St. Louis Blues Fans Step Up Big Time In Rewarding All-Star Voting

St. Louis Blues fans fans were once thought to be somewhat apathetic or, at the very least, low in number so unable to affect things that involved league-wide players. That has changed.

The St. Louis Blues fan base was originally thought to exist right around the city and mainly in the more affluent areas of the St. Louis area. Recent events have shown that is not the case at all.

Whether it is due to the team winning a Stanley Cup or not, the fans have come out of the woodwork. Road games are that in name only as “Let’s Go Blues!” chants have become regular affairs when away from home.

Another assumption about Blues fans is their general apathy towards getting the vote out. There have been several things over the years where if people would have gotten fully involved, their players might have benefited.

Instead, fan bases from larger, more populous areas got the rewards based on the pure numbers game. That has changed.

The most recent example of this change is the fans voting David Perron in as one of the NHL’s Last Men In for the 2020 All-Star Game. Instead of letting Colorado get an extra player or a second member of the Blackhawks just because they were the Blackhawks, Blues fans set their minds to avoiding a big, though inconsequential, injustice.

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Perron is on pace to have a career year. With slightly less than half the NHL season left, Perron has already tied his point total from all of 2018-19 now that he has 46 points as of the night the vote was revealed.

He is only eight goals away from setting a new career best too. As hot as he has been, it is hard not to imagine him not eclipsing eight goals in 36 games. Oh, by the way, Perron currently leads the league in game winning goals with eight.

However, despite all his production, it came down to a fan vote to get one of the most deserving members of the Blues on the team.

Jordan Binnington is one of the best goalies in the division, so he got in. Alex Pietrangelo is coming up big in his contract year. Ryan O’Reilly is having a solid year, but got in more on name recognition and also needing more centers.

It felt like Perron had been robbed of a chance for his first, and maybe only, All-Star appearance in his home away from home. Thankfully, St. Louis fans rectified that.

Blues fans set out to get as much of their own flavor on this game as possible. The Blues will have four players on the Central Division team, as well as the coach of that squad.

Blues fans also played a part in voting TJ Oshie on the the Atlantic Division team, you can be sure of that. Though he has been gone several years, Oshie remains a fan favorite.

The only thing the fans could not pull off was including St. Louisan Clayton Keller in the proceedings. Many vote posts on social media included Keller as one of the four being voted in, but he got outdone by Vancouver Canucks defenseman Quinn Hughes.

It is hard to argue against Hughes. The defender has 30 points. Still, it would have been nice to have large crowd reactions to former St. Louis residents of one sort or the other in Keller and Oshie. One of two isn’t bad.

However, the Perron thing was the big vote. The last time the Blues had a deserving player to be captain, when Vladimir Tarasenko was tearing things up a few seasons ago, PK Subban got voted in instead. The numbers were so low that Tarasenko got third in the vote. The assumption was Blues fans did not get the vote out, so why assume they could/would for Perron.

Blues fans came up big this time. It would have not been shocking, but it would have been very disappointing to not have Perron there.

He has been so instrumental to the team’s offense and overcoming the loss of a 30-plus goal scorer. He has had good seasons other years, but this is the first time he truly felt like he needed to be an All-Star. To have been robbed of that would have been a shame.

Thankfully, Blues fans stepped up to the plate. Now, there will be lots of opportunity for applause with a St. Louis flavor when the rosters are announced, and not just for the Central.