I have zero criticisms about the current prospect pool. At the end of the day, the prospect pool is shallow because Army went out and got an above-average 1C and a 1C/2C tweener in their primes. ROR had 5 years on a great cap number while Schenn had 3 years on a great cap number which was followed up by an 8 year extension that will hurt down the line. But worst case scenario, the sum result on Schenn is 5 years at a good-to-great AAV, a couple years on a 'meh' AAV and then 4 years of vast overpayment. That is absolutely a better long-term contribution than the expected medium-and-long-term contributions of picks number 14, 26, 27, 31, and 49 (spread out over 6 years). Especially when you factor in the large amount of dead cap money taken off the books in those trades.
Go look at the players available at pick #14 in 2018. The Flyers picked Joel Farabee. He has played 107 NHL games. No one drafted after him has hit the 100 NHL game mark. It is still
way too early to give up on every player in that draft class, but there are going to be a lot of busts among the players that were realistic options for us at pick 14. I like Farabee, but I'm not sold that he will ever be capable of contributing Schenn's ultimate/final contribution to the Blues.
Look at the guys drafted at 27 or later in 2017. We traded up to get Kostin at 31, but even assuming we would have picked another guy in that range, I don't see many huge difference makers. Even with the benefit of hindsight, we would have had to have made absolutely perfect draft selections for those two picks to have a better net long term contribution than the addition of Schenn and jettison of Lehtera.
Do I need to go into detail like that on the ROR trade? Is anyone claiming that Tage Thompson, anyone we might have drafted in the mid-late 1st round, and anyone drafted in the 2nd round in 21 would have been better for the team than 5 years of ROR?
I make both of those trades ten out of ten times. Those trades re-opened a Cup window. I don't like all of the decisions made in relation to that window, but it is pretty undeniable that those two trades opened a Cup window. Army watched some very good teams he assembled fall short due in large part to a lack of top end center talent. On 6/30/16, the center group was Backes/Stastny/Lehtera. on 7/1/18 the center group was ROR/Schenn/Bozak. He used a lot of futures assets to do it, but he fixed a massive shortcoming at a position that is notoriously difficult to obtain top end talent without utilizing top 5-10 draft picks. We're entering year 4 since ROR was acquired and all three of those centers are still on the roster (with Bozak's role as 3C going to a home-grown prospect). He didn't mortgage the future with those trades. He turned futures into a long-term solution. The center group is the strongest component of the team and should absolutely be 'contender-caliber' for the next 2 years (even if the Schenn of last year is the new normal). Over the next 2 years, the ROR/Schenn/Thomas combo will combine for $16.8M against the cap. Good luck building a better group of top 9 centers for less money unless you have a 1st overall pick on his ELC.
Are the Blues the #1 team in the NHL under Army's tenure? Of course not. But that shouldn't be the benchmark for the GM deserving a multi-year extension. In Army's 11 years as the GM, 7 teams have won the Cup. We are one of them. Each of the 6 other teams have at least one player who was a top 2 draft pick.
We are the only team since 2008 to win a Cup without at least one player that the club drafted at 1st or 2nd overall. The Bruins came close and you can argue that Seguin was a passenger at just 19 years old. But good luck arguing that Sid, Malkin, Kane, Doughty, Ovi, Hedman and Stamkos weren't foundational pieces of those teams. We've been to 2 Conference/Semi Finals since he took over as GM. 12 teams have done that through his tenure as GM. We are 5th in overall regular season standings points since he took over as GM. We've made the playoffs in 9 of his 11 seasons as GM, are one of 12 teams with more than 1 trip to the semis during his tenure and are one of 7 teams to win a Cup. How is that not the resume of a top 10 GM?
Again, I have plenty of issues with several decisions he has made. But he is a top 10 NHL GM by pretty much every metric and top 10 GMs deserve to be extended.