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Xerloris said:
I still think that if Pietrangelo had been a LHD then we would have given him his desired contract. As it stands, we needed a LHD and not another RHD. I think Krug may have been a mistake but I wouldn't say Pietrangelo was a mistake. We should have made a trade for a LHD instead of signing who ever was on the market.
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Or…sign Pietrangelo and trade Parayko for a haul as his trade value was likely quite high at the time. Or trade Faulk. Petro being right-handed shouldn’t have been a reason to not re-sign him. And I doubt it was. Army simply didn’t think he was worth it, and I think Army was dead wrong in this case.
ScratchCatFever said:
Keeping Petro would've resulted in virtually the same (if not worse) cap constraints than what we're currently facing, only delayed by 6-7 years as he, O'Reilly, Schenn, and Vladi would all have been on the back 9 of their 30's with next to unmovable contracts. I understand the argument that IF you win another cup none of it matters. But it most certainly would've put us in financial doldrums for the next 8-10 years after that. It wasn't all that dissimilar to the way Pujols left town.
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You say this as if keeping the Cup window open another 6-7 years would’ve been a bad thing. Additionally, any Cap problems would depend on the other moves outside of keeping Petro. IMO, most of the bad contracts are a result of trying to bandaid the hole left by Petro and bad decisions and a not good enough defense keeps leading to more bad decisions. Maybe if they keep Petro, the series of bad decisions after never happen.

To me, the goal should’ve been to keep the window as open as long as possible. IMO, the window was slammed shut as soon as Petro left. But make no mistake, the window will eventually close one way or another. Players get older and if you’re consistently at the top with lesser draft picks, the cycle will eventually catch up to you. But IMO, the Blues preemptively closed their window by letting Petro go.
 
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Xerloris said:
I still think that if Pietrangelo had been a LHD then we would have given him his desired contract. As it stands, we needed a LHD and not another RHD. I think Krug may have been a mistake but I wouldn't say Pietrangelo was a mistake. We should have made a trade for a LHD instead of signing who ever was on the market.
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That’s ridiculous though. What we need is a #1 d-man, it doesn’t matter if he’s RHD or LHD.

If we’re using that logic, Armstrong should have traded for a LHD instead of trading for Faulk. And I like Faulk.
 
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STL fan in MN said:
Or…sign Pietrangelo and trade Parayko for a haul as his trade value was likely quite high at the time. Or trade Faulk. Petro being right-handed shouldn’t have been a reason to not re-sign him. And I doubt it was. Army simply didn’t think he was worth it, and I think Army was dead wrong in this case.

You say this as if keeping the Cup window open another 6-7 years would’ve been a bad thing. Additionally, any Cap problems would depend on the other moves outside of keeping Petro. IMO, most of the bad contracts are a result of trying to bandaid the hole left by Petro and bad decisions and a not good enough defense keeps leading to more bad decisions. Maybe if they keep Petro, the series of bad decisions after never happen.

To me, the goal should’ve been to keep the window as open as long as possible. IMO, the window was slammed shut as soon as Petro left. But make no mistake, the window will eventually close one way or another. Players get older and if you’re consistently at the top with lesser draft picks, the cycle will eventually catch up to you. But IMO, the Blues preemptively closed their window by letting Petro go.
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I agree with all of this. It was more just a view of where we're at now because of what or what did not happen.
 
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Stupendous Yappi said:
For all the complaining about Armstrong (and ownership by extension) I'm glad we haven't seen him making moves like that. He allowed declining beloved players who could still play to walk because they wanted too much term, on more than one occasion. And each time it was the right call.
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It never was the right call with Pietrangelo, He is still playing at a high level and he has added another cup ring, Meanwhile the Blues are stuck in mediocrity with Torey f***ing Krug's anchor of a contract and a screwed up of a defense.
 
Xerloris said:
With the decline of ROR and Vladdi wanting out and being a shell of his former self at this point I don't think we'd be one defenseman away from our cup window still being open.
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True. To be honest, I simply copied the 6-7 years number from the other poster I was quoting. The actual window may not have lasted that long. But would’ve lasted to at least last season IMO when the ROR and Vladi contracts expired.

But overall, it’s basically impossible to say what all of the butterfly effects would’ve been had we re-signed Petro. Two things are for certain though - we’d have Petro and we wouldn’t have Krug.
 
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BlueDream said:
What? Yeah because the Blues don’t have any bad contracts for any aging players?

It wasn’t the right call on Pietrangelo. We are now stuck with Krug and a mess of a defense. That was very clearly the wrong call and nobody can deny it.

Was it the right call on Perron and O’Reilly? Time will tell but certainly no guarantee there.

Basically the only one where he definitively made the right call was Backes, which anybody could have done. But for that one time, he’s given out MANY more awful contracts. You’re giving him way too much credit here.
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He didn’t let O’Reilly walk. He traded him.

He didn’t let Pietro walk, he tried to sign him.

Perron is the one legit example. I think it was a cap casualty, but you would like to have seen something creative to keep him.


The Blues aren’t going to look like San Jose (and future Winnipeg) by having long anchor contracts to guys who can’t form the core any longer. He’s not perfect, but when we see other GMs making such egregious mistakes, you have to consider who you‘d have besides Armstrong and what that person would do. He’s made a lot of tough calls that look good in hindsight.
 
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Stupendous Yappi said:
He didn’t let Pietro walk, he tried to sign him.

Perron is the one legit example. I think it was a cap casualty, but you would like to have seen something creative to keep him.
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Perron was offered a contract. It was below his market value.

In both cases, Army drew a line in the sand that he would not cross. And in both cases, the player chose to go to free agency and sign with a team that offered what he wanted. I think both players made the correct choice, but it is not accurate to say that Army tried to sign one but not the other. He wouldn't budge on a full NMC for Petro and he wouldn't budge on an additional year of term for Perron. Both of those things are fully relevant contract terms that matter to a player and in both cases another team was willing to give them to the player.
 
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Brian39 said:
Perron was offered a contract. It was below his market value.

In both cases, Army drew a line in the sand that he would not cross. And in both cases, the player chose to go to free agency and sign with a team that offered what he wanted. I think both players made the correct choice, but it is not accurate to say that Army tried to sign one but not the other. He wouldn't budge on a full NMC for Petro and he wouldn't budge on an additional year of term for Perron. Both of those things are fully relevant contract terms that matter to a player and in both cases another team was willing to give them to the player.
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That’s not how Perron described it. He got a preliminary offer that was lowball and short on term. He was willing to negotiate but never heard anything else. That’s not Armstrong trying to sign him. That’s just a gesture.

Pietro they met several times including with the owner the night prior to UFA. Armstrong gave in on multiple negotiation points, but not the degree of protection Pietro asked for.

I think characterizing those as the same level of effort is a gross distortion. To me, Armstrong saw he had no way to offer Perron a reasonable contract and have room for him in the roster. Personally, I think he should have told him that directly rather than leave it quiet through the beginning of UFA. Armstrong’s attempt to sign Perron looks like a courtesy offer to me, and a weak one.
 
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Regarding Winnipeg, I’m not talking about this solitary season. I think they probably WILL be better than the Blues, but they’re not a contender and they are on a path of petering out over a few years rather than building to contender status.
 
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Xerloris said:
I caught myself hoping the Hawks scored, I feel sick :huh:
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Mike Liut said:
0 sog for Tarasenko. He’s a shell of his former self. So glad we didn’t re-sign him. ROR too. They will not age well.
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DIdn't watch the game, but just looking at the box score you'd think he's just a random 4th liner. Only 2 F on the Sens had less TOI or shifts.
 
Mike Liut said:
we’ll see as the season goes on. He was terrible last year and looked slow as molasses.
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Looked a lot better when he went to Toronto.

He’s still got it, he’s not close to being washed. Everyone on the Blues looked horrible last year so it doesn’t mean much.
 
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