St. Louis Blues Should Avoid James Neal And David Perron

The St. Louis Blues have plenty of history with some of the right wingers available on the pending free agent list. Despite that, they should avoid those players.

So many ideas for articles, interestingly, come from things seen on social media. One such topic is a small, but vocal group that think the St. Louis Blues should go after one or both out of David Perron or James Neal.

According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, both wingers appear set to enter free agency. Nothing is official, but it seems that neither received what they wanted from the Vegas Golden Knights. So, they could both bolt the team that came within a few games of winning a Stanley Cup.

However, despite their skills, the Blues need to stay away from both. It is not as though they could not contribute to this organization in 2018-19. The problem is one of cost vs. value.

According to the article, Perron is seeking a long-term deal and a raise from his current $3.75 salary. That is understandable from his perspective. He just had a career high 66 points.

Neal is in a similar situation. He turned down a deal that would have paid him $5 million per season over five years in Vegas. Reportedly, he wants something in the neighborhood of $6.5-7 million.

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Like Perron, he has earned the right to seek out extra money if it is available. He has scored 20 or more goals in 10 straight seasons, after all.

However, fans are always wowed by stats with other teams, figuring it will automatically translate. History has shown us that it rarely does.

Let me give you some stats. One player had 188 total points over four seasons for an average of 47 points per year. Another player had 180 points the last four seasons with an average of 45 per season.

The second player was Neal. The first player? Paul Stastny. Please tell me how paying $7 million for Stastny was a terrible contract when he actually averaged more points per season and total points over the last four years yet the team should pursue Neal.

Again, the Blues could potentially use someone of Neal’s talents. They only had three 20-plus goal scorers on their team in 2017-18. You have to demand more than 45 points per season if you are going to pay $7 million per season.

The same is true of Perron. There were no discussions about how much he will ask for, but he wants a raise. The problem is he is only worth around $3.5-4 million.

He is not a 60 point scorer. He was the beneficiary of playing in a high-powered, offensive minded system. His defensive deficiencies were a big reason for both times the Blues let him go and things did not change in Vegas. His offense was sufficient to cover it all up.

The same will not be true of the Blues, should he return. He is not going to have 50 assists, so do we really need another 15ish goal scorer? Not really.

With the lack of high-end free agents, maybe the Blues could take a flyer on one of these guys. Maybe, just maybe, they bring their Vegas success with them.

For the money and length they are both expecting, it just is not worth it. Neither are old, but they are in that mid-range age where long-term contracts are iffy. Production could hit a wall at any moment.

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St. Louis just has not had luck with those kinds of things. Stastny was proof positive of that. He had several 50-60 point seasons and could not live up to the deal St. Louis gave him.

The history for Perron and Neal is even less impressive, but we should open the check book? No, thank you.

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