The St. Louis Blues star scorer’s popularity, even injured, is well known in St. Louis. However, his jersey sales show he’s got to be popular outside the area.
The St. Louis Blues thought they had taken a big blow when they lost Vladimir Tarasenko for much of the 2019-20 season. His shoulder injury early in the year is scheduled to keep him out until March and maybe even through to April.
Time will tell whether the strong Russian forward rebounds this season or at all, given the amount of shoulder issues he has had. Somewhat surprisingly, the Blues continued to plug on without him.
David Perron has emerged as a legitimate, consistent scoring threat. Brayden Schenn and Jaden Schwartz have re-found the magic they briefly lost without Tarasenko as their winger.
However, what is just as interesting as the team’s success minus Tarasenko’s 30-plus goals per year is the fact fans have not forgotten 91. In fact, they still support him so much that he has ascended upward on a particular list.
The NHL released it’s jersey sales numbers, or at least the rankings of who sells the most. Tarasenko is very near the top.
On the one hand, perhaps we should not be surprised. Tarasenko is the most well known player for the defending Stanley Cup champions.
Any time a team wins, there is a spike in jersey sales, even outside of the home market. So, while other players might have had slightly more influence at times, Tarasenko still has the name recognition.
What is funny, perhaps even ironic, is that Tarasenko rises to the second spot in jersey sales in a year where he has only played in 10 games.
Clearly the championship aspect gave Tarasenko a bump. Fanatics pushes his jersey the most since they have those ready-made. Other names typically have to be special ordered. Even so, it is impressive to get to the second spot on the list.
It does seem odd for a name like Connor McDavid, who many consider the best individual in the game today, to have slipped. I no longer buy opposing team’s jerseys, but he seems like one that might interest me if I still did. Without having the Gretzky name, his appeal seems to cross those team barriers more than most in today’s game.
It also seems a bit strange for Marc-Andre Fleury to be that high. Perhaps it is the Vegas fan still figuring out who to latch onto. Or, maybe it is simply because he is still one of the better goaltenders in the game and plays in a market where they have not yet figured out how to hate on a goalie as soon as they have one bad game.
Regardless, it might mean nothing to some, but it shows that the Blues do have sway even in the fan community. We all love St. Louis and there are tons of Blues fans out there, but comparatively, it is a smaller market than just about every other team on that list.
The fact that Auston Matthews is not on top shows that jersey sales go beyond just the home market of every team. Pittsburgh has fans all over the country and not all, perhaps even most, don’t live or maybe never lived in Pittsburgh.
The same is true of the Blues. Just watch any away game and listen and see how many Blues fans there are now.
Plenty of those fans have always been Blues fans and some just got on board. If Tarasenko is their man, there is nothing wrong with that.
All Blues fans should love the guy. The only thing to dislike is the fact he hasn’t hit 40 goals yet and we all know he can.
We hoped 2019-20 would be the year and maybe he would have. He had 10 points in 10 games.
We’ll never know now. Such is life. At least he’s getting that sweet residual check.