The math doesn’t look good for the St. Louis Blues, and would the Vegas Golden Knights be interested in Brayden Schenn?
Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas on the 32 Thoughts: The Podcast – Hold Outs, Opt Ins, and Potential Trades episode, on the St. Louis Blues and if Brayden Schenn would interest the Vegas Golden Knights.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Bukauskas: “Okay, what about what’s going on in St Louis, Elliotte? Place where you never know what you might see out there, right? They were the headliners in the off-season with the two offer sheets. What are they thinking here as we inch closer to the trade deadline, particularly their captain, Brayden Schenn?
Friedman: “Well, there, they’ve been really disappointed with the way the season has gone. You know, they’ve already made a coaching change. They brought in Jim Montgomery. There’s been a couple of times this year where the quotes out of St Louis have kind of been, ‘if things don’t get going, we, we might have to make some changes.’
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You know, by points percentage, you know, even though they’re eight points back of Vancouver for the final playoff spot right now. You know by points percentage, they’re at .491. That’s less than you know, Vancouver is at .573. Calgary is at .545. Utah is at .509, even Anaheim, which is a point behind them because they’ve played two last games, they’re at .500. So the math is really not good for St Louis.
You know, it’s amazing. You look at the bottom of that Western Conference, like some of those goal differentials, even Vancouver in the playoffs, is minus 11. The Blues are minus 17. Like the math doesn’t look good for them. They’re not out by any stretch of the imagination, but they need to go on the kind of run that they haven’t gone on for much of this year.
And you know, one thing about Doug Armstrong is he’s not afraid, if he sees something and doesn’t like something, he’s not afraid to do things. He’s done it this year. He’s done it in the past. I mean, we’ve talked on this pod before about his famous Christmas memo of 2018 months before the Stanley Cup, where he basically made a ton of his team available. And then Jordan Binnington came up, got hot, and the rest is history.
But you know, if you’ve been looking at some of the trade boards, including Sportsnets, own one. They’re suddenly full of a lot of Blues players. And you know what it says to me is that Doug Armstrong has basically said,’ you want to talk to me about my guys, talk to me. Make me an offer, and all think.’
Now, I think in Schenn’s particular case, when his name got out last week. I think there was a lot of interest. I think there were a number of teams that reached out. And I don’t know specifics, but I heard that he asked a big price. And not only that, but I think there were some teams that were told, ‘you just don’t have what I’d want for him.’
And you know, like I said a year ago, there were teams that kind of poked around on him. I think Ottawa was one of them. And, you know, he basically said, ‘like, that’s my captain. I don’t want my captain out there unless there’s a good reason.’ This year, I think it’s been different because they’re disappointed by the way they’ve played. And it doesn’t mean that he’s going to trade eight guys. But what it does mean is that he’s willing to listen on a lot of his guys and kind of see where does it go from here.
And when it comes to Brayden Schenn in particular, you know, the team that I look at and say, I don’t know if they have what St Louis wants, but the team that immediately jumped into my mind was Vegas. I mean, Toronto, sure, because you know, you’re all, we know Toronto is looking for a center, and that’s a (Leafs GM Brad) Treliving kind of guy. But Vegas really jumped in my mind because Brayden Schenn played for Kelly McCrimmon in the Western Hockey League.
And like again, if I look up and down Vegas and I’d be wondering what they’re willing to do, and how can they make this work. But the one thing I’ve kind of felt is that you don’t underestimate Kelly McCrimmon. When he decides he wants someone, he will do what it takes to try and get that person. So the more I thought about Schenn’s availability, the more I wondered about, okay, you know Kelly McCrimmon knows this player, and he’s a Kelly McCrimmon type player, and do they have what it could take to do this.
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I don’t know the answer to that. But it’s really the team, the more I thought about it, the more I thought about them.”
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