Dave's a mess wrote:

CaptSMRT wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 9:37 am Can you imagine if the Red Wings or Avalanche had a goalie like Binnington in the 90's... they'd load up every year behind him. Armstrong is wasting this guys career on his five year plans. Fuck a five year plan... nobody has five fucking years... the President of the United states only gets four.

Well one of those teams had a top 5 goalie of all time, but that notwithstanding, I think 5 year plans are something GMs talk about when they are just trying to keep their job. You only need that assurance when you're either in the process of a major teardown/rebuild, or you need time for some of your mistakes to disappear. I think this team will be much improved next season, but only if Armstrong is finally able to do something with the D. I think he will as the cap is increasing, but we'll see.

I was thinking the same thing. And Detroit did all right for themselves.

BillP. wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 11:56 am

Dave's a mess wrote:

CaptSMRT wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 9:37 am Can you imagine if the Red Wings or Avalanche had a goalie like Binnington in the 90's... they'd load up every year behind him. Armstrong is wasting this guys career on his five year plans. Fuck a five year plan... nobody has five fucking years... the President of the United states only gets four.

Well one of those teams had a top 5 goalie of all time, but that notwithstanding, I think 5 year plans are something GMs talk about when they are just trying to keep their job. You only need that assurance when you're either in the process of a major teardown/rebuild, or you need time for some of your mistakes to disappear. I think this team will be much improved next season, but only if Armstrong is finally able to do something with the D. I think he will as the cap is increasing, but we'll see.

I was thinking the same thing. And Detroit did all right for themselves.

How many Blues GMs does it take to screw in a light bulb? We won't know until next season.

In Armstrong we trust has maybe been used too much in the last few years. It seems that if you're always a middling team, never getting close to the top tier draft picks thats where you'll stay. Yes, you might get a diamond from the late first or second round once in awhile, but that's rarifide air to make a Cup team on. Look at Chicago right now, sucking mud at the bottom but come July they'll be sucking single malt scotch with an elite hockey player ready to contribute. All the while we sit here hoping that one of the prospects drafted years ago are our saviors. We let goddamn good defensemen go in the past,no.1s, now Armstrong has exactly what he made a mediocre defense,with contracts that suck. Seeing that Armstrong is the second coming in Canadian lore, we're stuck. 1 trade that still sticks in my craw is the Miller trade, Moose got em where they were and just to upset the apple cart and dissolve cohesiveness and give up draft picks,brilliant.

BlueinNy wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 1:02 pm In Armstrong we trust has maybe been used too much in the last few years. It seems that if you're always a middling team, never getting close to the top tier draft picks thats where you'll stay. Yes, you might get a diamond from the late first or second round once in awhile, but that's rarifide air to make a Cup team on. Look at Chicago right now, sucking mud at the bottom but come July they'll be sucking single malt scotch with an elite hockey player ready to contribute. All the while we sit here hoping that one of the prospects drafted years ago are our saviors. We let goddamn good defensemen go in the past,no.1s, now Armstrong has exactly what he made a mediocre defense,with contracts that suck. Seeing that Armstrong is the second coming in Canadian lore, we're stuck. 1 trade that still sticks in my craw is the Miller trade, Moose got em where they were and just to upset the apple cart and dissolve cohesiveness and give up draft picks,brilliant.

Yeah, I mentioned earlier how the Blues are heading toward the worst draft pick for any team to have. Highest pick without making the playoffs. The only saving grace for me is with two 2's and two 3's if they want to move up for someone, they certainly can.

BlueinNy wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 1:02 pm In Armstrong we trust has maybe been used too much in the last few years. It seems that if you're always a middling team, never getting close to the top tier draft picks thats where you'll stay. Yes, you might get a diamond from the late first or second round once in awhile, but that's rarifide air to make a Cup team on. Look at Chicago right now, sucking mud at the bottom but come July they'll be sucking single malt scotch with an elite hockey player ready to contribute. All the while we sit here hoping that one of the prospects drafted years ago are our saviors. We let goddamn good defensemen go in the past,no.1s, now Armstrong has exactly what he made a mediocre defense,with contracts that suck. Seeing that Armstrong is the second coming in Canadian lore, we're stuck. 1 trade that still sticks in my craw is the Miller trade, Moose got em where they were and just to upset the apple cart and dissolve cohesiveness and give up draft picks,brilliant.

We pretty much won a Cup doing exactly that. Other than Petro we didn't have any high draft picks on the roster of our own.

I could understand your frustration if you had said this last season. Armstrong sold off the pieces and we sucked, but we had a stubborn coach who insisted we squeeze out every point that we could. We could easily have had a top five pick. Instead we got the ninth.

My frustration is with the previous coach. He should have known better and it cost him his job.

However, we are a better team now than we were last season even with all the assets that we sold off. I'm positive about the future. We have a lot of well regarded prospects now and this team seems to be doing a pretty good job of developing them.

Even with all the dead weight on this team we still almost made the playoffs.

I'm totally excited for next season.

I appreciate your optimistic response about next year, but my view isn't quite so rosy, we've got a goalie playing lights out, he won't be this good forever. If this team doesn't put together a defensive defense next year we'll be singing that same old song. Out of Our bottom 6 forwards Torpedo is the only 1 ready to move up, the rest are what they are. And to top it all off we don't have a true goal scorer that puts fear in the hearts of goalies, a Krieder, McKinnon,Draisaitl, OV,Tarasenko or Forsberg. I remember Vladis 1st game, you just knew that he was something special, I just don't see that in any of our prospects or current roster. Neighbors being an exception but still a work in progress. I guess where this is going is Armstrong built this mediocre team with a mediocre coach and I just see it going full circle next year.

BlueinNy wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 1:02 pm In Armstrong we trust has maybe been used too much in the last few years. It seems that if you're always a middling team, never getting close to the top tier draft picks thats where you'll stay. Yes, you might get a diamond from the late first or second round once in awhile, but that's rarifide air to make a Cup team on. Look at Chicago right now, sucking mud at the bottom but come July they'll be sucking single malt scotch with an elite hockey player ready to contribute. All the while we sit here hoping that one of the prospects drafted years ago are our saviors. We let goddamn good defensemen go in the past,no.1s, now Armstrong has exactly what he made a mediocre defense,with contracts that suck. Seeing that Armstrong is the second coming in Canadian lore, we're stuck. 1 trade that still sticks in my craw is the Miller trade, Moose got em where they were and just to upset the apple cart and dissolve cohesiveness and give up draft picks,brilliant.

You've just described 95% of Blues history.

BluesSK wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 7:48 pm

BlueinNy wrote: Fri Apr 05, 2024 1:02 pm In Armstrong we trust has maybe been used too much in the last few years. It seems that if you're always a middling team, never getting close to the top tier draft picks thats where you'll stay. Yes, you might get a diamond from the late first or second round once in awhile, but that's rarifide air to make a Cup team on. Look at Chicago right now, sucking mud at the bottom but come July they'll be sucking single malt scotch with an elite hockey player ready to contribute. All the while we sit here hoping that one of the prospects drafted years ago are our saviors. We let goddamn good defensemen go in the past,no.1s, now Armstrong has exactly what he made a mediocre defense,with contracts that suck. Seeing that Armstrong is the second coming in Canadian lore, we're stuck. 1 trade that still sticks in my craw is the Miller trade, Moose got em where they were and just to upset the apple cart and dissolve cohesiveness and give up draft picks,brilliant.

We pretty much won a Cup doing exactly that. Other than Petro we didn't have any high draft picks on the roster of our own.

I could understand your frustration if you had said this last season. Armstrong sold off the pieces and we sucked, but we had a stubborn coach who insisted we squeeze out every point that we could. We could easily have had a top five pick. Instead we got the ninth.

My frustration is with the previous coach. He should have known better and it cost him his job.

However, we are a better team now than we were last season even with all the assets that we sold off. I'm positive about the future. We have a lot of well regarded prospects now and this team seems to be doing a pretty good job of developing them.

Even with all the dead weight on this team we still almost made the playoffs.

I'm totally excited for next season.

I can see a lot of this being true. However, you could also make the case this is pretty much exactly the same team as the season before, however, the goaltending was much improved. The rest of the play has largely remained the same.

But like you, I do think there are better days ahead with the prospects in the pipeline. It's not one or two guys but a good handful of them on the way.

Well, it IS the Blues, so it's not exactly uncalled for to expect the worst. That said, I think we're going about according to plan.

We tore things down for future assets last season and racked up some of those future assets that we knew would take 3-4 years to develop, all while trying to stay 'competitive' during the retool. Well, we've been in the hunt for a wild-card spot until late in the season, which is about as expected. I expect about the same for next season, hopefully with a more positive outcome.

We made a few low-risk moves that haven't panned out (Vrana, Blais, Kapanen, Hayes). If one or two of those guys plays as hoped for, we're probably in the playoffs this season.

We have some younger players emerging: Neighbors (even if he takes a step back next season), Toropchenko, Kessel, Perunovich (there's still hope!), and Alexandrov. Three of those guys are already regulars.

We have a couple of players up for a cup of coffee in Dean and Bolduc who should take on more regular roles next season.

We have some dynamic younger players who are excelling and should be making the jump in the next 2-3 years in Lindstein, Snuggerud (in spite of his spending an extra year at college), Dvorsky, and Stenberg.

We have 5 picks in the first 3 rounds of the draft this Summer.

With (probably) Scandella, Vrana, Blais, and Kapanen off the books this season, and the cap going up, we've got about $13 mil of cap space heading into next season.

Several of the dreaded NTC 'albatross' contracts are reduced to 'list 12-15 team' clauses in 2025 (Schenn, Saad, Faulk, Krug, and Leddy). I expect at least one of those guys to be traded in 2025-26, probably two.

It MAY not happen, but there's a good chance we can keep Buchnevich beyond next season. (Hopefully without a full NTC!)

Of course, most of this is POTENTIAL, rather than certainty. That's the difference between top-5 'blue chip' prospects, and most everyone else. But there's a lot there that could go right, too.

If we had any kind of a decent record against the bottom-5 teams, we'd be in a wild-card spot right now.

RAFritchey wrote: Sat Apr 06, 2024 7:21 pm If we had any kind of a decent record against the bottom-5 teams, we'd be in a wild-card spot right now.

Yeah we would be. It's frustrating and something that will have to be sorted out.

The Blues record vs. the bottom 5 teams in the league (as of right now):

Anaheim 2-0 (one game left)
Chicago 2-1 (one game left)
Columbus 0-2
Arizona 2-2
San Jose 0-2-1

13 points out of a possible 28 (so far, with 4 more points on the table). We should have at least 20 of 28 points against the cellar-dwellers. That puts us solidly in a wild-card slot heading into the final stretch (albeit still fighting all the way.)

RAFritchey wrote: Sat Apr 06, 2024 8:18 pm The Blues record vs. the bottom 5 teams in the league (as of right now):

Anaheim 2-0 (one game left)
Chicago 2-1 (one game left)
Columbus 0-2
Arizona 2-2
San Jose 0-2-1

13 points out of a possible 28 (so far, with 4 more points on the table). We should have at least 20 of 28 points against the cellar-dwellers. That puts us solidly in a wild-card slot heading into the final stretch (albeit still fighting all the way.)

Kelly Chase was on the broadcast before the trade deadline and he said there was people on this team with no heart... here is the undeniable evidence.

Three points out of the last spot... with three games to go... this season has been one long dry kick in the nards.

CaptSMRT wrote:

RAFritchey wrote: Sat Apr 06, 2024 8:18 pm The Blues record vs. the bottom 5 teams in the league (as of right now):

Anaheim 2-0 (one game left)
Chicago 2-1 (one game left)
Columbus 0-2
Arizona 2-2
San Jose 0-2-1

13 points out of a possible 28 (so far, with 4 more points on the table). We should have at least 20 of 28 points against the cellar-dwellers. That puts us solidly in a wild-card slot heading into the final stretch (albeit still fighting all the way.)

Kelly Chase was on the broadcast before the trade deadline and he said there was people on this team with no heart... here is the undeniable evidence.

It's funny to hear a player say that when he himself played on Blues teams that were labeled as no shows in big games as well.

This is such an embarrassing tweet for whoever runs the Blues account.

Dread_Pirate_Westley wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:01 pm This is such an embarrassing tweet for whoever runs the Blues account.

It took 78 games for bedard to get hit?

Highly unlikely

Ozzies09tc wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:53 pm

Dread_Pirate_Westley wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:01 pm This is such an embarrassing tweet for whoever runs the Blues account.

It took 78 games for bedard to get hit?

Highly unlikely

By a guy who has played less games haha. It's not like Tucker is a grizzled vet of the league.

Dread_Pirate_Westley wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 2:43 pm

Ozzies09tc wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:53 pm

Dread_Pirate_Westley wrote: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:01 pm This is such an embarrassing tweet for whoever runs the Blues account.

It took 78 games for bedard to get hit?

Highly unlikely

By a guy who has played less games haha. It's not like Tucker is a grizzled vet of the league.

I didn't even think of that LMAO

total tweet fail

So we've reached the last day of the regular season. I suppose the most pressing decision the Blues have is what to do at Head Coach. Bannister has a record of 30-19-4 at the moment, good for a .604 points percentage. I don't know about you but that exceeded my expectations. Was that turnaround his doing? Was the improved record due to better play, or the goalies just stopping more pucks? I don't know, but I don't think he's removed himself from consideration.

The other names that JR brought up a couple names in an article the other day. One was David Carle, the 35 year old coach of Denver University who just won the NCAA Championship for the second time in 3 years. That's the same route Jim Montgomery took to the NHL, and besides that rough spell he had off ice for a couple years, he's been one of the best coaches in the league since he got here. The other name in is the elephant in the room, Coach Q. He obviously wants back in the league and has a basically unmatched pedigree, and I think Bettman would approve his return to the league. The question is whether or not Stillman would be comfortable with the PR hit the team would take for at least a little while if they went that route. That's not to say he won't or shouldn't, but it's a consideration.

Surely there are other names that will be in play including a bunch of the usual coach re-treads. I'm kind of intrigued by Carle, but kind of feel like Armstrong would prefer a proven commodity. Not sure how long we'll have to wait for an answer on Bannister either.

Dave's a mess wrote: Wed Apr 17, 2024 8:30 am So we've reached the last day of the regular season. I suppose the most pressing decision the Blues have is what to do at Head Coach. Bannister has a record of 30-19-4 at the moment, good for a .604 points percentage. I don't know about you but that exceeded my expectations. Was that turnaround his doing? Was the improved record due to better play, or the goalies just stopping more pucks? I don't know, but I don't think he's removed himself from consideration.

The other names that JR brought up a couple names in an article the other day. One was David Carle, the 35 year old coach of Denver University who just won the NCAA Championship for the second time in 3 years. That's the same route Jim Montgomery took to the NHL, and besides that rough spell he had off ice for a couple years, he's been one of the best coaches in the league since he got here. The other name in is the elephant in the room, Coach Q. He obviously wants back in the league and has a basically unmatched pedigree, and I think Bettman would approve his return to the league. The question is whether or not Stillman would be comfortable with the PR hit the team would take for at least a little while if they went that route. That's not to say he won't or shouldn't, but it's a consideration.

Surely there are other names that will be in play including a bunch of the usual coach re-treads. I'm kind of intrigued by Carle, but kind of feel like Armstrong would prefer a proven commodity. Not sure how long we'll have to wait for an answer on Bannister either.

Get it done leery!!

Dread_Pirate_Westley wrote: Wed Apr 17, 2024 1:29 pm

Dave's a mess wrote: Wed Apr 17, 2024 8:30 am So we've reached the last day of the regular season. I suppose the most pressing decision the Blues have is what to do at Head Coach. Bannister has a record of 30-19-4 at the moment, good for a .604 points percentage. I don't know about you but that exceeded my expectations. Was that turnaround his doing? Was the improved record due to better play, or the goalies just stopping more pucks? I don't know, but I don't think he's removed himself from consideration.

The other names that JR brought up a couple names in an article the other day. One was David Carle, the 35 year old coach of Denver University who just won the NCAA Championship for the second time in 3 years. That's the same route Jim Montgomery took to the NHL, and besides that rough spell he had off ice for a couple years, he's been one of the best coaches in the league since he got here. The other name in is the elephant in the room, Coach Q. He obviously wants back in the league and has a basically unmatched pedigree, and I think Bettman would approve his return to the league. The question is whether or not Stillman would be comfortable with the PR hit the team would take for at least a little while if they went that route. That's not to say he won't or shouldn't, but it's a consideration.

Surely there are other names that will be in play including a bunch of the usual coach re-treads. I'm kind of intrigued by Carle, but kind of feel like Armstrong would prefer a proven commodity. Not sure how long we'll have to wait for an answer on Bannister either.

Get it done leery!!

Dag's, cole, and a 3rd'll do it!

Dave's a mess wrote: Wed Apr 17, 2024 8:30 am So we've reached the last day of the regular season. I suppose the most pressing decision the Blues have is what to do at Head Coach. Bannister has a record of 30-19-4 at the moment, good for a .604 points percentage. I don't know about you but that exceeded my expectations. Was that turnaround his doing? Was the improved record due to better play, or the goalies just stopping more pucks? I don't know, but I don't think he's removed himself from consideration.

The other names that JR brought up a couple names in an article the other day. One was David Carle, the 35 year old coach of Denver University who just won the NCAA Championship for the second time in 3 years. That's the same route Jim Montgomery took to the NHL, and besides that rough spell he had off ice for a couple years, he's been one of the best coaches in the league since he got here. The other name in is the elephant in the room, Coach Q. He obviously wants back in the league and has a basically unmatched pedigree, and I think Bettman would approve his return to the league. The question is whether or not Stillman would be comfortable with the PR hit the team would take for at least a little while if they went that route. That's not to say he won't or shouldn't, but it's a consideration.

Surely there are other names that will be in play including a bunch of the usual coach re-treads. I'm kind of intrigued by Carle, but kind of feel like Armstrong would prefer a proven commodity. Not sure how long we'll have to wait for an answer on Bannister either.

We'll have an influx of young players, some here now, more on the way over the next few years. Also, I think we'll be a bubble team again next season and 'competitive' the year after that, before becoming 'Cup-level' again. I don't know that Coach Q, baggage aside, is the right match for that. A younger coach like Carle might be the right way to go, at least for the next 2-3 years. And who can project how long a coach will last beyond that?