Thunderbirds 2024-25
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Hartford is a very good team. Big. Springfield played very well and relatively mistake free, but Hartford just keeps coming. Berard doesn’t belong in the AHL. He was dominant. Ellis just stonewalled them and few rebounds. He is very good.
If Robertsson plays like he did last night, then he will be the first Blues call up. He is just really smart and reads the play before it happens. Steals pucks. Gets in dirty areas.
To get three points with McGing and Peterson is accomplishing something. He and Kaski on the PK are money.
Kessel got rag dolled in a fight. Loof totally made a Hartford player eat his glove all the way to the ice in an after the whistle skirmish. Harold Snepsts would’ve been proud! Dvo clanked the iron but that was the extent of that lines good chances. Pretty quiet.
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ChicagoBlues
Terraformers
- Oct 24, 2006
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Kessel is too mild-mannered to fight. Loof is a maniac. Leo’s got jam! If Loof can translate his game to the NHL, imma get excited to have a nasty defenseman.
Brian39
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- Apr 24, 2014
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He can be a Group 6 UFA the summer of 2026 if he doesn't play 30 NHL games before then (same way Bishop was going to hit UFA).
Realistically, we need to convince him to sign a 2 year deal this summer. I assume that means offering a 1 way deal so he makes $800k or so in the AHL next season. He's making $85k this year in the AHL, so that would be a massive raise and some real financial security for a guy who's played in the NHL.
bleedblue1223
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- Jan 21, 2011
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That makes sense, 2028 didn't feel right and forgot about group 6. Yes, going the 1-way route makes sense, but I also imagine he's wanting a legitimate NHL shot.
Brian39
Registered User
- Apr 24, 2014
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For sure, but the reality is that we will qualify him this offseason and drastically limit his options to accomplish that goal. I'll be pretty surprised if we give him a 1 year, 1 way deal. Why pay him $775k+ to play in the AHL and potentially walk him right to UFA? He's probably going to have to choose between locking in $1.5M over 2 years or locking in $85k for 1 year in order to (hopefully) get a 1 way contract and potentially better NHL opportunity in 2026/27.
By the end of this season, he will have made about $570k in his career since signing with the Blues in March of 2021. He's extremely far away from lifetime financial security and isn't too far off from the financial realities of us regular people. He's made a hell of a lot more than I did in my early-to-mid 20s, but he also passed up college and lost out on his QMJHL scholarship to play pro hockey. If his career ended tomorrow, he almost certainly doesn't have more than a few years of savings/investments to last while he starts a new career path. He made $85k this year and that is what he'll make next year if he simply signs a QO to get himself to UFA quicker. Given the short window to earn money in this career, delaying that first real NHL payday by a year is really, really risky.
I get that pro athletes are wired different and often want to bet on themselves. But his agent has a duty to sit him down and explain just how much financial security he'd be giving up to bet on himself if the Blues do in fact bring a 2 year, 1 way deal to the table. $1.5M paid out over 2 years is objectively life-changing money for someone in his position.
What happens to him if he signs a 1 year deal this summer and then doesn't outplay Zherenko in 2025/26? Or he gets hurt? Or he still outplays Zherenko, but "only" with a .910 in the AHL? Sure he would be a UFA in the summer of 2026, but how many teams would come knocking with a 1 way deal or a guaranteed NHL roster spot? Suddenly he would likely be taking a 2 way deal that pays $250k in the AHL with a team that is bringing him to camp to battle with someone else for their NHL #2 job. There are so many realistic paths where 'betting on himself' could cause him to go from making $1.5M to less than $500k over the next 2 years.
He has 40 career AHL games and that number will probably be more like 60 at the end of the year. If you can turn that into 2 years of guaranteed NHL money, I think you just have to take that deal even if it pushes your potential NHL start date back a year. And not for nothing, but he'll require waivers next season so there would be that (very small) chance of getting claimed.
We’ve been lucky with goalie injuries the last few years (knock on wood), but it won’t take much for Ellis to get his shot. Zherenko is still not himself since his own injury last year (which gave Ellis his shot and led to us dumping Malcolm Subban), and while I still have faith he can find his game again, Ellis is pretty clearly 3rd in the pecking order right now. Once he gets that shot, anything could happen, just like it happened with Binner in 2019.
There are unfortunately only +/- 64 goalie jobs at the NHL level. Most teams have at least one NHL-caliber goalie playing in the A. Spencer Knight comes to mind for the Panthers. All of that to say that switching teams can sometimes give guys a path to the NHL, but generally you don’t see a lot of pre-UFA goalie trade action. They basically have no value to anyone except the team that drafted them, unless they’re clearly elite and just blocked like Askarov. Ellis is in about as good of a position as he’s gonna find right now. In any event, I hope he stays and finds a way to don the Blue Note. I think he’s got a shot.
