St. Louis Blues 31-Man Roster Has No Surprises On It

The St. Louis Blues pretty much always knew who was going to Edmonton on their roster. The official reveal just proved that.

The St. Louis Blues unveiled their 31-man roster. These are the men that will be traveling to Edmonton to attempt winning a second straight Stanley Cup for your team.

However, while it is nice to know who the 31 are, it was a tad, bit disappointing. It was not disappointing because of who was on or off, but that there was no build up or intrigue.

We basically knew who was going to be left off from the start. Joel Hofer and Tyler Tucker were brought in more to see where they were than any real chance of making the team.

So, it is no surprise that they are the two men left off a 33-man roster to trim it to 31. In fact, there were no surprises. That is the disappointment.

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The fun of wondering who might make the team or get left off in a normal situation is the debate. You usually have your guys and other people have their guys and you banter the merits of each.

In this situation, the Blues picked the names we all knew were going to go. It is basically the regular roster plus the people any fan would have selected for the Black Aces group.

Here is the lineup via the team website:

Forwards

49 – Ivan Barbashev
9 – Sammy Blais
21 – Tyler Bozak
36 – Troy Brouwer
61 – Jacob de la Rose
37 – Klim Kostin
33 – Jordan Kyrou
28 – Mackenzie MacEachern
90 – Ryan O’Reilly
57 – David Perron
53 – Austin Poganski
12 – Zach Sanford
10 – Brayden Schenn
17 – Jaden Schwartz
20 – Alexander Steen
70 – Oskar Sundqvist
91 – Vladimir Tarasenko
18 – Robert Thomas

Defense

41 – Robert Bortuzzo
29 – Vince Dunn
72 – Justin Faulk
4 – Carl Gunnarsson
77 – Niko Mikkola
55 – Colton Parayko
27 – Alex Pietrangelo
51 – Derrick Pouliot
6 – Marco Scandella
46 – Jake Walman

Goalies

34 – Jake Allen
50 – Jordan Binnington
35 – Ville Husso

Personally, I was a little surprised that Troy Brouwer made the squad, but his playoff experience would help in an injury situation and also to tutor the guys on the practice squad. If nothing else, there was just nobody that was going to take that spot.

Tucker showed well, but the Blues already had plenty of defenders. With no forwards pushing the envelope beyond the ones that made it, Brouwer made the cut.

I still maintain that the team should have given Nathan Walker a shot in camp, if nothing else as a reward for a good minor league season. He was not even invited to camp as far as we know, so not being included in the roster was a foregone conclusion.

Ultimately, there is no issue with the roster. It was just expected. Having a surprise name would have been nice, but we all saw this coming, given the players involved in practices.