St. Louis Blues: Beware The Tortoise Vladimir Tarasenko

By Todd Panula |

SUNRISE, FL - OCTOBER 12: Vladimir Tarasenko

As proof that some people are never satisfied, the rumblings of what is wrong with Vladimir Tarasenko are starting to emanate from the epicenter of the depths of internet fandom. The truth is he has the long game in mind.

Some people are never quite happy. It happens in all fanbases, but since we focus on the St. Louis Blues, those end up being the issues seen the most.

The vast majority of Blues fans just want to win and see their stars perform. Those people keep to themselves, outside the occasional outburst at a game or yelling at the television. Then you have the internet.

At times, the internet has transformed into a grotesque den of vile humanity that would make the citizens of Mordor from Lord of the Rings cringe. There are some out there that literally call for the firing of coaches and general managers following every single loss. They also want every good player traded away if they do not score two or more goals every single game.

These people are not grounded in reality. Who knows why. Maybe it’s all just trolling and maybe they are unbalanced enough to actually believe some of the stuff.

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So, it should come as no surprise that there are actually people wanting Vladimir Tarasenko gone or benched or whatever. Four goals and six points in six games is just not good enough.

The issue here is the now or never nature of today’s society. They want everything right now or it all just sucks.

So when there are other players off to hot starts with nine goals or 11 points, then whatever you have is just garbage. A quick look at the stat leaders as of 10/17/18 reveals a lot though.

No offense to any of those players. Many of them are great players that add a lot to their teams. There is a good chunk of those names that are not going to be in the top 10 in scoring come the end of the season.

That is the problem here from the fan side. Many people have forgotten their fables.

Tarasenko has not. He is simply taking the tortoise approach and slow, but steady could still win the race.

Though we want him to be the next incarnation of Brett Hull, that kind of scoring just does not exist in today’s game. Even Alex Ovechkin won’t keep up his current pace.

On the same side of the coin, Tarasenko has never been a scorer that just pumps in the goals left and right. He is the only player to have 37 or more goals in each of the last three seasons though.

So, the hot heads can complain about this and that, but by the end of the year Tarasenko has done exactly what he needed to do.

We can all hope that he continues to get better. We would all love to see a 50 goal scorer again and the talent is there.

Tarasenko can improve too. He is streaky at times, going a handful of games without a goal and then scoring in four or five straight. He’s just rarely had multiple multiple-goal games. That’s the only difference.

Let’s leave Vlady to do his work. I’ll take someone with the long-game perspective nine times out of ten.

Above all else, he wants to win. He wants to have that championship parade in front of Scottrade. If he can win without scoring, he is alright with that.

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The difference, this season, is he knows scoring is more likely to help the team win. Even so, old habits are hard to break.

There have been a few times in the young season where he has deffered to teammates when he should have shot. That is still the mark of a good teammate.

Tarasenko will have his goals by the end of the year. It’s just going to be a slow drip instead of a sudden gush and then nothing.

Slow and steady wins the race.

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