2021-2022 S Blues Multi-Purpose Thread Part 3

[Mike Liut]

I wouldn’t be surprised if we are better than last year.

 

[BlueDream]

I love how we beat Minnesota in the playoffs, both teams have similar offseasons (we lose Perron, they lose Fiala; not much else happened) and now they are ‘clearly’ better than us? Lol.

The doom and gloom is getting a bit much and this is from someone who is absolutely NOT always optimistic.

Having NINE 20-goal scorers is basically an anomaly. It’s insane. That basically never happens.

The fact that we are returning 8 of those guys is pretty damn good. You cannot expect to roll a lineup with nine 20-goal scorers multiple years in a row. It’s just not possible.

I also think it’s hard to say we took a step back when Colorado did, too.

If we re-play our playoff series against them and we remove Perron from our team, and Kadri, Burakovsky and Kuemper from theirs, do they beat us? If everyone else is fully healthy, I am not so sure. You can make a definite case for us.

 

[Reality Czech]

New JR piece in the Athletic is just impossibly stupid. Are the Blues worse than last year? Of course they are. Their already horrific defense stayed the same and goaltending and forwards got substantially worse. There is a definite chance the Blues miss the playoffs this year without a major trade. Only team in the division that is clearly worse is Chicago. Minnesota and Colorado are clearly better. Then it’s a mess between Winnipeg, Nashville, and Dallas. Blues will probably get in because the Pacific is still terrible, but not much else.

How "horrific" can the Blues defense be if they were 10th in the NHL in goals against per game and about league average in shots against? Our defensive stats are almost the exact same as Colorado. Yes, it could be better but horrific seems a bit extreme.

OK, people are disappointed we lost Perron but I'm not sure why anyone would be surprised defensive depth would be a priority after watching AHL guys play playoff games for us a couple months ago.

 

[TK 421]

New JR piece in the Athletic is just impossibly stupid. Are the Blues worse than last year? Of course they are. Their already horrific defense stayed the same and goaltending and forwards got substantially worse. There is a definite chance the Blues miss the playoffs this year without a major trade. Only team in the division that is clearly worse is Chicago. Minnesota and Colorado are clearly better. Then it’s a mess between Winnipeg, Nashville, and Dallas. Blues will probably get in because the Pacific is still terrible, but not much else.

Ok bear with me here, it might not be as bad as you're thinking.

Let's start with the defense. They aren't really the same because we started the year without Nick Leddy last season so right off the bat we're in a better spot just having him in training camp. Furthermore we never saw this defense all in a game together in the PO's, Leddy concussed G1 vs. Minnesota, Krug got injured towards the end of the regular season then again against Minnesota and never saw the ice vs the Avs, Scandella was in and out with an injury etc. It doesn't seem all that fair to me to judge a group that never really got to play together so this could end up much better than what you're currently thinking.

Re: Goaltending

I'm not sure we're actually worse here but who knows rn so why get too worked up about it. The key aspect to goaltending working out is not forcing too big a workload on your starter so Greiss only job is making sure he gives us enough starts that Binny isn't asked to do too much prior to the PO's where we need him fresh. I anticipate Greiss getting a higher % of starts down the stretch run to accomplish this.

Re: Forwards

Hard disagree that we got substantially worse here. Acciari is a big upgrade on Bozak and we're adding Neighbours to the bottom 6 as well. Toropchenko was a revelation and we'll have him back in December. Bolduc has a chance to compete against Brown, Frk, Walker Kostin and Leivo for another bottom 6 spot and he has shooting ability beyond that fields capabilities that give him an edge. Perron did most of his scoring on the PP, I think it's reasonable to suggest others can step up in that role and replace most of what he did on that unit.

 

[joe galiba]

I am not so sure we are worse in goal
Greiss has a very solid track record and Husso really only has half a season of being good
they are goalies so who knows

on D we are certainly improved going into this season vs going into last season

at forward - can Barbi approximate what he did last year?
can we replace the one timer on pp1?
and i think 5v5 we won’t miss Perron

 

[Itsnotatrap]

Not saying the PP will be as good or better, but Kyrou seems custom built for the power play, and he should get between a 25-50% increase in time there.

 

[Xerloris]

New JR piece in the Athletic is just impossibly stupid. Are the Blues worse than last year? Of course they are. Their already horrific defense stayed the same and goaltending and forwards got substantially worse. There is a definite chance the Blues miss the playoffs this year without a major trade. Only team in the division that is clearly worse is Chicago. Minnesota and Colorado are clearly better. Then it’s a mess between Winnipeg, Nashville, and Dallas. Blues will probably get in because the Pacific is still terrible, but not much else.

This entire post is dumb as f***

Ok bear with me here, it might not be as bad as you're thinking.

Let's start with the defense. They aren't really the same because we started the year without Nick Leddy last season so right off the bat we're in a better spot just having him in training camp. Furthermore we never saw this defense all in a game together in the PO's, Leddy concussed G1 vs. Minnesota, Krug got injured towards the end of the regular season then again against Minnesota and never saw the ice vs the Avs, Scandella was in and out with an injury etc. It doesn't seem all that fair to me to judge a group that never really got to play together so this could end up much better than what you're currently thinking.

Re: Goaltending

I'm not sure we're actually worse here but who knows rn so why get too worked up about it. The key aspect to goaltending working out is not forcing too big a workload on your starter so Greiss only job is making sure he gives us enough starts that Binny isn't asked to do too much prior to the PO's where we need him fresh. I anticipate Greiss getting a higher % of starts down the stretch run to accomplish this.

Re: Forwards

Hard disagree that we got substantially worse here. Acciari is a big upgrade on Bozak and we're adding Neighbours to the bottom 6 as well. Toropchenko was a revelation and we'll have him back in December. Bolduc has a chance to compete against Brown, Frk, Walker Kostin and Leivo for another bottom 6 spot and he has shooting ability beyond that fields capabilities that give him an edge. Perron did most of his scoring on the PP, I think it's reasonable to suggest others can step up in that role and replace most of what he did on that unit.

You shouldn't give that guy any attention. He's clearly out of his mind.

 

[Falco Lombardi]

If you focus on only the Blues, it’s understandable to be frustrated and doom and gloom. They certainly don’t feel like a contender for the Cup.

But missing the playoffs feels like a stretch. How much/little they do when they get there is where I think most of the discourse is at but they could finish anywhere from 2nd-4th in the Central and it wouldn’t be too surprising

 

[LGB]

Not saying the PP will be as good or better, but Kyrou seems custom built for the power play, and he should get between a 25-50% increase in time there.

If he learns to be more patient. Right now on the PP he gives the puck away way too often.

 

[Bye Bye Blueston]

Ten ranks Blues left wings as elite group, one of only 3 in league at top level: Grading every NHL team's left wing depth - TSN.ca

 

[Brian39]

Ten ranks Blues left wings as elite group, one of only 3 in league at top level: Grading every NHL team's left wing depth - TSN.ca

For those too lazy to scroll to the bottom of the article, this is under the assumption that Saad, Buch, Barby and Walker will be the 4 LWs. So it isn't as if we got to that tier on the assumption that Schenn would be a LW.

FWIW, I think that he is putting a bit too much weight on the bottom 2 players and not enough weight on top end talent. The Rangers are in the middle tier despite having Panarin and Krieder as their top 2 LWs. Same thing for Winnipeg despite their Connor/Ehlers duo. Depth is important, but I think there is a bit too much weight given to Barby/Walker to bump our group all the way to elite (tier 1) if those two duos can't get their teams above average (tier 3).

Based on this article, I think we will also be in the top tier for centers ROR, Thomas, Schenn, Acciari is pretty damn good top to bottom. We definitely won't be in the top tier for RWs though. I'd wager we will be in tier 3. Kyrou and Tarasenko is a really good top 6, but then he will likely either use two of Leivo/Torpo/Brown or he will assume that we use a prospect and grade that prospect below replacement. That is exactly what brought down Winnipeg/NYR to tier 3 despite having a great top 6, so we will probably fall into that group.

The offense is still going to be really, really good.

 

[Brian39]

If he learns to be more patient. Right now on the PP he gives the puck away way too often.

Last year Kyrou was 10th in the NHL in points per 60 on the PP (among guys with 60+ minutes of PP time). That was good for 2nd best on our team (Perron was 1st on the team and 5th league-wide).

Kyrou's not a perfect player, but he is among the league's best on the PP and I don't think he needs to change his play in order to merit top unit time this year.

 

[LGB]

Last year Kyrou was 10th in the NHL in points per 60 on the PP (among guys with 60+ minutes of PP time). That was good for 2nd best on our team (Perron was 1st on the team and 5th league-wide).

Kyrou's not a perfect player, but he is among the league's best on the PP and I don't think he needs to change his play in order to merit top unit time this year.

You're right. Very surprised by that.

 

[Xanadude]

We'll miss Perron's presence on the PP but I'm quite optimistic about this team's chances. Health and age are a concern (as is the case for 90% of the league), but I honestly think we can give anyone a run for their money in a 7 game series.

Now, winning 4 of those in a row? That'll take some luck and some of our young guys really stepping up...but I'm very confident that this roster will land somewhere in the top 3 of the central by the time next year's playoffs roll around.

 

[WeWentBlues]

Great article by JR today (and I'm not one to praise JR).

David Perron 'still in a little bit of shock' over 'hurtful' Blues departure

The 34-year-old could have seen himself living in St. Louis in the future, but doesn't know if that's possible anymore.

theathletic.com

 

[542365]

Huge Army fan, but the way he handled the Perron situation is simply unacceptable.

 

[Brian39]

I love how that article simultaneously reports that the Blues never made a formal offer and also made a formal offer of 2 years at $4M AAV.

I still would have liked Perron at the contract he signed and I think it was a mistake to let him walk given what his market value turned out to be. But this "the Blues never even made an offer" narrative has gotten out of control. We made an offer before the season started that asked him to take a discount. He (correctly IMO) declined. There were conversations after the season and both sides were clearly still far apart. It is clear from that article that Perron (again, correctly) stayed out of conversations and had his agent handle them.

It's pretty obvious that Army wouldn't budge off his offer during conversations and that Perron told his agent he wasn't interested in signing here if Army didn't make a better offer. So the conversation died. Again, I think Army should have budged. But that is different than this narrative that Army was silent and never made any effort to sign him

 

[STL fan in MN]

I love how that article simultaneously reports that the Blues never made a formal offer and also made a formal offer of 2 years at $4M AAV.

I still would have liked Perron at the contract he signed and I think it was a mistake to let him walk given what his market value turned out to be. But this "the Blues never even made an offer" narrative has gotten out of control. We made an offer before the season started that asked him to take a discount. He (correctly IMO) declined. There were conversations after the season and both sides were clearly still far apart. It is clear from that article that Perron (again, correctly) stayed out of conversations and had his agent handle them.

It's pretty obvious that Army wouldn't budge off his offer during conversations and that Perron told his agent he wasn't interested in signing here if Army didn't make a better offer. So the conversation died. Again, I think Army should have budged. But that is different than this narrative that Army was silent and never made any effort to sign him

While the scenario you lay out here could be true, there’s a lot of details regarding the back and forth convos we just don’t know that you are guessing at here.

Also, you oftentimes have some of the best posts here so no need to play dumb with your first paragraph. It’s pretty easy to understand the context that a lowball offer was made about a year ago (one source said it was a 1 year offer, another said it was 2) but then once this season was over, there was no formal offer.

And it seems pretty clear to me that it’s how things were handled this off-season is what rubbed Perron the wrong way. My impression is that Army seemed to string Perron along a bit and the situation was handled poorly.

 

[Robb_K]

I love how that article simultaneously reports that the Blues never made a formal offer and also made a formal offer of 2 years at $4M AAV.

I still would have liked Perron at the contract he signed and I think it was a mistake to let him walk given what his market value turned out to be. But this "the Blues never even made an offer" narrative has gotten out of control. We made an offer before the season started that asked him to take a discount. He (correctly IMO) declined. There were conversations after the season and both sides were clearly still far apart. It is clear from that article that Perron (again, correctly) stayed out of conversations and had his agent handle them.

It's pretty obvious that Army wouldn't budge off his offer during conversations and that Perron told his agent he wasn't interested in signing here if Army didn't make a better offer. So the conversation died. Again, I think Army should have budged. But that is different than this narrative that Army was silent and never made any effort to sign him

I think it was much more about the term than the AAV. Army wanted to sign Thomas, ROR and Kyrou to long-term contracts, and knew that he could only keep Perron for one more year or probably lose a much younger talented player, or ROR going forward after 2022-23. So he balked at giving Perron the 3 year contract he wanted originally, and even decided not to offer a 2-year guaranteed contract. So Perron refused the one year, and there was no chance for an agreement. Perron would be 37 years old at the end of the 3-years, and 36 at the end of 2. We saw how fast Backes fell apart. And, although Steen's declined play declined more slowly and steadily, it fell off quite a bit after 35. I, too would have liked to have Perron back for 2 years at $4.75 million, but I wouldn't want to lose a talented young player with a lot of upside to keep him that second year.

 

[Robb_K]

While the scenario you lay out here could be true, there’s a lot of details regarding the back and forth convos we just don’t know that you are guessing at here.

Also, you oftentimes have some of the best posts here so no need to play dumb with your first paragraph. It’s pretty easy to understand the context that a lowball offer was made about a year ago (one source said it was a 1 year offer, another said it was 2) but then once this season was over, there was no formal offer.

And it seems pretty clear to me that it’s how things were handled this off-season is what rubbed Perron the wrong way. My impression is that Army seemed to string Perron along a bit and the situation was handled poorly.

I think that is very similar to the way Army is handling Tarasenko, - telling him he'd like to keep him (IF the cap situation could be worked out) and that he'll try to clear Cap room, and he "might" be able to offer him (maybe a) mid-term contract (4 to 5) years (hoping for that, but knowing, deep down, that that is almost certain to not happen). In both cases, he was hoping for a miracle, but knew in his heart that he'll lose both. And that will leave a bad taste in both of their mouths.

 

[Linkens Mastery]

I think that is very similar to the way Army is handling Tarasenko, - telling him he'd like to keep him (IF the cap situation could be worked out) and that he'll try to clear Cap room, and he "might" be able to offer him (maybe a) mid-term contract (4 to 5) years (hoping for that, but knowing, deep down, that that is almost certain to not happen). In both cases, he was hoping for a miracle, but knew in his heart that he'll lose both. And that will leave a bad taste in both of their mouths.

Two completely different things. Perron wanted to be here but because of cap and other reasons DA parted ways. Tarasenko doesn't even want to be here anymore. Tarasenko is going to play out his contract here (if he doesn't get traded) and bounce.

 

[WeWentBlues]

Armstrong can still fix this! I hear Marco really likes it in Detroit. Army needs to work the phones with his new favorite trading partner.

"Steve, hey its your buddy Doug. Listen. I really screwed things up with David and at home! I've had to sleep on the couch since July 13th as David was my wife's favorite Blue.

What would it take to send David back home at a number we can fit into our cap? We can send our 2023 1st in this upcoming loaded draft class. We will also throw in some sweeteners to make it worth your while with any prospect in our system outside of the top two guys. We also have this guy Marco Scandella who really wants to play in Detroit. I have also named you Assistant GM to Team Canada."

 

[Brian39]

While the scenario you lay out here could be true, there’s a lot of details regarding the back and forth convos we just don’t know that you are guessing at here.

Also, you oftentimes have some of the best posts here so no need to play dumb with your first paragraph. It’s pretty easy to understand the context that a lowball offer was made about a year ago (one source said it was a 1 year offer, another said it was 2) but then once this season was over, there was no formal offer.

And it seems pretty clear to me that it’s how things were handled this off-season is what rubbed Perron the wrong way. My impression is that Army seemed to string Perron along a bit and the situation was handled poorly.

I'm not guessing, I'm taking Perron's words at face value.

"They were talking, but it was just talking,” Perron said. “It was never really serious from what I was hearing on my end. We were just hoping to get something to think about. I’m guessing contract situations like that, you can talk for a while and eventually there’s an offer and then it gets done in a minute. But it’s not like there was anything that I was getting excited about."

How else do you interpret that besides Army not budging from the previous offer, Perron not considering that a serious effort to keep him, and that lack of common ground functionally ending negotiations? Are you saying that they were possibly just talking about other topics and never even talked about a potential contract? Perron's lack of excitement makes it clear that some contractual terms/structure was passed along to Perron by his agent and that it wasn't at all within his consideration range.

I'm not playing dumb. I'm pointing out that this distinction between discussing terms and a "formal offer" is asinine when Perron rejected a formal offer and there is zero indication that he countered. The story has morphed from JR saying 'neither side would confirm that an offer has been made,' to Perron going on the radio and saying he was never presented with any offer from the Blues, to JR then citing his own 'I can't confirm' story as proof that no formal offer was made. Meanwhile we have hard confirmation from multiple sources (including Perron) that a firm offer was made months ago and Perron himself very clearly wasn't at all interested in taking it. Perron's agent stated that he and Army had numerous productive conversations about Perron with Army between the end of the season and camp.

It is painfully obvious that there was plenty of discussion but that the two sides were so far apart that formal offers weren't exchanged this summer. That is much different than the notion that Army never even gave Perron a chance to stay.

This notion that Army didn't even try or make any type of offer isn't true. Army played hardball on a player that he either thought would take a discount and/or who he didn't view as essential to the team's future. Perron felt disrespected and decided to move on unless Army came back with something better than the hometown discount offer. Army never did and Perron moved on. I have zero animosity toward Perron and will be giving him a standing ovation when he returns in white and red. I think it was a mistake for Army to play hardball with him.

But it is incredibly frustrating that the guy who is supposed to be our best insider can't even accurately portray the series of events in his post-mortem article that includes a 1 on 1 long-form interview with the player. Giving Perron hundreds of words to express his (absolutely fair/justified) emotions about the negotiations without accurately summarizing those negotiations or pinning him down on the formal offer he did in fact reject is bad reporting. When the story has become 'the team didn't make an offer' you have an obligation to flesh out the differences between 'just talking,' 'formal offer,' and the timeline of what happened.

 

[Bye Bye Blueston]

I'm not guessing, I'm taking Perron's words at face value.

"They were talking, but it was just talking,” Perron said. “It was never really serious from what I was hearing on my end. We were just hoping to get something to think about. I’m guessing contract situations like that, you can talk for a while and eventually there’s an offer and then it gets done in a minute. But it’s not like there was anything that I was getting excited about."

How else do you interpret that besides Army not budging from the previous offer, Perron not considering that a serious effort to keep him, and that lack of common ground functionally ending negotiations? Are you saying that they were possibly just talking about other topics and never even talked about a potential contract? Perron's lack of excitement makes it clear that some contractual terms/structure was passed along to Perron by his agent and that it wasn't at all within his consideration range.

I'm not playing dumb. I'm pointing out that this distinction between discussing terms and a "formal offer" is asinine when Perron rejected a formal offer and there is zero indication that he countered. The story has morphed from JR saying 'neither side would confirm that an offer has been made,' to Perron going on the radio and saying he was never presented with any offer from the Blues, to JR then citing his own 'I can't confirm' story as proof that no formal offer was made. Meanwhile we have hard confirmation from multiple sources (including Perron) that a firm offer was made months ago and Perron himself very clearly wasn't at all interested in taking it. Perron's agent stated that he and Army had numerous productive conversations about Perron with Army between the end of the season and camp.

It is painfully obvious that there was plenty of discussion but that the two sides were so far apart that formal offers weren't exchanged this summer. That is much different than the notion that Army never even gave Perron a chance to stay.

This notion that Army didn't even try or make any type of offer isn't true. Army played hardball on a player that he either thought would take a discount and/or who he didn't view as essential to the team's future. Perron felt disrespected and decided to move on unless Army came back with something better than the hometown discount offer. Army never did and Perron moved on. I have zero animosity toward Perron and will be giving him a standing ovation when he returns in white and red. I think it was a mistake for Army to play hardball with him.

But it is incredibly frustrating that the guy who is supposed to be our best insider can't even accurately portray the series of events in his post-mortem article that includes a 1 on 1 long-form interview with the player. Giving Perron hundreds of words to express his (absolutely fair/justified) emotions about the negotiations without accurately summarizing those negotiations or pinning him down on the formal offer he did in fact reject is bad reporting. When the story has become 'the team didn't make an offer' you have an obligation to flesh out the differences between 'just talking,' 'formal offer,' and the timeline of what happened.

I could see a scenario having occurred where Army tells agent “cap is tight. We aren’t going to be able to improve on what we discussed prior to the season” and agent responding “yeah, that ain’t gonna work”. This isn’t club blowing him off, it’s frank discussion of what was possible from their perspective and agent/player saying no. But you could characterize it as no offer if you like.

 

[STL fan in MN]

I'm not guessing, I'm taking Perron's words at face value.

"They were talking, but it was just talking,” Perron said. “It was never really serious from what I was hearing on my end. We were just hoping to get something to think about. I’m guessing contract situations like that, you can talk for a while and eventually there’s an offer and then it gets done in a minute. But it’s not like there was anything that I was getting excited about."

How else do you interpret that besides Army not budging from the previous offer, Perron not considering that a serious effort to keep him, and that lack of common ground functionally ending negotiations? Are you saying that they were possibly just talking about other topics and never even talked about a potential contract? Perron's lack of excitement makes it clear that some contractual terms/structure was passed along to Perron by his agent and that it wasn't at all within his consideration range.

I'm not playing dumb. I'm pointing out that this distinction between discussing terms and a "formal offer" is asinine when Perron rejected a formal offer and there is zero indication that he countered. The story has morphed from JR saying 'neither side would confirm that an offer has been made,' to Perron going on the radio and saying he was never presented with any offer from the Blues, to JR then citing his own 'I can't confirm' story as proof that no formal offer was made. Meanwhile we have hard confirmation from multiple sources (including Perron) that a firm offer was made months ago and Perron himself very clearly wasn't at all interested in taking it. Perron's agent stated that he and Army had numerous productive conversations about Perron with Army between the end of the season and camp.

It is painfully obvious that there was plenty of discussion but that the two sides were so far apart that formal offers weren't exchanged this summer. That is much different than the notion that Army never even gave Perron a chance to stay.

This notion that Army didn't even try or make any type of offer isn't true. Army played hardball on a player that he either thought would take a discount and/or who he didn't view as essential to the team's future. Perron felt disrespected and decided to move on unless Army came back with something better than the hometown discount offer. Army never did and Perron moved on. I have zero animosity toward Perron and will be giving him a standing ovation when he returns in white and red. I think it was a mistake for Army to play hardball with him.

But it is incredibly frustrating that the guy who is supposed to be our best insider can't even accurately portray the series of events in his post-mortem article that includes a 1 on 1 long-form interview with the player. Giving Perron hundreds of words to express his (absolutely fair/justified) emotions about the negotiations without accurately summarizing those negotiations or pinning him down on the formal offer he did in fact reject is bad reporting. When the story has become 'the team didn't make an offer' you have an obligation to flesh out the differences between 'just talking,' 'formal offer,' and the timeline of what happened.

Ok. So your beef is more with JR’s writing. I can agree with that. His style has always left a lot to be desired. I’ve more or less accepted that JR is who he is so I’m not going to constantly complain about it but it does suck that the best we have is him, Strick, JT and Timmerman.

And I can totally get behind this paragraph:

This notion that Army didn't even try or make any type of offer isn't true. Army played hardball on a player that he either thought would take a discount and/or who he didn't view as essential to the team's future. Perron felt disrespected and decided to move on unless Army came back with something better than the hometown discount offer. Army never did and Perron moved on. I have zero animosity toward Perron and will be giving him a standing ovation when he returns in white and red. I think it was a mistake for Army to play hardball with him.