NHL hall of famer Mark Recchi doing an interview after being inducted into the Flyers hall of famePhoto credit: NHL

The Columbus Blue Jackets appear to be shaking up their coaching staff heading into next season as they just announced assistant coach Mark Recchi was let go.

Athletic reporter Aaron Portzline announced the news on his X account this afternoon. He revealed that the hockey hall of fame forward will ot be asked to return to the Blue Jackets when training camps kick off next month.

Assistant coach Mark Recchi has been informed he will not be back with #CBJ next season.

That’s a rough ride for an NHL Hall of Famer w 3 Stanley Cup rings – fired after only one season after joining the franchise last Sept mid-training camp following the Babcock debacle.

It seems as though Reechi came into a bad situation and got the worst of it more than anything else. After all, he was brought in at the last minute last year after the team fired Mike Babcock before he even coached a single game for the team.

Then he went through a year of hockey where his team was miserably bad and was rewarded for it by losing his job. That’s a pretty rough year! According to Portzline, fellow assistant coach Steve McCarthy, who was brought in at the same time as Reechi, will be staying with the team.

Recchi had one year remaining on his contract w #CBJ. The club has not announced his replacement on Dean Evason’s staff.

Sounds like #CBJ assistant coach Steve McCarthy will be retained, although neither the club nor McCarthy has commented publicly on that.

As reported last week, assistant coach Jared Boll will return next season.

Even if coaching does not work out for Recchi in the long-run, he will always have his playing career to be happy for. He was underrated and one of the best players of his generation, putting up more than 1500 career points and winning three Stanley Cups, all with different teams. He had 577 career goals and 956 assists in 1652 games played.

How good was Mark Recchi?

He played 22 seasons and never had under 40 points in a full season in his career. Even in his last season at 42/43 years old he got 48 points. He finished with 577 goals and 1533 pts. In his prime he had seasons of 100-120+ pts and 40-50+ goals.