Sinking ship

However those nervous owners in Columbus decide to solve their problems, the fact club president Mike Priest and former (future?) coach Ken Hitchcock have been watching practice together from the stands at Nationwide Arena is bad form.

You might as well give Hitch a scythe and dress him in a black cloak, as far as Blue Jackets head coach Scott Arniel is concerned. Could you imagine Arniel, running a practice while his boss sits in the stands with a far more experienced replacement — who is already on the team’s payroll since being fired by the Blue Jackets two seasons ago.

That paints the picture for me in Columbus: Either Priest is so vacant that he can’t see the error in sitting in the pews with a likely replacement at his side. Or, he knows the pressure that puts on Arniel, and that is exactly why he’s doing it.

Now, take that management tactic and apply it to the rest of Priest’s domain in Columbus.

If he’s squeezing Arniel in public, what’s he saying to GM Scott Howson in private? Was it Howson’s idea to spend $33 million on James Wisniewski? Or did Priest apply similar pressure, the way Dale Tallon was pushed into signing Cristobal Huet and Brian Campbell to big, splashy deals back when the Chicago Blackhawks wanted to make some noise in their market?

The Columbus problem is the same one we have seen unfold in countless markets over the years. It goes like this:

Owner buys team, team doesn’t perform, profits wane, owner cuts payroll. Now the team doesn’t have a chance to win, and fans, spotting that ownership isn’t spending like a winner, stop coming.

Enter Priest, the team president who has promised majority owner John P. McConnell that he can solve the problem. So convincing was Priest that McConnell opens up his wallet to the extent that the Blue Jackets now have the fifth-highest payroll in the National Hockey League.

It is nothing short of ridiculous, however, that a Columbus team that sported the 27th-lowest attendance a season ago should become a top-five spender. (They are 28th this season, now that Atlanta has moved to Winnipeg.) However, the money is now spent, and the pressure is on Priest to deliver on his promises to McConnell, as the Blue Jackets stumble to a 2-9-1 start.

As the losses mount, both financially and on the ice, Priest takes to issuing defiant quotes like these:

"Let me be clear here, though. Everybody understands that the losing can’t continue."

And everybody’s favorite: "This franchise is going to win. I can’t tell you when that is, but it’s going to win."

The inference, of course, is that Priest and the owner "have their guy." And down in the dressing room, there are no less than seven players signed through 2015 or beyond. Everybody knows those guys aren’t going anywhere.

So with one foot on the shore and another on the stern of a leaky rowboat, Priest pushed Arniel and Howson out into an uncomfortable and isolated lake, under a sky full of lightning bolts.

Wisniewski takes an eight-game suspension — not the GM’s fault. Jeff Carter busts his foot — not the coach’s fault. The franchise goalie continues his spotty work — nobody’s fault other than Steve Mason himself.

Yet, as is always the case, if the president is going to show that he is engaged and sincere in his concern for McConnell’s ever-growing investment, heads have to roll.

And then there is the final ingredient: Player concern.

"The players here love what we’ve got," Rick Nash told the Columbus Dispatch. "Management, coaches… everyone’s very excited and very happy with what we have. And we wouldn’t want to lose it. "As players, you feel guilty because you’re obviously not winning, that’s the reason. But we all believe in our system, in our management. We believe in Arnie. That’s the last thing we’d want to happen."

But it’s the first thing that will happen, if guys like Nash and Mason don’t deliver on the ice.

Mark Spector is the senior columnist on sportsnet.ca