Here are four takeaways from the interview.
1. Versatile experience
Kekäläinen has held a variety of roles in NHL front offices: four years as a European scout with Ottawa, followed by three as the club’s director of player personnel; seven years with St. Louis, as director of amateur scouting and then as assistant general manager; and more than a decade as general manager for Columbus.
Between his stops in St. Louis and Columbus, he spent three years as general manager for Jokerit, one of the top teams in Finland’s professional league.
"I have a pretty versatile background as far as what I've done in my life,” he said. “I have a master's degree in business management, but I did the amateur scouting because I wanted to show everybody that I'm willing to pay my dues and do the hard work to get where I want to get to. But when you do that for 15 years, then people might start seeing you differently. So, I wanted to kind of change my resume a little bit by going back and managing a team, and it was one of the top teams in the Finnish League.”
2. Willingness to go all-in
Kekäläinen’s tenure in Columbus was defined in part by his willingness to push his chips to the middle of the table while the Blue Jackets were experiencing their greatest run of success in franchise history, four consecutive playoff seasons from 2016 to 2020.
That run saw Kekäläinen not only trade for superstar talent such as Artemi Panarin, Matt Duchene, and Seth Jones, but also hold onto those players as they approached free agency rather than trade them for future assets.
The reason? He saw a chance to win the Stanley Cup, and was not willing to jeopardize that potential for future assets.
“If you firmly believe you have a chance to win the Cup – and I'm not talking about a one-in-100 or one-in-a-million chance –but if you firmly believe that you have a chance to win the Cup, at making the playoffs and winning the cup, I think you got to do everything in your power to help the team to get through the finish line, and if it takes a little sacrifice for the future, so be it.
“You can always recoup some of those assets if you have to tear it down a bit, which we did in my in my previous stop in Columbus. But I think the players in the locker room expect that. I think the coaches expect that. I think the whole organization should have that mindset, that if you have a chance to go for it, you're going to go for it.”
3. Dreams of the Cup
Kekäläinen is not shy about stating his goal for the organization: a Stanley Cup.
“I've dreamt about it many times and will keep doing that, because I believe in that,” he said. “I think you’ve got to dream big. I think it's easier to commit when you're even talking about it. … That puts us on notice that, also, we’ve got to put the work in to have that chance. So yes, I always, every year, watch the game, the final game, and the moment they lift the Cup. And I'm going to keep doing that until we do it with our team.”
4. Family lessons
Kekäläinen announced on social media Sunday that his father, Kari, had passed away at 82 following a long-term illness.
Kari Kekäläinen played professionally in Finland and had a profound impact on Jarmo’s hockey career. But Jarmo credited his parents first and foremost with prioritizing education, which has been crucial to his career in management.
“My father introduced me to hockey at a young age, and was my coach until I was 15, 16 years old, and I'm thankful for everything that I ever learned in hockey [from] him,” he said.
“But they were always adamant about school. They did not want me to just think that I'm going to make it as a hockey player and that's it. They were always on me about, ‘Take care of your school, take care of your school,’ and I'm very thankful for that because that's a big reason why I'm here, too.”
Kekäläinen also shared that his family owns a popular bakery in his hometown Kuopio, where Jarmo and his two brothers - both of whom are now NHL scouts - worked summers growing up.
"My father's grandmother started it, and it's got a big name in Finland," he said. "It's very small, but they sell everything they make. So, it's a great business still, and we're very proud of that. They both come from humble beginnings, and I think the values were strong growing up, and a big part of how me and my brothers were brought up.”
