3 Reasons St. Louis Blues Should Not Trade For Matthew Tkachuk

So, as of writing this article, the St. Louis Blues have not officially begun the offseason. The players are mostly all gone, but the playoffs continue without them.

The loss to the Colorado Avalanche still stings. Most fans, including myself, are big enough to admit that the Avs just had more talent.

Why it stings is because the Blues were good enough to knock off Colorado, when they were at their best. The Blues just were not at their best for long enough to get the job done.

Hats off to Colorado for slaying their demons and getting it done. Yet, we swing our own focus back to the Blues and the ever-present hope that an offseason brings.

It is filled with uncertainty, never knowing exactly who will return and who might come in. St. Louis is good enough and has enough roster certainty that we all expect gaps to be filled as opposed to any sort of reset.

In terms of filling the gaps, there are always names. The most popular in town has to be that of Matthew Tkachuk.

Every city does it, but for some odd reason, St. Louis gets a wet dream when one of their own might be playing in their home city. So, beyond just the talent, St. Louisans are frothing at the mouth to bring a Tkachuk back to The Note.

There are definitely reasons why this would be a good idea. Tkachuk has talent, he has age on his side and he’s not fully in his prime.

For all the furor about him being a missing piece, the Blues need to not go down that road – at least not how it’s being presented. As of right now, the Blues would likely need to trade for Tkachuk since he is to be a restricted free agent.

There are three main reasons the Blues need to not explore that option.

Careless with the puck

Everyone who thinks about Matthew Tkachuk being in a Blues uniform next season, or at any point in his career, marvels at the skill. Their main thought is likely fixated on his ability to dangle and move, even at his size.

We all would love to have a power forward that can still cut through defenders like a hot knife through butter. One or two highlights of scoring through his legs does not take away the mistakes he still makes.

That is fantastic to watch. But, Blues fans only get to see that stuff. They don’t see what happens over the course of an entire season.

For example, in 2021-22, Tkachuk was a turnover machine. He had a total of 91 statistical giveaways. I say statistical because we’ve seen game sheets where a player was not credited with a giveaway, but we all saw at least a couple turnovers. So, who knows how many times he actually lost the puck.

Tkachuk had 61 giveaways in 56 games in 2020-21. He had 86 the season prior to that.

To a certain extent, you can forgive a little carelessness when the talent is there. That’s getting right to the edge of that fine line.

Putting it into perspective, many fans considered Colton Parayko a turnover machine for the Blues in 2021-22. Parayko did lead the team in giveaways and only had 53.

The leading forward for the Blues in the giveaway category was Robert Thomas with 50. As weak as Jordan Kyrou was on the puck toward the end of the season, he only had 32 regular season giveaways.

In the playoffs alone, Tkachuk had 17 giveaways in 12 games. In the same amount of games, Parayko, who led the team in turnovers again, had 10.

We are talking almost twice as many turnovers as the player that led the Blues. That’s not sustainable.

Playoff numbers

Another big reason fans are big on Tkachuk is the regular season numbers. In 2021-22, he put up a career high in goals and points.

Tkachuk had a fantastic year. 42 goals and 104 points.

Those numbers would have been atop the Blues list in every category – goals, assists and points. Who wouldn’t want those numbers on their team?

104 points? Yes, please.

42 goals? Fantastic.

Those all sound great and we’d all be crazy to turn that down. However, where are the numbers in the playoffs.

People will sugarcoat it, because they like Tkachuk and his tenacity and the fact he’s considered from St. Louis. The bottom line is the numbers disappear in the playoffs.

Prior to 2021-22, Tkachuk had three goals and five points in 15 career playoff games. That’s not great.

He had zero goals and zero points in a sweep when he was 19. Even if you give him a pass on that season due to his inexperience, that’s three goals and five points in 11 games. That’s barely a goal every three games and only a point every other game from a guy you depend on.

Many fans will say to look at 2021-22, which was his career year to date. He still only had four goals and 10 points in 12 games.

Guess who had more goals in the same amount of games. Vladimir Tarasenko had six goals in 12 games for the Blues.

If you want to the whole “oh but…” thing, go ahead. Tarasenko got most of his goals against Minnesota and not Colorado?

That’s a valid point. However, Tarasenko still had a goal and three points against a surprisingly stingy Colorado team. Those points came in the team’s two wins as well, proving the team is better when Tarasenko scores.

Tkachuk had three goals against an embarrassingly porous Edmonton defense. Those three goals came in one game and he had one assist the rest of the series. Even in seven games against a shaky Dallas team, Tkachuk only had one goal and six points.

I’m not even saying any of this to tear the guy down. I don’t dislike him, but there is an overvaluation of his ability when he has yet to prove it in crunch time.

100-plus points is fantastic, but the Blues already had one of their highest scoring teams in franchise history. If those numbers aren’t somewhat replicated in the most important part of any season, what difference would it really make?