JR is a good beat writer, Stickland is the better local insider. My bigger problem with the JR/Tarasenko stuff is how everyone has gone complete lizard brain on it. Just because Tarasenko is healthy and just because the team is playing well, it doesn't mean the relationship has magically been fixed between him and management/medical.
We are still in the same situation where we have a player that we know will 100% not extend his contract here. In 2 summers, he's gone, similar to the Shattenkirk situation. Now it's probably more likely that Tarasenko isn't moved this season unless a big offer comes, but Army will still have him out there and he'll definitely have him available in the summer.
JR as a beat writer is fine, but he's no longer
just a beat writer. He's with the Athletic and is looked upon to give insights to the Blues that other people probably shouldn't have, or at least post articles that are worth more than a "wElL gOlLy tHiS tEaM sUrE iS gReAt". He should have a better grasp on actual hockey information besides surface level stuff. Also, I do agree with you that people are lizard-braining right now because everything is seemingly going well. I've maintained the stance that Tarasenko wants a trade, and until more information comes out, he still probably wants a trade. But unless JR is going to give reasons why he knows this or at least beat around the bush hard that someone close to Tarasenko has confirmed this to him, then why tf even say it. I just found his discussion so much more annoying because having information like "What would the Blues ask for in return for Tarasenko" seems like such baseline, easy information to receive from someone in the front office and he couldn't answer that directly.
I always take concepts like this with a grain of salt anyway because there isn't likely a fit for a "hockey trade" in-season in this situation. The likeliest scenario where Tarasenko gets traded in season between now and the TDL is that we trade him for futures to a team in need of offense with cap space (LTIR or organic) and we flip those futures and/or use some of our own to supplement the current roster. It seems like a bit of a unicorn, as capped out as almost all contenders are at this point, that there would be a team with a glut of LD in need of offense that could match up with our need of a LD where Tarasenko would actually waive his NTC to go to.
I ALWAYS take opinions from these sorts of guys with a huge grain of salt. St Louis isn't known for its hockey reporting, so there's not really any use in trusting these opinions, even from guys like Jamie Rivers. Nothing against him, but like what valuable connections does he have in the front office right now that would tell him something important and what's the likelihood that he'd even release that information? 101 ESPN is hardly known for breaking big time stories or news so I don't expect high journalism there. Like I said before, I find it annoying that I can give a better, more clear answer to the question "What would the Blues look in return" than a 10+ St. Louis Blues writer can, and my information is solely just based on looking at team performance and roster construction. Maybe I'm being too hard on JR, but I mean c'mon.
