In some way, you have to respect Kekäläinen's willingness to not care what the outside world thinks of his team and swing for the fences.

He has done this before and he is not afraid to make a bold investment in the immediate future of his team, even if it is not quite ready to realistically compete.

He is doing that again this offseason with the Provorov and Severson deals.

Columbus has now made a major investment in its defense over the past few years, signing Zach Werenski to a long-term deal worth more than $9 million per year, adding Erik Gudbranson in free agency last year, drafting David Jiricek No. 6 overall in 2022, and now adding Provorov and Severson.

But how good IS that defense? And is it worthy of the salary-cap commitment they are dedicating to it?

Between Werenski, Gudbranson, Provorov and Severson the Blue Jackets are paying their top-four $24.4 million against the cap for the next few years. They have over $30 million going to their defense as a whole.

Provorov plays a lot of big minutes, but he has never really shown an ability to play them consistently well. Gudbranson's contract was a disaster from the moment pen was put to paper, and that cap hit is one of the big reasons they were forced to give away Oliver Bjorkstrand to Seattle in a salary dump trade.

In the short term, there is nothing wrong with wanting to add Severson to your roster. He is a very good player, he has strong offensive instincts, he is a great passer, and he will make them a little better. But he is also prone to mistakes defensively and has some shortcomings in his own end of the ice.

He is also already 29 years old.

That is by no means "over the hill" for an NHL player, especially a good one, but the Blue Jackets need to be thinking long-term here. No matter how much they spend on free agents and trades this offseason this is not a team that is ready to compete this season. They were one of the worst teams in the NHL a year ago and still have some glaring flaws on their roster.

Signing a non-star that is closing in on their age-30 season to a seven-or eight-year deal in free agency (which is essentially what Columbus did here) is a recipe for disaster in the NHL. Those deals do not tend to work out long-term and within three or four years, teams are usually looking for a way out of them. Either through a buyout, a salary retained trade, or a swap of undesirable contracts. That could come back to haunt Columbus in a few years when maybe it is ready to compete.

As it stands now, Columbus has about $5 million remaining under the salary cap, the team doesn't have a viable No. 1 (or No. 2) center, it has major question marks in goal and it is a team that finished 30th in goals scored a year ago. How is it going to improve that with so little salary cap space to work with?

Obviously, the potential for more deals is still out there and salary can be moved. But when Columbus had to do that a year ago to make room for its big offseason additions it saw them trade one of its best players (Bjorkstrand) for two second-round draft picks. It did not work out as planned.