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After 15-year absence, an emotional Barry Brennan returns to Blue Jackets' staff
After 15-year absence, an emotional Barry Brennan returns to Blue Jackets' staff

New York Times

time31 minutes ago

  • Sport
  • New York Times

After 15-year absence, an emotional Barry Brennan returns to Blue Jackets' staff

COLUMBUS, Ohio — In the summer of 2001, the Columbus Blue Jackets hired Barry Brennan to be the strength and conditioning coach for their American Hockey League team in Syracuse, N.Y. Part of the gig was to help with the NHL club's development camp in early July. 'I drove all night — 12 hours — from Ottawa to Columbus to get there early in the morning, because I couldn't freaking wait to get started,' Brennan said. 'I got to the rink (Nationwide Arena), was walking around trying to find the dressing room, and just pinching myself that I was working in an NHL rink. Advertisement 'When I finally found the dressing room, a guy was sitting on a chair right next to the door. The guy. I knew exactly who it was, and I honestly almost fainted.' There aren't many Blue Jackets coaches or staff who have been with the organization long enough to have had a personal interaction with franchise founder John H. McConnell, who died in 2009. But Brennan is one of the lucky few. And it's a big reason Brennan was so excited — almost to the point of tears, he said — to return to the Blue Jackets on Thursday, when GM Don Waddell announced his hiring as the club's new strength and conditioning coach. He last held the job in 2010. 'This whole time, through the interview process and in the last day or so since I found out I was coming back, I've been thinking about that (interaction) with Mr. Mac,' Brennan said. 'He reached out his hand, shook mine and said, 'You must be Barry. Happy you're here.' 'It was so genuine. What owner does that? I was a minor-league guy, a peon. It was so meaningful to me, and I walked away saying to myself, 'This is where I belong, and I'm going to do everything I can for that man and his hockey team.' I will never forget it. 'This place just means so much to me. I mean … I'm getting emotional, but it does. This city, this organization … these fans. To get this opportunity … I'm just so freakin' thrilled about what we're going to get done here, and I can't wait to get started.' Waddell said he was sent 'so, so many' applications for the job, which came open shortly after the season ended in April when previous strength and conditioning coach Kevin Collins was among a wave of support staff whose contracts were not renewed. He spent months cutting the list down to four or five candidates, then went into hyperdrive talking to mutual contacts around the league. Advertisement NHL legend Sergei Fedorov, who played for the Blue Jackets when Brennan was working in Columbus, crafted a handwritten letter to persuade Waddel. Fedorov admired Brennan's work so much that he took him along to Russia as strength and conditioning coach when Fedorov was general manager, and later coach, of CSKA Moscow. It also meant a phone call from Waddell's longtime compatriot Rick Dudley, along with other Blue Jackets luminaries — director of player personnel Rick Nash, assistant coach Jared Boll, team services director Aarron Johnson, broadcaster Jody Shelley — who were all players when Brennan ran the Blue Jackets' weight room. 'Usually when you talk to as many people as I talked to, you're going to find somebody who has some kind of a complaint or an issue with somebody,' Waddell said. 'I talked to a lot of people. Not just people in this building, but all around the league, around hockey. Nobody had anything negative to say. It was all glowing. 'His track record is impressive. You don't put that together without knowing what you're doing. And his work ethic is tremendous. But his passion for the job … and his passion specifically for Columbus, really stood out.' Brennan spent four seasons working for the Blue Jackets' AHL club before he took over in Columbus, spending five seasons with the Blue Jackets (2005-06 to 2009-10), including the franchise's first Stanley Cup playoff berth in 2009. After Columbus, he spent one season with the Atlanta Thrashers, but didn't make the move when the franchise relocated to Winnipeg in 2011. Waddell was the Thrashers' club president during Brennan's one season in Atlanta. Over the last 15 years, Brennan has worked in Russia's KHL and operated a gym in Ottawa, working with NHL players and prospects, professional boxers, etc. When Brennan and Fedorov arrived in Moscow, CSKA was the fifth-worst team in the 23-team KHL. In the years since, they've had the best record in the league six times, won three Gagarin Cups as the league champion and finished as runner-up three times. Advertisement Fedorov invited Brennan as one of his guests when he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2015. Waddell said Brennan's expertise and experience, along with his passion for the job, were the reasons he was picked. But his experience with CSKA should come in handy with Russians Yegor Chinakhov, Kirill Marchenko, Ivan Provorov and Dmitry Voronkov on the roster. The Blue Jackets also have a plethora of Russian prospects: goaltenders Pyotr Andreyanov and Sergei Ivanov, forward Kirill Dolzhenkov, and defenseman Nikolai Makarov, who may come to North America over the next several seasons. 'You have to be able to get 22 or 23 guys in the room to believe what you're saying,' Waddell said. 'We feel like he's the guy who can do that.' Brennan takes over a Blue Jackets roster that is not only blessed with some of the NHL's best young talent but was also one of the league's biggest surprises last season by finishing just two points out of a playoff spot. It's also a club that has been overwhelmed by injuries in recent seasons. The Jackets had 309 man-games lost to injury last season, fourth-most in the NHL. That marked the fifth time in six seasons they exceeded 300 man-games lost in a season, including a franchise-record 563 in 2022-23. Ryan Gadbois, an assistant under Collins the last four seasons, will remain in that capacity under Brennan, although Waddell said he was impressed with how Gadbois handled summer workout instruction with players over the summer, during development camp, etc. Ben Eaves will enter his sixth season as the AHL Cleveland strength and conditioning coach. 'I told (Gadbois) and (Eaves) that we're all going to work together, all pulling the rope in the right direction,' said Brennan, 62. 'They're going to be the guys who take over for me, so I want to help show them the path and let them run. It's a group effort.' Advertisement Even as the years ticked by, Brennan said, he always had a strange sense that his time in Columbus wasn't finished. When he returned to Columbus for a Bruce Springsteen concert in the spring of 2024, Johnson showed Brennan the refurbished dressing room at Nationwide Arena, and the fire burned even hotter. The last couple of days, Brennan said, have been emotional. 'I watched every Blue Jackets game I could, even when I was over in Russia,' Brennan said. 'I poured everything into Columbus. That place means everything to me. Everything. To come back there … man, I can't even begin to describe it. 'I'm coming back to finish the job we started. From the day I left, I wanted to come back here and help this team get to the playoffs. I feel like this team is right on the edge. There's some work to do, absolutely, but this can be special. I want a Stanley Cup for Columbus. To be part of that would be the dream of a lifetime.' (Top photo of Barry Brennan with Alexander Radulov: Courtesy of Barry Brennan)

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