2022-2023 Blues Multi-Purpose Thread

[Stupendous Yappi]

I thought Reimer’s respectful statement when he declined to wear a pride jersey was pretty clear. That incident didn’t inspire a thread in the main bird that I saw (or maybe it was squelched.) Maybe someone can pull the quote, which I can’t manage at the moment on my phone.

To me it was a clear message of accepting the individual and agreeing hockey should be open to anyone. (I’d insert - unless you remorselessly bullied a special needs child or participated in a gang rape, tbd). But whether the majority like it or not, we live in a country where many people are tolerant of others’ freedom to make choices that they believe are counter to a morality instructed by God. Compelling speech (through wearing a pride jersey) can be seen as celebrating something that violates those views. But I don’t see any of the players involved in that doing anything to make a hostile lockerrrom or trying to exclude any individual.

If a Moslem player were being compelled to do it and objected on religious grounds, I expect the public reaction would be more understanding . Is it not OK to be a practicing Moslem and be welcome in the NHL? Of course it’s OK. It’s also OK to be a practicing Christian or whatever religious descriptor someone chooses to describe a sincerely held belief.

If the NHL is going for inclusiveness, it needs to go both directions. (Hey, Christians have been mass executed historically at times too.)There is a distinction between choosing not to celebrate something and showing actual hostility. Let players show their welcome in a way that doesn’t create moral dissonance for them individually. But trying to enforce a homogenous viewpoint on a diverse population with differing backgrounds and beliefs is a fools errand, and ends up detracting from the purpose of the events in question.

 

[Bye Bye Blueston]

I thought Reimer’s respectful statement when he declined to wear a pride jersey was pretty clear. That incident didn’t inspire a thread in the main bird that I saw (or maybe it was squelched.) Maybe someone can pull the quote, which I can’t manage at the moment on my phone.

To me it was a clear message of accepting the individual and agreeing hockey should be open to anyone. (I’d insert - unless you remorselessly bullied a special needs child or participated in a gang rape, tbd). But whether the majority like it or not, we live in a country where many people are tolerant of others’ freedom to make choices that they believe are counter to a morality instructed by God. Compelling speech (through wearing a pride jersey) can be seen as celebrating something that violates those views. But I don’t see any of the players involved in that doing anything to make a hostile lockerrrom or trying to exclude any individual.

If a Moslem player were being compelled to do it and objected on religious grounds, I expect the public reaction would be more understanding . Is it not OK to be a practicing Moslem and be welcome in the NHL? Of course it’s OK. It’s also OK to be a practicing Christian or whatever religious descriptor someone chooses to describe a sincerely held belief.

If the NHL is going for inclusiveness, it needs to go both directions. There is a distinction between choosing not to celebrate something and showing actual hostility. Let players show their welcome in a way that doesn’t create moral dissonance for them individually. But trying to enforce a homogenous viewpoint on a diverse population with differing backgrounds and beliefs is a fools errand, and ends up detracting from the purpose of the events in question.

Strongly disagree. Reimer's statement was weak sauce. He says he accepts gays but disapproves of them on religious grounds. Fine. But the Pride jersey isn't about endorsing gay sex. It's about showing the kind of love and acceptance for all that Jesus preached but Reimer apparently doesn't believe in. So Reimer can go f*** all the way off with his hypocrisy.

But Reimer doesn't have to wear the jersey. Nobody is saying bigots like him need to wear Pride jerseys. What we are saying is that the teams shouldn't surrender to the bigotry. Absolutely players should have the freedom to support or oppose the LGBTQ community, like all of us do. That is why it is so important for teams to wear the jerseys, to show the gay community that despite some bigoted players the NHL welcomes you into our community and will support you. Instead we cower to the bigots and let the gay community know that they ultimately don't matter that much to the teams. Which is sad. Because inclusiveness of bigotry isn't inclusiveness, it's condoning the bigotry.

 

[LetsGoBooze]

I just want the return of Hooters night, bring back the old arena vibes.

 

[bleedblue1223]

The problem with the idea of enforcing players to wear a Pride jersey is this. The league already has pretty loose rules on this, and with no formal policy, I don't think there is anything stopping an owner of having a Support the Police night with a thin blue line warm-up jersey to auction off for charity. In the situation where the political side is flipped, I don't think we'd have to force someone to wear that jersey if they don't want to.

The NHL definitely needs a clear policy put in place, and they should've handled this better when the Provorov situation went down, instead of just letting the teams do what they want. In the past, it probably wasn't required, but players also didn't think it was optional. In the summer, the league has to figure out what they want to do for these types of situations, they need a clear policy.

 

[BlueOil]

I thought Reimer’s respectful statement when he declined to wear a pride jersey was pretty clear. That incident didn’t inspire a thread in the main bird that I saw (or maybe it was squelched.) Maybe someone can pull the quote, which I can’t manage at the moment on my phone.

To me it was a clear message of accepting the individual and agreeing hockey should be open to anyone. (I’d insert - unless you remorselessly bullied a special needs child or participated in a gang rape, tbd). But whether the majority like it or not, we live in a country where many people are tolerant of others’ freedom to make choices that they believe are counter to a morality instructed by God. Compelling speech (through wearing a pride jersey) can be seen as celebrating something that violates those views. But I don’t see any of the players involved in that doing anything to make a hostile lockerrrom or trying to exclude any individual.

If a Moslem player were being compelled to do it and objected on religious grounds, I expect the public reaction would be more understanding . Is it not OK to be a practicing Moslem and be welcome in the NHL? Of course it’s OK. It’s also OK to be a practicing Christian or whatever religious descriptor someone chooses to describe a sincerely held belief.

If the NHL is going for inclusiveness, it needs to go both directions. (Hey, Christians have been mass executed historically at times too.)There is a distinction between choosing not to celebrate something and showing actual hostility. Let players show their welcome in a way that doesn’t create moral dissonance for them individually. But trying to enforce a homogenous viewpoint on a diverse population with differing backgrounds and beliefs is a fools errand, and ends up detracting from the purpose of the events in question.

reimer's statement is pure hypocrisy. he has "no hate" to offer, but also no support for people he says he loves, while citing jesus and the bible as the reasons he's allowed to mistreat others. it's a minefield unless you're willing to ignore the hypocrisy and it's never lost on me that many people were raised to do so. he's saying he "strives" not to mistreat them, but clearly does not think of them as equals so what does he actually strive for besides an excuse of out it? christians should be embarrassed he is misusing religion for fearful and hateful reasons and instead constantly cite religious freedom fears and ancient religious persecution, just to show off how fast they can run down a slippery slope to avoid answering the most basic questions. religion should be treated like an institution and like it has integrity, but reimer is treating it like a get out of jail free card. it cheapens every aspect of religion and it'd be nice for the community to push back when such abuses are being so openly flaunted.

as to your inclusiveness needs to go both directions comment, i agree it does. it's ALREADY CATERING TO THE GROUP YOU'RE AFRAID MIGHT SUFFER and not to the group you don't mind ignoring, so yes, let's have it go both directions instead of this stupid one reimer's on about.

 

[izzy]

Pride Night is symbolic because it says "We, the members of the ultimate in-group, recognize the equal humanity in members of an out group that are treated differently under the law in this country and in this world."

And instead they're going to take a different symbolic stand, one that protect the feelings of Russians who come from the most viciously bigoted country on the planet and whose "religious leader" is a straight up FSB agent. It's morally pathetic. This is the same thing as if there were Jewish Pride Nights during WWII but the hockey team had some unapologetic Germans on the roster and the hockey players didn't want to cause any ripples by demonstrating support for the out group, and why is it on them anyway? I deplore the moral cowardice of the players on the 22-23 St. Louis Blues.

Nearly never agree with your hockey takes, but you hit it 100% here

 

[The Note]

I thought the way the Sharks handled it was the best way to go about it. Let whoever is opposed to wearing Pride stuff opt out, but don't cancel the warmups with all the other players who would like to wear the sweater. I like the message that sends from the organization of: "you are free to not wear the Pride sweater if you like but the rest of us are going to take part". Canceling the team wearing sweaters thing just seems cowardly.

 

[BlueOil]

I thought the way the Sharks handled it was the best way to go about it. Let whoever is opposed to wearing Pride stuff opt out, but don't cancel the warmups with all the other players who would like to wear the sweater. I like the message that sends from the organization of: "you are free to not wear the Pride sweater if you like but the rest of us are going to take part". Canceling the whole thing just seems cowardly.

canceling it would've taken bigger balls than the blues used here, they didn't cancel it, just tried to obfuscate it

 

[The Note]

canceling it would've taken bigger balls than the blues used here, they didn't cancel it, just tried to obfuscate it

Fair point - I should’ve been more clear a canceling the Pride night sweaters during warmups.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

Strongly disagree. Reimer's statement was weak sauce. He says he accepts gays but disapproves of them on religious grounds. Fine. But the Pride jersey isn't about endorsing gay sex. It's about showing the kind of love and acceptance for all that Jesus preached but Reimer apparently doesn't believe in. So Reimer can go f*** all the way off with his hypocrisy.

But Reimer doesn't have to wear the jersey. Nobody is saying bigots like him need to wear Pride jerseys. What we are saying is that the teams shouldn't surrender to the bigotry. Absolutely players should have the freedom to support or oppose the LGBTQ community, like all of us do. That is why it is so important for teams to wear the jerseys, to show the gay community that despite some bigoted players the NHL welcomes you into our community and will support you. Instead we cower to the bigots and let the gay community know that they ultimately don't matter that much to the teams. Which is sad. Because inclusiveness of bigotry isn't inclusiveness, it's condoning the bigotry.

Of course you don’t agree with Reimers religious views or his efforts to live by them. We don’t have to.

To equate a nuanced view of mutual tolerance and difference of opinion with bigotry is a lazy oversimplification. Lots of religious folks support the right for gay marriage, but view the practice of homosexuality as contrary to God’s guidance for their own lives. They’re not imposing their views on someone else, but also stand by a morality they “strive to live by”. It’s immaterial if you believe hypocrisy is present.

Mutual tolerance is not bigotry. Bullying players into compelled speech is not the way to go, and would create a distraction from the purpose of these events anyway.

The purpose of these events isn’t to try and impose an opinion on the players. Getting hung up on the jerseys looks like someone is trying to make it be about that. Why? Are they a big fundraiser? There are lots of ways you could structure a Pride Night to be a strong inclusive statement without individual players being scrutinized for whether they ‘wear the ribbon’.

 

[ChicagoBlues]

Going forward, I think the NHL should leave it up to individual players to adorn Pride insignia if they choose. Easy breezy beautiful…..cover girl.

 

[Bye Bye Blueston]

Of course you don’t agree with Reimers religious views or his efforts to live by them. We don’t have to.

To equate a nuanced view of mutual tolerance and difference of opinion with bigotry is a lazy oversimplification. Lots of religious folks support the right for gay marriage, but view the practice of homosexuality as contrary to God’s guidance for their own lives. They’re not imposing their views on someone else, but also stand by a morality they “strive to live by”. It’s immaterial if you believe hypocrisy is present.

Mutual tolerance is not bigotry. Bullying players into compelled speech is not the way to go, and would create a distraction from the purpose of these events anyway.

The purpose of these events isn’t to try and impose an opinion on the players. Getting hung up on the jerseys looks like someone is trying to make it be about that. Why? Are they a big fundraiser? There are lots of ways you could structure a Pride Night to be a strong inclusive statement without individual players being scrutinized for whether they ‘wear the ribbon’.

Nobody is compelling the players. Reimer didn’t wear Pride jersey. Nobody made him do anything. I totally support his right to believe what he wants, wear what he wants, say what he wants, and have sex with who he wants. But the rest of Sharks wore them. Because the team thought it was important to show support for marginalized folks and make them feel welcome.

I only wish our team would have done so too. And any players who didn’t want to wear them don’t wear them. But our team decided that standing with gay community and making them feel welcome is something they only support up to a point. So nobody on our team will wear them. And LGTBQ folks will know they are not fully supported and welcome by Blues. And that is sad.

 

[Linkens Mastery]

Playing around on NaturalStatTrick and found this Kind of funny. This is at all strengths.

Buch-Thomas-Kyrou 37GF 17GA (+20)

Buch-Thomas W/O Kyrou 22GF 25GA (-3)

Thomas-Kyrou W/O Buch 27GF 37GA (-10)

Kyrou-Buch W/O Thomas 7GF 3 GA (+4)

Berube needs to just keep those 3 together and stop messing with it.

 

[MissouriMook]

I just want the return of Hooters night, bring back the old arena vibes.

Every night is "Hooters Night" when you've got the Uber app.

 

[BlueDream]

Nobody is compelling the players. Reimer didn’t wear Pride jersey. Nobody made him do anything. I totally support his right to believe what he wants, wear. What he wants, say what he wants, and have sex with who he wants. But the rest of Sharks wore them. Because the team thought it was important to show support for marginalized folks and make them feel welcome.

I only wish our team would have done so too. And any players who didn’t want to wear them don’t wear them. But our team decided that standing with gay community and making them feel welcome is something they only support up to a point. So nobody on our team will wear them. And LGTBQ folks will know they are not fully supported and welcome by Blues. And that is sad.

Do they feel that way, though? I know three gay Blues fans in real life who do not seem to care or even pay any attention to the Pride Nights.

I know that’s anecdotal, but the Blues have worn Pride jerseys multiple times in the past (as has every other team, I’m pretty sure). Does them not wearing them this year suddenly eliminate all those other times? I don’t understand that logic. There’s an openly gay prospect in Nashville’s system who seems to be doing okay. I’m not seeing much evidence that they’re unwelcome. And if there are some people saying that, they simply need to be ignored. With 8 billion people on the planet, there will never be a time everyone will get along and agree. Certain people will always dislike others for a ton of different reasons.

FWIW, I support gay rights completely. I’m just indifferent about any of the theme nights, as I think it’s mostly for show and not that effective. For all I care they can get rid of military nights and even the national anthem too. I don’t care either way.

 

[PocketNines]

The problem with the idea of enforcing players to wear a Pride jersey is this. The league already has pretty loose rules on this, and with no formal policy, I don't think there is anything stopping an owner of having a Support the Police night with a thin blue line warm-up jersey to auction off for charity. In the situation where the political side is flipped, I don't think we'd have to force someone to wear that jersey if they don't want to.

The NHL definitely needs a clear policy put in place, and they should've handled this better when the Provorov situation went down, instead of just letting the teams do what they want. In the past, it probably wasn't required, but players also didn't think it was optional. In the summer, the league has to figure out what they want to do for these types of situations, they need a clear policy.

It's a moral disaster on the part of the police that we automatically think of the police as the institution most opposed to allowing people in out groups to be seen as equal human beings. But the police have earned that reputation, every last ounce of it.

There are in groups the law protects but does not bind and there are out groups the law binds but does not protect. Pro athletes and police and owners of professional sports teams are among the ultimate people in the in groups. Every single game there is a nationalistic anthem and military recognition and cops and guns on the ice for the anthem. We are overwhelmed by an unending gun plague in America but guns must go on the ice in St. Louis, Missouri before games during the ritual acknowledgement of the in group institutions. It's not hypothetical, literally every game every player must and does submit to this. The idea that others have suggested that there be no politics in sports is ridiculously untethered to reality.

There is no legal requirement of these ingroupers to support the outgroupers. It's a moral issue. They can be invited to be ingroupers who support outgroupers. And they can decline, which they clearly are doing. Everyone knows more about them as people because they declined. We know they prefer the absence of tension over the presence of justice, which is how the unequal status quo is continued.

I think of this Blues roster as people who can do one thing in life well (play hockey) who are moral cowards. In no way is that impressive.

 

[Snubbed4Vezina]

Playing around on NaturalStatTrick and found this Kind of funny. This is at all strengths.

Buch-Thomas-Kyrou 37GF 17GA (+20)

Buch-Thomas W/O Kyrou 22GF 25GA (-3)

Thomas-Kyrou W/O Buch 27GF 37GA (-10)

Kyrou-Buch W/O Thomas 7GF 3 GA (+4)

Berube needs to just keep those 3 together and stop messing with it.

That would depend what having one of our 3 best offensive players on another line does to the production of the other line as well.

 

[execwrite1]

Seattle defense -

Vince Dunn

D

76

13

50

63

51

+25

Adam Larsson

D

76

7

25

32

41

27

Justin Schultz

D

68

6

25

31

38

2

Jamie Oleksiak

D

69

9

13

22

68

9

Will Borgen

D

76

3

16

19

35

8

Carson Soucy

D

73

3

12

15

63

16

Justin Faulk

D

78

11

35

46

30

-4

Torey Krug

D

59

7

24

31

47

-28

Colton Parayko

D

75

4

23

27

30

-21

Nick Leddy

D

74

2

20

22

20

2

Calle Rosen

D

45

8

10

18

8

21

Robert Bortuzzo

D

43

2

3

5

29

9

 

[Bobby Orrtuzzo]

Saw this on Facebook from a page called ‘Blues Views’ and thought it was interesting. It puts the last 12 years into perspective as we enter this potential retool/rebuild.

Yesterday, the St. Louis Blues were eliminated from playoff contention mid-season for the first time since 2011.

Below are the Blues’ numbers from 2011-12 to 2021-22. The first ranking is the Western Conference, and the second ranking is the NHL overall.

483 Wins (1st) - (3rd)
.634 PT% (1st) - (4th)
2.92 GF/GP (1st) - (6th)
2.53 GA/GP (1st) - (2nd)
+321 Goal Differential (1st) - (4th)
21.0 PP% (2nd) - (5th)
83.2 PK% (1st) - (2nd)
10 Playoff Appearances (1st) - (2nd)
50 Playoff Wins (2nd) - (7th)
1 Stanley Cup (T-3rd) - (T-5th)

There isn’t a team in the Western Conference that comes close to matching STL’s consistency over the last eleven years. It all started when good ole Ken Hitchcock took over the reigns on November 6th, 2011. The Blues went from a promising team on paper, to the greatest regular season team for the next six seasons. Mike Yeo had his fun in 2017/2018, and then Berube took STL to the promise land in 2019. From coaches, to scouts, to ownership, to the general manager….massive respect to everyone within the Blues organization for making these last eleven years happen.

Here are some more fun facts for ya:

Since 2011, The Blues and Penguins are the only two franchises in all four major sports (NHL, MLB, NFL, NBA), to not play a regular season game while eliminated from playoff contention. That’s 2 out of 124 professional sports teams. This will change tomorrow.

In that same span, the St. Louis Cardinals only played 5 games while eliminated from playoff contention. Outside of Penguins-Steelers, I don’t know if any city-combo can come close to matching that consistency.

 

[simon IC]

Saw this on Facebook from a page called ‘Blues Views’ and thought it was interesting. It puts the last 12 years into perspective as we enter this potential retool/rebuild.

Nice.
I always thought Hitchcock was underappreciated on this board. With all the influx of new talent, I think now might be a great time to reintroduce some Hitch-style hockey.

 

[Renard]

Nice.
I always thought Hitchcock was underappreciated on this board. With all the influx of new talent, I think now might be a great time to reintroduce some Hitch-style hockey.

Hitch made an immediate change for the better.

Its too bad his coaching style aliented some players, like Oshie and Cole. Too many meetings, they said.

 

[Davimir Tarablad]

The problem with the idea of enforcing players to wear a Pride jersey is this. The league already has pretty loose rules on this, and with no formal policy, I don't think there is anything stopping an owner of having a Support the Police night with a thin blue line warm-up jersey to auction off for charity. In the situation where the political side is flipped, I don't think we'd have to force someone to wear that jersey if they don't want to.

The NHL definitely needs a clear policy put in place, and they should've handled this better when the Provorov situation went down, instead of just letting the teams do what they want. In the past, it probably wasn't required, but players also didn't think it was optional. In the summer, the league has to figure out what they want to do for these types of situations, they need a clear policy.

Prior to this season, I had simply assumed it was more or less an enforced policy. Every job I've worked has had some sort of dress code, and wearing a special warmup jersey seems very much like a company enforcing a dress code policy.

 

[bleedblue1223]

Prior to this season, I had simply assumed it was more or less an enforced policy. Every job I've worked has had some sort of dress code, and wearing a special warmup jersey seems very much like a company enforcing a dress code policy.

I think it was something that most players just assumed that it was enforced, just no one ever challenged it. After Provorov, everything changed. And teams instead of putting a spotlight on individual players that choose not to wear the jersey, have decided to just cancel the entire event. I understand the logic, but I don't agree with it. NHL needs to have a clear policy with the NHLPA in the summer.

 

[Bye Bye Blueston]

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

Saw this on Facebook from a page called ‘Blues Views’ and thought it was interesting. It puts the last 12 years into perspective as we enter this potential retool/rebuild.

It’s worth noting that that type of sustained excellence doesn’t always yield a Cup. You could map a similar stretch of excellence from the Sharks the decade prior, and they never got there. Getting over the hump is special.