Torts takes another shot at Panarin, Bobrovsky and Duchene!

It’s been a rough offseason for Columbus Blue Jackets fans. After all, fans saw star players like Matt Duchene, Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky walk away via free agency for essentially nothing.

But stop talking about it to head coach John Tortorella! 

Earlier this month, the bench boss slammed the former Blue Jackets players when he met with team insider Aaron Portzline of The Athletic and questioned their decisions to “leave to go somewhere to win.”

Now that the Blue Jackets are getting busy to take over the ice for training camp, Torts had more words for the departed players when he met with media members on Wednesday.

Tortorella simply took a shot at Panarin, Bobrovsky and Duchene when he talked about the upcoming season and what he was looking forward to. He once again rubbed their decisions to leave in their faces with his comments. 

“I’m looking forward to this year because they want to be here. They want to be in this city. That’s really important as we keep on pushing through here.”

He went on to say that he doesn’t care about all the preseason chatter about Columbus struggling without the departed free agents and is ready prove everyone wrong. 

“I don’t read it but I have everybody that I see telling me about what they’ve read. It’s put a huge chip on my shoulder.”

Team general manager Jarmo Kekalainen echoed the coach’s statement, saying he wants people to stop saying his team took a step back in the summer.

“We’re going to surprise some people with the young players we have coming in.”

The Jackets are ready to prove everyone wrong it seems.