The 5-Hole: Blue Jackets News and Notes – 2/23/10 – Olympic Break Edition

Every Tuesday, WFNY’s The 5-Hole brings you up to date with the goings-on of the CBJ…

The Week That Was

This Week: no games
Overall: 25-28-10, 60 points (5th division; 14th conference)

It’s Olympic Break time! Six Jackets are in Vancouver while the rest enjoy the two-week break. In this shortened 5-Hole, we’ll update how the Jackets players in the tournament are doing and any updates about the roster.

Olympic Player Update

Nobody’s really tearing it up out there, but a lot of the Jackets playing in the Olympics are more grinder-types. The two Swedes are not being counted on for their offense when one looks at how loaded that team is. Likewise, the three defensemen aren’t exactly known for their offense in the NHL, and Tyutin’s team is loaded up front anyway. The biggest “disappointment” if you can call it that would be Nash, who has been playing with Sidney Crosby and probably should have a few goals already during the tournament. Nash has had trouble finishing his chances, and both he and Crosby were –3 against the US on Sunday night. Though, as Andrew and Craig and I were discussing yesterday Nash’s physical play has been something to behold. He was totally wrecking dudes against the US on Sunday night (Aaron Portzline phrased it: Nash has “taken the body like a madman”, which I love as well). Portzline reports that Nash is being moved to a different line for the Germany game.

Up Next

The Jackets are off until March 2nd because of the Olympic break. The Olympic Roster Freeze is over on Sunday, 2/28. Look for the Jackets to explore making some trades at that time.

Full Schedule

Injury Update

There aren’t really a lot of updates to report, since the non-Olympians are largely gone from Columbus over the break. Forward Derick Brassard suffered an upper-body injury in the last game, but expects to be back on 3/2. Defenseman Mike Commodore is doing conditioning work in Minnesota during the break, which will only help him. Forward Fredrik Modin has returned to action (sore foot) and is playing with Team Sweden, as has defenseman Fedor Tyuitin (sore knee) with Team Russia. Forward Derek Dorsett (sore hand) and defenseman Anton Stalman, who missed some practice time and a game with a foot injury but are expected back when the season resumes.

The elephant in the room is defenseman Rostislav Klesla. We’ve been told he’ll be back sometime after, but haven’t heard anything since the break began.

Not much else out there to report, people. Enjoy the Olympics!