie in the West, despite being better than any netminder plying the twine in the East.
Briere is leading the team in scoring with 43 points in 44 games, good for 13th among right wingers (7th in the West).
Zajac is one point behind with 42 points in 44 games, which is good but leaves him outside the league's top 20 centers. What has been impressive though is his clutch performance. He leads the Jackets with 8 power play goals (on a team that doesn't score on the powerplay) and while he's tied with Briere at 12 game stars, he leads the team with 7 first star kudos.
Timonen is not among the league's top scoring blueliners, but he's been very steady with a heavy workload for the Jackets. He has 4 goals and 18 points along with a +9 rating, but what's impressive is that he's been steady and unflappable despite a heavy workload of 25+ minutes per game, including playing on the first PP and PK units. If this team could score with the man advantage, he'd find himself among the league leaders in defensive scoring.
Daley is perhaps the least obvious but most interesting case. Starting the season moving between the second and third pairings and the Jackets' bench, Daley has really stepped up since veteran Marek Zidlicky was moved, and has claimed a spot on the team's top pairing, playing over 20 minutes per game and boasting a standout +19 rating, the best BY FAR on the Jackets (more than double the next highest dman on a team with several players in the minus column), tied for second highest in the league.
In the absence of league-leading performers, some credit must be given to
Head Coach Mike Babcock for getting the most out of a balanced squad, and
GM Doug Emerson for a year of creative moves to assemble the (currently) leading team in the extremely challenging Central Division.
Hopefully we'll see at least one of these names honoured at the All Star game, but we'll settle for winning the Division.
