St. Louis Blues: Vladimir Tarasenko Out 5 Months With Shoulder Injury
The St. Louis Blues and their fans received devastating news. Their All-sSar sniper, Vladimir Tarasenko, will require shoulder surgery on his left shoulder injured in the game against the Los Angeles Kings on October 24th.
The St. Louis Blues were hoping for some good news regarding Vladimir Tarasenko when they returned from a two-game road trip. Instead, they got some of the worst news possible. Tarasenko is going to be out at least five months, needing shoulder surgery.
Tarasenko was starting to round into form and began playing the type of game we all know he is capable of. While it would have been difficult to achieve, there was talk of him hitting 100 points.
The play where he was injured seemed rather harmless. Just like when the same shoulder was injured in the final game of the season against Colorado in 2017-18, it just did not seem like something you would get hurt on.
Tarasenko was driving to the net, trying to beat the King’s defender, when he appeared to just give up on the play. During the aftermath of the play, I asked my friend, “Did he just get hurt?”
The camera showed Vladi on the bench seemingly in no pain, but sort of hunched. He was then shown walking back to the locker room with the Blues trainer and didn’t return. The Blues announced he wasn’t going to travel with the team and would be re-evaluated today and the news couldn’t be much worse.
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Vladi was starting to really heat up and play like we saw in the second half of the 2018-19 season. Hopes were high that this was the year Tarasenko reached the 50-goal mark.
It’s a really sad day for Blues fans and the team, but this is the NHL and the Blues are known as a next man up team. In this case though, the next man up has some big skates to fill.
In the short term, the Blues are using Robert Thomas in Vladi’s spot on the top line. I don’t mind this look for now, but I don’t think Thomas is the answer for that spot. Thomas still belongs on the second or third line, for now.
It’s unclear who the Blues will call up. Nathan Walker leads the San Antonio Rampage with seven goals, five assists and 12 points in eight games this season. He may be the one called up, but I would be really hard-pressed to see Doug Armstrong and Craig Berube not use this injury as a excuse to let Klim Kosin come up and see if what he did in the preseason can carry over.
There are some players in the AHL that, for whatever reason, don’t do as well in the minors and when they come up to the NHL they flourish. This is usually attributed to the fact that in the AHL more guys are playing to pad their stats to get noticed by the big club and get their shot.
Kostin has one goal and four assists in eight games with the Rampage. He was tearing it up in the preseason and had many fans, including myself, screaming for him to stay on the Blues roster and send someone else down to San Antonio.
Kostin, noted by Berube and the coaching staff, still has some work to do. I don’t think he’s going to get that work in down in the AHL. I hope he gets the call-up and Blues fans get what we all have been waiting for – Klim Kostin in the NHL.
Tarasenko will be re-evaluated when that five months is up. Unfortunately, that means he might not be back in five months. That makes his earliest return at the end of March. That’s some solid time to get Kostin going and perhaps give the Blues another sniper.
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Either way, this injury is devastating to the organization. You don’t just plug someone in and replace 30-plus goals.
The Blues have the team to make the playoffs still, but the next man up will need to carry more of a load than ever before. It’s impossible to replace a player like Vladi, but it is possible to mitigate the impact of losing a player of his caliber.