St. Louis Blues Might Not Be Done This Offseason?

The St. Louis Blues have made enough additions to cover two summers this offseason. Despite that, some are suggesting the team might not be done yet.

The St. Louis Blues made some serious changes to their roster for the 2018-19 season this summer. They added two centers, a power-wing and a scoring specialist that can help with their power play.

Adding four players to any roster is usually the kind of change you pull over a couple offseasons. The Blues did it all in one.

However, just when we all thought it was safe to go back to our daily lives, there are rumblings they might not be done.

According to a link on MyNHLTradeRumors, the St. Louis Blues and Toronto Maple Leafs have had talks. According to Howard Berger, the two teams have kicked the tires on the idea of swapping a defenseman for a forward.

Berger’s piece tossed out the idea that the Leafs could offer up Jake Gardiner and Andreas Johnsson for Colton Parayko. Personally, I would be confused as to why this kind of trade would happen for either side.

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Yes, the Leafs need defensive help, but you’d be giving up a defenseman that just scored you 52 points in 2017-18. Gardiner has plenty of defensive questions, but I’m not sure Parayko is the defensive specialist needed in return to give up 50-plus points.

Conversely, do the Blues really want someone like Gardiner? Out of 52 points, only 15 came on the power play, so how much he helps that unit is up in the air. Also, the Blues already had Kevin Shattenkirk. If not for money, they would likely have kept him, but he was becoming an increasing liability on the blue line.

The age issue is not that big a deal. Gardiner is 27 and Parayko is 25. Two years is two years, but you have no guarantees any of these guys finish as Blues anyway.

The bigger issue is the contracts. Parayko has four years left on a team-friendly deal. Gardiner will be a free agent. He makes less than Parayko now, but if he keeps scoring, he would want the same amount or more. So, you’d be paying the same amount of money or more for a slightly older player that does not play defense as well.

The biggest issue is the true value of Johnsson. I’m not sure why the Blues would still think they need forward help after adding four new forwards and having at least three forward prospects on the cusp of playing in the NHL.

How good is Johnsson? He scored 54 points in 54 games in the AHL in 2017-18 and 47 points in a full season the year prior. He did have an impressive 10 goals and 24 points in 16 playoff games for the Toronto Marlies.

Still, there is no way of knowing if that translates to the NHL though. You might be getting a budding star or you might be getting the next Nail Yakupov.

There are plenty out there that would likely take this deal since there is some odd, growing faction against Parayko. He has not blossomed into an offensive threat as we hoped and his defensive game took a step back, but he’s still learning the NHL game too. We forget he’s only had two seasons. He’s not a seasoned veteran yet.

I would love to have someone with the capabilities of Gardiner on my team, but it would feel like a defenseman for a defenseman and the Blues would lose out on defense. Yes, St. Louis needs more scoring, but even if they were statistically good defensively in terms of goals against, the entire back side was shaky from the goaltending to the top-six defenders. I’m not sure giving up a big body for a scorer would benefit the team.

We just do not know enough about this Johnsson either. He gets high praise from the scouting report, but the Blues already have highly touted prospects. How many more do we need to add?

All of this is likely conjecture. Berger writes for a Canadian site, so his sources are probably from the Maple Leafs side of things. It just seems too unlikely Armstrong would give up Parayko without it being a home run. Even if you consider that trade good, it seems like a triple at best and more likely a double.

For me, I’m going to demand Gardiner and William Nylander or Nazim Kadri and that just is not happening. Even with Kadri I would think twice, but at least you’ve seen the type of player you’ll get. Johnsson is just too much of a wild card to give up on Parayko yet.

For once, I hope the Blues are done. They’ve made significant changes to their roster and even if you cannot guarantee the health of Robby Fabbri, there comes a point where too many changes make it hard to form chemistry. I get the size difference, but it just doesn’t make a ton of sense for Toronto either.

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Time will tell if this rumor turns into more. I, for one, hope Armstrong is not picking up the phone anymore

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