Puck Watching
A hockey podcast centered around the St. Louis Blues. Two brothers host your premier talk show featuring prominent guests and thought-provoking discussion.
Puck Watching
Puck Watching Premier - State of the Union!
Join us as we kick off Puck Watching STL with an episode that's brimming with St. Louis Blues passion. As lifelong fans, we, Luke and Nick Koenig, are eager to share our journey through the peaks and valleys of Blues fandom. This episode is a deep dive into the rollercoaster that is the Blues' 24-25 season, examining everything from promising player additions like Dylan Holloway and Philip Broberg to the changing tides under Coach Jim Montgomery.
Expect insight into the Blues' current struggles and triumphs, and how underperformance in key players like Jordan Binnington and Joel Hofer has impacted the team's dynamics. We'll unpack the enigma of a defense that shines with Colton Parayko yet stumbles with Justin Faulk's decline. From potential trades involving veterans like Brandon Saad to financial strategies affecting the roster, we dissect the team’s tactical maneuvers and the implications for their playoff prospects.
As we navigate through the heart of the team, we tackle the ups and downs of players like Dylan Holloway, Robert Thomas, and Jake Neighbors, analyzing their roles and growth. With critical eyes, we assess the Blues’ playoff chances amidst power play struggles and roster shake-ups. Tune in for a candid conversation filled with personal insights, and get ready to witness how we, along with our beloved Blues, plan to tackle the challenges ahead.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to episode one of Puck Watching STL. I'm Luke Koenig. Nick Koenig, my brother to my right on the screen. We're so happy that you've got to join us today for the inaugural episode of Puck Watching and really to give a brief introduction to us. We are two brothers of Jake Koenig, a part of the ball watching sort of network here, and we're excited to include the interesting story of the St Louis Blues recently, which we will happily get into as we go along. But a little bit about me. I'm right now residing in Boston, massachusetts, but although a local guy, born and raised a St Louis Blues super fan and have decided, you know what, let's do this thing with Nick, who is also a super fan, and you can get into this Nick on your own yeah, sure, uh, thanks, luke.
Nick:But yeah, I'm Nick Koenig. I'm, uh, one of the older brothers of Luke, obviously, jake over there at ball washing with with Justin, uh, and I'm also from St Louis, super fan of the Blues, been a huge Blues fan for a long time. Uh, and 2019 kind of set that in stone. I would say. I think that happened with a lot of people, but I moved away from St Louis when I was 18, going to TCU, spent about seven years in Texas and then just came back to St Louis about a year and a half ago with my now wife about a year and a half ago with my now wife.
Nick:And to provide some context to you guys on why we wanted to start this podcast for the most part, we wanted to have normal casual conversations, as most Blues fans do, wanted to keep it that way and keep it light, but also bring you guys some guests that we have potential access to and we want to bring some experts on to help provide, I guess, that side of the story for the Blues as well.
Nick:There's no shortage of analysts and reporters for the Blues that have a lot of knowledge, so we're looking forward to that part of it. That's not going to be for this episode, obviously, but we want to do that and also have some topics on there and we'll, I think, fine tune that as we grow and do more episodes and get that under our belt. But we want to have some debates, we want to have some hot takes. Luke and I are pretty notorious, if those that don't know us, of having extremely heated debates around all sorts of topics, but the Blues are absolutely one of them and fall under that umbrella, so very excited to have that side of it and we'll see if we can get a little bit of that on this episode, as the Blues have gone through a lot, even in this last week alone. But we're very excited and we appreciate everyone tuning in YouTube X sorry for the Insta problems.
Luke :We'll figure that out at a later time. But yeah, that's just, I don't know, separate. We'll been surrounding our, we've been surrounding ourselves with around the sport for a while, but not actually on the ice. So that's an important thing to mention and that's why we need the guests We'll be happily be getting, hopefully in a little bit in the future, here, but we cannot go.
Luke :I think we've missed 52 games already so far this season and that's a lot of games and there's a lot of ground to cover and I think we can't immediately jump to the conclusion of what's been going on recently with this four-game skid without looking all the way towards before the season even began. And so let's start with expectations here. Going into the 24-25 Blues season, they were 26th in odds to win the Cup, about plus 20,000. And I think you'd be a fool to say that they probably would be chasing a Cup this year, I think maybe in a similar grounds to last season. But I wasn't expecting too much. But with the holloway and broberg additions, you thought, man, maybe this team would have just a little bit more life and could potentially hunt for a playoff spot yeah, I I think, on on that front, what the Blues had 93 points last season and, to be frank about it, they overachieved incredibly.
Nick:I don't know if you disagree with that, luke. The goaltending by Hofer and Bennington was the thing that stood out the most, I think, of last year. I think there was some good additions and compliments to them Robert Thomas, jordan, k Cairo Butch all having decent years. However, bennington and Hofer bailed them out time and time again and they were, I would say, extremely fortunate to be that well above 500 and be in contention. And I think, if I'm not mistaken, they were really not eliminated from that playoff race until they played Vegas, I remember pretty distinctly in March and they dropped a pretty bad performance. I don't really think the expectations were that high, necessarily, but they overachieved and that's why I think most people are extremely disappointed where we are now, but still, I think there's a lot of buildup to be made.
Nick:We come into this year. Bannister has a 30 and 19 and two record with the blues Once he took over for Berube and we entered this season about two months in. I would say Bannister gets the boot because Jim Montgomery becomes available after his firing from the Boston Bruins so fired. What was it fired? Fired on a Sunday, hired on a Tuesday.
Luke :Thursday, Thursday, Thursday.
Nick:Army comes out really excited about the higher blues fans, extremely excited about the higher, rightfully so. He's had some successful seasons Boston and Dallas and was the assistant in St Louis for a while and a lot of the players liked him. Everyone thought it'd be a really good change of pace. And then we fast forward. Blues are playing a little bit better. We have the additions of Broberg and Holloway, with those matching offers that Army was able to do, and things are, you know, fine. We're not the best team in the NHL, but we're contending, just like last year, I would say. I don't know if you disagree with that, luke, but then we arrived in January and I think that's where things really took a turn for the absolute worst and there's a lot to talk about there. But, luke, if you want to start with, all of that.
Luke :There's a lot you just said there and I want to almost go back a little bit, because when you look at the team last year, I don't think there's a lot of difference when it comes to the overall roster, excluding the additions of Broberg and Holloway.
Luke :When you look at this like you say, oh, like Marco Scandella was on that team last year and and uh, callie Rosen and Sammy Blay and all these yeah, and, but these people weren't contributing members of the team, that all the contributors are still there, and so the top five that you have right now in scoring, with Kairu, thomas, boots, shen, neighbors and all of that and Holloway besides Holloway, those are your normal contributors.
Luke :So, if anything, I think an average Blues fan like myself, when going into this season, would be like oh, you're just adding another offensive piece to a team that had 92 points last season and lost their playoff contention, I think, with two games left in the season last year and they were 42 and 33 last year, which is quite the, I think 42, 33 and something like four or something like that, but quite the season. And right now we're absolutely nowhere close to that and it's important to realize that. I think you touched a great topic, which is Jordan Bennington and Joel Hofer. That season is that we do not have that this year and also some players are underperforming.
Nick:I think you could say that. I think you could say that about all sorts of players on the roster. I wouldn't even just leave Hofer and Bennington out to dry. I did see a stat the other day where you have goals saved above expected and it's one of the advanced stats. But for those that care about that kind of thing, I think Bennington has saved just over a goal above expected on average throughout this entire season and that was good for 40th in the league as far as it pertains to goalies.
Nick:And Hofer was worse and I think came in at 73, 73 out of all the goalies in contention in the NHL and he was at a negative five point something. So that, and if you show that advanced stat last year we're talking, I think Bennington had over eight or nine goals saved above expected when it was all said and done. I think Hofer was the same. So they bailed us out and we don't have that help from them this year. No, despite, I think, a defense that's better, with the addition of fowler, broberg, pareko having, some would say, a record year, at least points wise, goals wise. He's having a very good year and we don't have that supplemental help from the goalies or the offense as well, and that's a whole other story that we need to get into as well.
Luke :As far as James Jarre, wingers and centers, yeah, I think when you look at the first 10 games and you think of because I think expectations. You look at the first 10 games and you think of because I think expectations were pretty probably the highest it's been since the playoff drought began. It's not really a drought, but you're going to be.
Nick:We're on the verge of a drought.
Luke :Right, you're going to be your third season in a row if things don't really turn around dramatically quick. But you had a loss to Minnesota pretty early on, exposed a lot of the weaknesses of the team. You had a loss to Montreal, who was not expected to be as good as what they are right now so they're a competing team but also had a couple wins Carolina, who's now probably going to be one of the top teams in the league after Mika Rantanen trade One against them. And then you also won against Toronto, which you love it because it's against Craig Berube's team. Now, obviously, we love Chief, but also, at the same time, toronto's a really talented team and the Blues are not the talented team that Toronto has. Those are some important wins early on, but there's also some important losses to think about. I think you saw some of the weaknesses with, with the offense in some of those games, but you also saw the high caliber defense that you saw and Pareko particularly man.
Luke :I have been so impressed with him and for a while after that, after that COVID season, when it comes to 21, 22, I was really nervous about that guy. He had some back issues, some injury, that I didn't think that he was going to recover from if he would have continued to play like that. But, man, the last two seasons particularly I think this one shows it the most is just his way of coming up at the blue line. You're able to stop right there, that defender or that winger, and he just immediately brings him to the halt and the great job of the 50-50 puck battles down low. And that's what defenders like him, who are extremely well-sized, have to do. You have to win those 50-50 battles and be confident on the boards. And that's exactly what we missed from him for a long time. And now we're seeing it from him and it's very incredible to watch the dramatic shift that he's had.
Luke :But then you counteract that with one of Justin Falk's worst seasons. I've ever seen him play With the confidence that I had in him after he was traded, from the Hurricanes to where I said, oh, this guy's. To where I said, oh, this guy's going to be great. This guy's going to fill, uh, maybe a, not even a void, really just a better player than joel edmondson was when he was traded, like he. But that's what could? He was filling that void, but now he just is not the player who he was traded to be no, his value, uh, and contribution has dropped off significantly.
Nick:He may have a goal in the last, yeah, last, whole year. I that that's the part he he is supposed to be somewhat offensive minded. He's not that big, so it's not like he's a Torrey Krug which obviously out for the year bummer of an injury also has had a lot of struggles. So that wasn't necessarily something I don't think a lot of Blues fans were extremely bummed out about. He had a better year last year but in terms of offensive production we would probably need a lot more, expect a lot more from him. To justify him being kind of liability, I would say on the defensive end of the ice.
Nick:But with Falk there's no doubt that there's been a drop-off. There is a serious case to be made. We're not to foreshadow what we're going to talk about later. But to Brandon Saad, justin Falk, I think we're entering that timeframe for him where he has a couple of years left on his contract. He's getting paid a lot of money relative to what he does for the Blues. So I don't know what you think about that, luke, but I think there needs to be a lot of things put on the table as far as this team is concerned for Army and Steen and Montgomery to think about. As far as roster management, yeah, I think the problem is with Falk for Army and Steen and Montgomery to think about.
Luke :As far as roster management, yeah, I think the problem is with Falk right now too, is that you have a guy like Broberg who can be a very good D partner with Falk, and now you see him with Tucker, who isn't. He's a third pairing right now and he probably isn't anything more than that, and that's fine. You can have a third pairing. But I'm worried though, like you know, he doesn't have a consistent partner with him, and we saw that with pareko right after bowmeister left. He didn't have a solid d partner for a long time, like they tried it with letty. That didn't work.
Luke :Um, they try, they're trying it with broberg right now, and it goes either way sometimes, but him and camp baller look the best right now, and so I think having those two, uh as like a committed d pair together that have some chemistry is great. But when you have justin falk out there and you're not sure, you're kind of switching up the lines. It could be Broberg, it could be Tucker, it could be, you know, it doesn't matter. Like that was an issue for him and I and I, so I'll give him some benefit of the doubt with that, but that doesn't excuse, you know, the play that he's had this season. He's pretty well low in the minus category and Broberg is the plus leading defenseman right now with plus seven, which isn't even that good. Falk has the worst plus minus.
Nick:I believe, on the team. Yeah, that's not right. It seems that he always finds himself on the ice when there are goals against Yep and a lot of our defensemen actually don't have a very bad plus minus. When you think about Fowler, broberg, pareko, suter, they really don't. So, you know, I don't know what you can really do with him right now.
Nick:I don't think there's going to be a lot of teams and I hate to bash on Justin Falk because he did have a good, probably one or two good years on the Blues post-Petrangelo departure, but there's just been a huge drop-off and I remember last year he was hurt for a very long time and he didn't ever seem to be the same uh since that injury and we have not seen him recalibrate and return to form at all and, if anything, it's gotten much worse uh.
Nick:But when you look at the, the defense, I I don't think that's your main issue. No, I I think we need to look forward, uh, in order to actually figure out what the problem with this team is. And for me, you have to look at your top lines, and when we're looking at our top lines, we're thinking about Jordan Cairo, we're thinking about Robert Thomas, pavel Buchnevich, braden Shen, dylan Holloway A couple of those guys haven't had the worst years, but I'd love to get your thoughts there, luke, on those five or six guys that are performing adequately up to expectations and the guys that are underperforming or very much underperforming from your perspective there were.
Luke :There were no expectations coming in for Holloway. I think there was some expectation. I think you saw his performance in the playoffs in Edmonton and you thought that, okay, this guy could maybe be a nice third liner, and right now he's our first liner. And so you talk about exceeding expectations. Yeah, that's Dylan Holloway, for sure, and not that he's the best player we have in our team right now, but when it comes to the ceiling that he was put at at the beginning of the season, he is way above that ceiling right now.
Nick:No doubt in my mind, you can make a case, he's the best forward we have right now.
Luke :I think you got to give it to Ky just just for the way he's played in comparison to later or past years yeah, that's fine, I'll allow it.
Luke :We can circle back yeah, I, I, I think the whole, I think the whole the shannon kairu thing just said about kairu. But shen um, honestly, you're kind of getting what you need from Shen right now. I don't think anybody was expecting him to have a 30-goal season this year, let alone a 25-goal season, and I don't think he's going to get to 25, but he probably will get to 20, maybe a little bit above 20. But that's where I see his ceiling. I think he's proving to be pretty good right there. I don't know if you agree with that, but I think shen is right where he needs to be. I think after last season people saw it I was like, yeah, this is probably where he should steadily be pretty consistently I mean the last two years.
Nick:I would say braden shen has drastically performed below expectations yeah, yeah uh, I I don't think there's really any work around there.
Nick:However, he's been better this year and he's benefited from playing on a better line, so I think that has helped him. I don't think braden shen's contract is a good thing for the blues. I I still I don't think so. I know he's the captain, I know he does step up in moments where we may need a spark, which happens very frequently right now, but I don't think that Braden Shen, unfortunately, is good enough to justify him being tied with the Blues for as long as he is at this moment.
Luke :I felt that way for a very long time, so this isn't just a recent development.
Nick:I know he's had a better year, but the blues have some bad contracts out there and braden shen is probably one of them that I'm going to put in that category. It could be unpopular, but I don't know what is it?
Luke :is it six and a half?
Nick:six and a half yeah god, like a nine-year contract. Yeah yeah, was it 11?
Luke :Oh my God, that's crazy yeah, it was nuts, but you're probably right Like, does he deserve six and a half million every year? Maybe not, but does he deserve five? Probably just because he's the captain and he's won a cup with us and he had some pretty contributing moments in his history as a team, with the team. But I want to move down to the second line, which is that's where the issues are, because we talked about Cairo for a second. We can get into that.
Luke :But I think when it comes to Bucinavich, thomas and Neighbors, this is where I have the most problem. Because, first of all, neighbors Neighbors was a guy who scored 27 goals last year, which again you talked about holly, with the ceiling last year. Nobody knew that that was that guy's ceiling, absolutely not. I mean maybe a third liner. Again, he turned out to be your nasty guy in the front of the net. That would just be putting dishing pucks into the net from, like the blue paint, which is crazy and off like a good neighbor, yeah exactly um, but like incredible stuff he did last season.
Luke :But when you look at, you know this one. You say well, the team is not performing offensively as as like it was last season with him, but I I don't know if it's, if it's his fault he's 13 goals right now. I think he's on pace for about 20, 2021.
Luke :So so I think like if you want 20 goal seasons from the guy consistently, you can get it. But if that's all you're going to what you're going to get and you lose Brandon sod, who was also I think he was 26 goals last year you Also I think he was 26 goals last year you lose a guy like him. He's gone and he wasn't going to be doing anything, probably for the rest of his career. That didn't look like it this season. But when you lose that and you don't have neighbors doing well either, it makes a lot of sense why the offensive struggles are happening.
Nick:Yeah, I mean neighbors. If you look at the lines, a couple months ago you had Jake Neighbors on line one, line two, and he since has been demoted to three, and when you get dropped down to a three or third or fourth line third line is not the same as fourth, but the third line does not have a bunch of firepower and you're probably not going to find a bunch of goals like you probably did last year. Yeah, but unfortunately I don't really know what I'll say about jake neighbor. His goals have been different this year, which actually gives me a little bit of hope for him, and maybe he could be a player that's not just, you know, creating a lot of havoc and chaos around the crease area, which is great.
Nick:I love when he does do that and I think someone has to do that for one team, but it seems like that dimension is not as much there for him as it was last year. So potentially he could be developing into a better overall player, but just not seeing the results we did last year, I never expected him to have over 25 goals this year. I didn't think that was probably going to happen, but hopefully he does get to 20 and he can I don't know. Keep up that consistency and keep continuing to get better. He's still really young, so no hope lost for Jake Nabors at this point, from my perspective.
Luke :Yeah, I think. When you look at the rest of the line, though, I think it gets a little concerning, although I'm going to, I'm going to say that Thomas is having a good year. He's not having a great year, he's having a good year, and, people, when you look at his point totals, you'll think, oh, like 38 points, that's not good and it's not. But when you consider the injury that he had you know, I missed 12 games and that cost the Blues a lot when he was gone, and I think you got to give him the benefit of the doubt there, and I'm giving a lot of benefits of the doubt today I'm going to stop doing that. But for Thomas particularly, though, that guy was the cornerstone of this franchise last season and it showed this was the guy.
Luke :And I still think, though, if Robert Thomas was not in the lineup for as many games as he has been this season, we would be in even a worse situation right now. So I think we can put the rumors to bed and the stuff to talk to bed about how Robert Thomas is not having this great year. He's not having a great year, but if the Blues didn't have this guy, I'm going to tell you right now we'd be looking at way more games below 500 than what we are right now. I can tell you that he's a great player. I would agree.
Nick:I do want to plug for a second here our Instagram, x and YouTube usernames here, just to make sure you guys know where to follow. So, on X, you guys can find us on at Puck Watching STL. We're live streaming on X currently, streaming on X currently. And on Instagram, more of the same, uh, puck watching STL. And then on YouTube, again, uh, same sort of deal. And uh, yeah, like and subscribe if you can, if you guys are enjoying it. Feel free to leave comments, leave feedback. We're more than open to it. But while we have you guys here, we wanted to make sure sure you, you all, were aware of it of all the platforms that we're on, and I do want to.
Nick:Robert thomas got hurt, broke his ankle this year. Uh, injuries happen, that's totally fine. He has been a bit overshadowed because of kairu having a better year, or at least a more consistent year, I think, than people expected him to have. However, his play has dropped off pretty significantly in the last few weeks and I feel like that is a huge reason why they are struggling. Robert Thomas, I think, at the end of the day, needs to score more goals. He loves throwing those passes to the front of the net, seeing if someone is able to get a stick on it. Great, I like. I like when he does that sometimes. But you, you and I were talking about it the other day for every good Robert, Thomas, thomas, pass, there are probably seven bad ones that's fine and that's fine.
Nick:Those, the good to great players are going to have that type of mentality and I think that's okay because he's a playmaker and he's got to try to make plays, especially for this team, that struggles like they do offensively. But you do have to take the bad with the good on this and he is, I would say, going through a slump and I really hope that he can find a rhythm and score some goals. He has been getting some bad bounces. I would hate to act like he hasn't had, you know, some score some goals. He has been getting some bad bounces. I would hate to act like he hasn't had some good showings. He's hit the post a few times the last few games. You got to feel for the guy. He needs to buy one to get his head on right. But I'm not losing faith on Robert Thomas. He just needs to have the next few games are going to be important before Four Nations, I think for him. I think he needs to score a goal or have a multi-point game in the next few.
Luke :Yeah, he had. He played. The only season he's ever played 82 games was this past season and uh, and he had 26 goals, which was I'm sorry, not 26 goals. Yeah, oh yeah, he did have 26 goals and he had, I think, 60 assists or something like that. So he had, I think 60 assists or something like that. So he had like more than 80 points.
Luke :And so you can tell that's the effect of being healthy. And when you break your ankle, I mean, I've broken my ankle once in my life, I never, and I'm very weak, so I wouldn't necessarily think that that's a very easy injury to come back from. Knowing, from experience and especially being playing hockey with it. But he's a tough guy, I mean, and all hockey players are, so you got to expect the guy to come back with some force. We haven't seen the force. I agree that he hasn't had the best couple weeks, but again, when talking about that, you know exactly what, who this person on the Blues is. That is the guy. We need to be playing well for the whole team to be playing well, because when Thomas drops off, then the rest of the stock goes down. And so, you're right, there is a lot of pressure on Thomas, and I will not doubt that. But it's a little concerning that we rely on a guy like that so much to where now our stock is dropping just because he's had a not so good past couple weeks.
Nick:Yeah, no, it's concerning. The Blues have been known for a very long time for depth. I think you can make the case. Maybe Vladimir Tarasenko was this guy that was going to be the face of the NHL for a while. I don't really think that ever really panned out. I remember he was on the cover of NHL 17.
Nick:That was cool, but he was never that guy. He wasn't a Sidney Crosby, he wasn't an Ovechkin, he certainly was never a Conor McDavid or McKinnon. Yeah, and he was fun. He was a really fun watch, but he didn't have that. He had a burst here and there, but he's not going to fly through guys and be finishing, you know, like you see McDavid or McKinnon do. He just had a crazy shot. He was physical, fun watch, but never panned out. So the Blues are a depth team and when your depth players are not consistently producing, it's not like they're scoring a goal, a game, but at least you know you have 50, 60 points, you're scoring and you're assisting and you're doing the hard parts of hockey. Uh, that doesn't happen right now and I think we can talk more about that. But look, we did get a question yeah, I want to.
Luke :I want to have a fun one. Yeah, you can go ahead well, are you talking about the, the um? Not the jim montgomery one oh no, I'm not talking about the montgomery one. Sorry, which one were you talking about?
Nick:I just see the one. You see the blues um splashing at the deadline with yeah, yeah, yeah, hockey g yeah, g, yeah, g91.
Luke :Hockey G yeah, he's an old friend, so well, the blue splashing at the deadline, I mean, we've talked about this a little bit, but I think the whole Saad thing, when we can get into him because also there's a question about Saad later him, because also there's a question about sod later, um, but I think, with him having the having some renewed cap space with this I I still think, though, that unless things really drastically turn around the next few weeks where, like I think, the trade deadline is, I think, in early march, I want to say yeah, so yeah, I I don't see us doing anything particular, despite the sod thing, because that means this team has to go on and win a couple games in a row, which we are, oh, seven and one and doing in three game, in three game win streaks have never done that. Only team in the nhL to have not done that before this season. That is absurd, absurd stat.
Nick:Agreed, yeah, agreed. I. However, I mean I would love for them to have fun at the deadline. There's no reason to do so. They don't have a. I wouldn't consider them having any type of shot at this point. I tweeted it out this morning. But they have below a 10% chance now of making the playoffs. I think if you rewind the clock, a week and a half ago they had just below 20. So the odds have significantly diminished on the probability of them being able to compete for that second wild card spot. The icing on the cake, I think, which we can talk about later, is the Colorado game.
Nick:But the sod contract, of course it clears up some cap space. They do have room to move around a bit, but they have other obligations. I know they're going to have to pay suitor bonuses if he completes 60 games or at that 60 game threshold, which is in 10 more games. So they're gonna have to pay people out and they need to make sure they have enough money for that. And I just looked at the unrestricted free agents for next year. It is a loaded campaign, yeah, of players. So they're able to clear certain amounts of cap space.
Nick:Maybe, krug, you can either offload or LTIR Krug. I don't understand what's really going on with him at this point. I don't know if he has a chance of really playing again, unfortunately. Throw for the guy, but there's a lot of room to offload cap trade players. You may have to eat some of the salary, but Saab's mutual contract termination certainly helps when you're trying to reload and make sure that you can make a push for a legitimate free agent signing this summer, so at the deadline they could be. Sellers Wouldn't be surprised if they tried to get rid of someone. Unfortunately, I would love to. I mean, we were just talking about a uh, bulk and suitor. I would be more than okay to sell.
Luke :That sounds great yeah, but like who's gonna really like. The problem is is that when you sell somebody for example, when we did it two years, two seasons ago, when we did it with with o'reilly and teresanko and barbachev these these guys were contributing members to teams and were pretty active. And when you look at Falk again, I'm on the guy's side. I want the guy to do well, but he's not doing that well and, like, his name four seasons ago is so much different than his name now and so I don't know if teams are going to be really calling. I don't think it's going to be a brand sod situation where where doug armstrong is calling teams and nobody wants them, but I don't think anybody's gonna be picking up the phone and saying I want falk I'm not at all saying that people should be handing over an arm and a leg to grab justin falk at the deadline, certainly no.
Nick:I do think sometimes there is a case for teams to move players despite maybe having to retain some of the money and just literally throwing a sixth round pick. That's conditional. I honestly don't care. We have a lot of young people in our organization in the AHL. When you look at, like Tucker and Kessel, and there's other guys down there too, I would rather them play. I honestly would. I don't think there's a great case to keep Justin Falk on the roster for another year. I mean this season, okay, fine, For another whole year. I think that would be a huge mistake. And Nick Letty exactly the same way. I had the same thoughts about Nick Letty.
Luke :Wait, he exists, he exists.
Nick:I feel about it. That whole injury saga is crazy yeah crazy. I like that he's on the ice all the time and he just doesn't play and I'm like whatever, I don't understand it he practices every, he practices almost all the time, and then and then, and then it's just like but he's still long term.
Luke :So I mean he, I mean he's basically like again. Also, people forget we still have Torrey Krug on this team and technically, and I don't know where he's going to go. And I mean just remember, by the way, like Torrey Krug was a consistent member of the team last season, before the injury or no, I'm sorry, did he? He got injured, I think at the end, but right Is that? I don't remember. I think he played the whole year.
Nick:He played all year, and then they LTI-ered a few weeks before the season, Everyone was like, ah, no shoot.
Luke :Yeah, that's a good reaction.
Nick:That's a very good rendition of that, but you know Krug's like, he's a fun guy. He's some energy here and there. He's getting older. But I remember when we signed him not to go back down memory lane, but when we got him I was excited. I thought Crew could be a good player for the Blues, especially after watching him in 2019 and him laying Robert Thomas out on the ice, which was definitely an illegal hit. It was not called, but regardless, he scored goals, he created a lot of offense, he was fun and I don't think I really saw much of that at all with him as long as he's been on the Blues Besides that one year. Which was what was that? 2020, 2021?
Luke :That's true.
Nick:Yeah, his first season and I thought he was good, but after that he was great in the Power Play. Power Play yeah, his first season and I thought he was good, but after that he was good and the Blues were good that year.
Luke :I don't want to touch the Karrue Petrangelo thing right now, it's too much to handle. But I do want to talk about it's funny because you said that the hit was illegal. But I will say it probably was illegal. But also when you look at, say, well, would you rather them call the penalty there for charging five minute major or would you rather call and then have them call the Achari trip in game?
Nick:five. Nearly a trip. I think that was cosmic justice for that hand pass against the Sharks, so I don't care about it.
Luke :I didn't adjust. It still goes, just a series.
Nick:It didn't feel bad Justice still goes. Just a series. It works, even though we won the series. That was some BS on that one too. That was insane.
Luke :I thought the Justice was the 5-0 win the next day, or sorry, the 3-2 win and then the 5-0 win.
Nick:Nope, it was for the hand pass, but we're not getting a team.
Luke :Let's talk about the season, yeah, so, but I also wanted to touch on this too, and we have a nice little comment from Michael Stromberg, who is a Blackhawks fan, and he says good stuff, boys, sod's best years are with the Blackhawks. We don't need to talk about the franchise. They're ruining the ruining. Bedard right now Totally agree, but Brandon Saad particularly obviously.
Luke :We saw the move this past week and I think the move was for the better. I think you get the younger guys like Texier to be able to get into the lineup pretty consistently and see if he really is this guy who is a young gun and who can develop into some player that can be a contributing member of this team, cause we haven't seen that this year, cause he just hasn't played that much, uh, but I don't know if it's possible, if we uh, if we can see that, because, again, I don't think Montgomery is too high on him we were talking about that earlier and so that's concerning and so, like, what does that really move do? Well, it frees up the cap space, but not much else, because he doesn't really do anything for the blues. He was not like that, he was. I don't think he put this team stock down, but I also don't think he really helped us that much either.
Nick:You know he was just kind of or sad, sad, oh, no, no. Oh no, no, he had that one hat trick, which was cool. What was that? A couple months ago, that was the most noteworthy. I don't understand how that even happened. Everyone's like, oh, brandon Saad, here comes another 20 goals this year. And you're like, oh wow, that couldn't have been more wrong.
Luke :He scored in three games this season and then seven goals. That was the craziest stat Keep going.
Nick:Sorry. Quick thing on the Blackhawks, just five seconds. At least Blackhawks fans can say that they're at least retaining 50% of Rantanen's salary, so he's maybe technically on the roster for some Bedard help. But that is crazy. Yeah, that's it.
Luke :I just thought that was hilarious.
Nick:Just thought that was hilarious that they're retaining 50 of Branton and salary. But don't have Nico ranting um, but sod, yep, I'm totally content. I know some people were bummed that he signed with Vegas and I'm like what did you expect him to do? Um, and let's not act like Vegas just got a steal with Brandon sod. We all wanted him to leave, so I don't really know why people would be upset about that. Vegas is going to Vegas and they'll sign players at the deadline every year because they're always contenders and they always spend to the cap. And then all of a sudden, mark Stone will just go on LTIR and then they'll be able to spend the cap and then he'll come back before the playoffs. I mean, that's usually what they do. I don't think that happened this year, but um, the knights will be good.
Luke :I don't think it's going to be because they signed brandon saad. Yeah, I can agree with that. I think he just has another chance of a cup and I think he'll be a, you know, solid third or fourth line guy, because vegas is too good to where, like, they don't have a and I this is another important point that the third and fourth lines for St Louis is totally different than the third and fourth lines of some other teams. Because when you have a guy like Oscar Sundquist who's centering this third line right now occasionally sometimes he's not, sometimes he doesn't, but he's done it the most of the season and you have a guy sometimes like jake neighbors who's on that and, uh, you know, texier or something like that, you're not gonna develop these guys.
Luke :Sunquist unfortunately it's always sunny in st louis great guy, love the guy. He's locker room dude 100 and he had a. Great is two cups, clearly a, but he does not have the same stuff that he had like later earlier in his career. He just doesn't and he's slower. He's just not as good on the puck and he doesn't have the puck handles like he used to when it comes to just being able to skate into the zone pretty easily and be able to dump it in and maybe win a 50, 50 puck battle. He's just not as good at that anymore and it's tough. So Saad wasn't anything with Oscar Sundquist, so we'll maybe give him that benefit. But when you look at him in Vegas it's going to be a different story. You have so much more skill down there. But yeah, that's my view of the whole Saad thing.
Nick:Vegas is going to unlock.
Luke :Brandon Saad? No. Is that it going to unlock Brandon Sod? No, no, but he, he will, I think, be able to do something. Not that he's going to be able to get seven more goals, but I think like he's a good playoff guy. You know, you've never we'd never really seen him in the playoffs, except once with the team so, and he did pretty well. So I don't know. I think it'd be interesting to see that, but good for him. Brandon Saad always liked the guy, but I think I'm happy he's gone.
Nick:No, I would agree. I mean you could talk about the mismanagement, the faulty trades, acquisitions, letting Petrangelo go. I just saw a comment on YouTube. Obviously, you could pretty much draw a straight line to the struggles of the Blues and the Alex Petrangelo departure. I feel like that's just something that will always be resonating with Blues fans especially. Alex Petrangelo has had fantastic years on the Vegas Golden Knights since he left the Blues and the Blues. Obviously it did leave room for Pareko to take a step forward. It took him a long time to take a step forward after Petrangelo left, but he did finally.
Nick:But imagine having both of those guys locked up on your defense. Don't do this to me. It's just something that you have to think about in order to evaluate Army's full set of work that he's done since he's gotten to St Louis. And now you get Krug, then you get Justin Falk all people that we really, if we're being candid, would rather not have in our team at this point, given their age and their level of performance. It's just a frustrating factor.
Nick:And then you sign Kyrou and Thomas to an eight by eight fine. And then you wake up one summer day and he did the same thing to Bucinavich, but at 6x8. And we can go right into the struggles that Pablo Bucinavich has had. I mean, he is struggling beyond belief right now. He's well below pace of his last few years that he's been on the Blues and I watched him pretty intently the other day against the Avalanche. He has opportunities he does and you can tell that the frustration is building and something has to give, I think, at some point for him, but until then it's not even close to the struggles of Thomas Butch, is going through something much different.
Luke :He's never been a big finisher. I think he's never been the guy who's going to be this cornerstone of the offense, but he just found ways to score the last couple years and it was pretty incredible and I give him credit. I mean he's had over 20 goal seasons pretty consistently for the Blues and he's a huge part of the offense. Give him credit. He's had over 20 goal seasons pretty consistently for the Blues and he's a huge part of the offense. I just don't know.
Luke :I think the Thomas and him ref too is not good. I don't know if they're seeing not actually seeing eye to eye, but on the ice I don't know if they're connecting as much as they were in the past. I think that's kind of a part to play with it. But also Boosh, I think he just is not doing what he has been the last couple years and the points is the easiest explanation. But I just don't know. I think him and Thomas are kind of off cue a little bit right now and I think also it does not help that they don't have a consistent line mate with him either. I mean he's signed neighbors.
Nick:Yeah, no, have a consistent line mate with him either. I mean he's on neighbors, yeah, no, I, I agree and I do want to. We'll take about, you know, 10 to 15 more minutes here. Luke, I think, yeah, but to address, I think we're good on as far as uh, the roster, uh, presently, yeah, but scott prunovich moves on last week, gets traded to the islanders for a conditional 2026 pick.
Nick:I believe Prunovic has to play 20 games on the Islanders this year in order for us to get that pick. I thought it was fine. I really struggled to see where Prunovic was going to fit, despite lackluster Justin Falk. I guess I don't really know if Falk and Prunovic are interchangeable fellas as far as defensive pairings would go. But Prunovic struggled, I'd say, a bit when he was on the ice. He's extremely undersized, but he's a Tory Krug in that sense where he's going to try to ignite an offense. He's played pretty well on the Islanders since he's gone there. I believe he's a plus four on the ice and has three points, three assists. That's fitting, but I mean, at the end of the day, I don't know regardless of how he performs with the Islanders, I don't think that it was a mistake to move Perunovic. Unfortunately.
Luke :Yeah, I don't think it was a mistake either. And I think that, scott Perunovic, you know Hobie Baker, this guy I mean he did some incredible stuff in college and thinking that you know, a lot of times it translates, sometimes it doesn't, and you just never know. But you took a chance on the guy. He's undersized, you said, and but he is the power to move the puck and be, you know, very active on the blue line and it's pretty incredible to watch when he was playing out there and he made an impact sometimes but I think defensively he was okay. I think he was just like krug, I think I don't think he was necessarily a liability out there, but he the size just really puts it to a nice perspective of just how tall you have to be on D to be successful.
Nick:Not to mention injuries too.
Nick:People forget that he was injured a lot since he had been drafted on the Blues, horrible injuries as well, so really tough to come back from. So that's another reason why I'm not that upset that they got rid of them and weren't more patient with them, because those injuries, those tell stories a bit on what it's going to look like in the future and I know that's speculative but unfortunately kind of has to be factored in. So I do wish him the best. I hope he does well, I don't want him to. There's no sourness on my end at all 100%.
Luke :I think it's the same way with Saad. I think both those players you want to see him do well and Perunovic just never had it, just never had the time, never had the full healthiness, and we just we needed that. And having Krug as well, you wouldn't have been able to see him that much if Krug actually would have come up as a good player in the last couple years. But I just feel like Perunovic just having him and Krug on the same team two undersized guys that basically play the same role on a team on the power play and want to spark offenses hard to have those two as well with the same kind of role. So a shame. But I think the Islanders will be lucky to have him. I think he's got a lot of upside and I hope he stays healthy because that's going to be the way he will continue to play with New York.
Luke :Agreed, but also I wanted to address one more comment here about Jim Montgomery from my buddy here at bc. Why do you think jim montgomery is so bad? And this is a boston bruins fan and what I? I don't even want to talk about this comment. There's no substance behind it. But you know, obviously again, we talked about it briefly, but we also fail to acknowledge here that there kind of is some substance, unfortunately, not to say Jim Montgomery is a bad coach at all. He has done a good job with St Louis and we are above 500 with him at the helm.
Nick:I don't think we should say that yet.
Luke :Well, hold on, hold on. Let me finish this. So we definitely have lost four in a row. This is the worst skid we've had with them. But right now the Blues are the 25th team in the league. In the power play 18.5%. League average is about 21% below league average. And then penalty kill 29th in the league 71.1%. That is abysmal. And that's league average about 78%. And there's 32 teams in the league. So the fact that, as a coach, you have seen and you've been the person who's been implementing some of these power play and penalty kill strategy, that that has been one of your main issues as a concern for me, because that's that seems like one of the coach's biggest roles not to say that, of course, you got to execute as a player, but concerning that there hasn't been much development on that front since Bannister's firing. It's basically the same and, if not a little worse.
Nick:Yeah, honestly, this may sound a bit bleak. I don't think it even matters right now. We're not going to get rid of Jim Montgomery for a long time. You can't keep going through coaches at the rate that the Blues have been going through. Army had extremely high praise for Montgomery before he even hired him and said once he became available it was a must-have, and fired Bannister on the spot after not a very bad record the previous year Rough start in the first part of the season for Bannister Don't think it was his fault, so I don't know what to really say about Montgomery.
Nick:Montgomery has a lot of leash. I don't think he has any hot seat issues as it currently stands for the Blues, nor should he. You need to give him a lot more time and I think this all comes down to roster and Montgomery can only do so much to try to motivate. I know this was the problem with Berube. You know he tries to motivate players. I don't know why I always think of Jordan Cairo like needing to be motivated by coaches. Unfortunately, I don't know how it doesn't work, but I always feel like they're talking to Thomas and Cairo and I don't really know why, but it does feel that way. So I hope that he can get through to both of those guys and tap into a level that maybe they haven't reached yet.
Nick:I would say they're at the prime of their careers. They're not going to probably get significantly better. They're 26, 27 years old. They've been in the league since 2018, 2019. They're both on the roster when we won the cup. Thomas played a semi-active role in that playoff run, played a semi-active role in that playoff run, so I don't think there's really any more excuses for those two to step up their game. But for Montgomery's sake I don't know what to say on him. It seems like he's tried to pull some strings exactly what Bannister and Berube did and it doesn't really seem to have changed things all that much. There's only so much you can do, so I think the jury's still out on montgomery. He has a long time to be the coach of the blues. Unfortunately. I think the roster needs to shake up.
Luke :It's not going to be the coach yeah, I think, I think you're right there, I think, unfortunately, I've always been a jim montgomery's corner and I'm not going to be out of there for a while. I think a lot of the time it's the players, and I think this gladly brings us into our final topic, which is are these Blues a playoff team? Nick?
Nick:No, no, I would not say that they're a playoff team. Just to paint the picture of what happened last week you go to Utah two weeks ago, actually today, or two days ago, utah, yeah yeah. You lose in a horrible, horrible performance at Utah after you had just beaten Calgary.
Luke :Oh yeah, sorry. Yeah, You're rewinding.
Nick:Yeah, rewinding. You go to Vegas and you think the dream is going to die. You are up four to two with three minutes left. You let up, uh, two goals in the last three minutes where the knights pulled their goalie. You end up winning in a shootout. Sigh of relief okay, we get the knights at home.
Nick:Another horrible performance. They lose that game. Uh, and then where do you go? You go to vancouver. No, there's a game in between there. Yeah, no, the stars, the stars in vancouver. They played well that game. Yep, they did. They lost that game because they hit four posts. Uh, got the yips when it came to finishing and they lost. And then they go to vancouver. It's like, okay, now it's time you're chasing vancouver. You have to right the ship. They lose to Vancouver. Another horrible performance.
Nick:And then the icing on the cake was, of course, friday night against Colorado, where not an easy game. Nathan McKinnon is a god. I think he's probably, if not the best you have McDavid up there the second best player in the NHL. When that guy gets the puck, everyone is just excited in the arena, which is a feeling I don't think any Blues fans have really ever had about a player, at least really in my lifetime. I don't know if you would say differently, but when that guy touches the puck and he has a full head of steam, everyone's like something great is going to happen. And the blues just had no answers for any of them. You had niches getting on the board as well for his first goal as a part of the avalanche. Um, some unfortunate bounces, uh, but more so, just a lackluster effort.
Nick:And you bring us to now. What are they? 25th or 26th in the league? They have some of the worst power play, both four and power play or penalty kills in the league. I don't know how you win if you're not going to be effective in either of those metrics, and something would have to drastically change. And we have Utah tonight and there's maybe some lines, previews we could do. And then you have a gauntlet. You have the Oilers, florida and the Blackhawks, you know, not counting them, but those last three at home and if you know, somehow, some way we do the impossible and we win four games in a row against good teams. Uh, that would put us probably right back into it. I would imagine. I don't see that happening so what do you?
Luke :think yeah, not a playoff team. I'm with you, but and I and I wish I could disagree because I would love some playoff hockey I know that that was some of the prime time stuff in 2019 through 22 of seeing some blues hockey although it's kind of weird seasons with COVID but I will say that the blues have been outscored 16-4 in the last four games. That's not something that's sustainable. And also, I think the 5-0 thing is obviously the kicker there. But I think when you look at the team and you think that just evaluating their play, as we've done this whole episode I don't see it happening.
Luke :I don't unless people have some radical change at a pretty crucial point in the season, and that'd be incredible to watch people like thomas and uh, kairu and buchnevich all those guys stepping up to the plate, and even neighbors too. That's the way it happens. I don't see it happening any other way and I don't see it happening this season. And jordan, bennington and hofer I don't see them improving. I see this being a pretty similar bennington season to what we saw two years ago, which was when billy husso was playing in the playoffs, because bennington was not the hot goalie at the time. So I see that.
Nick:No, I mean yeah, I would totally agree. I would like to preview just briefly. I don't want to go really over an hour preferably, but the lines for tonight are a bit comical in my opinion. First of all, robert Thomas and Pareko are questionable. They're both sick. Pareko missed Friday night because he had an illness. Apparently, thomas also probably got exactly what he had, so he's questionable.
Nick:But projected lineup, given both of them play, is first line Booch, robert Thomas, kairou. This one's funny Second line is Holloway, braden Shen and Matthew Joseph. Oh, so Texier looks up and all of a sudden is downgraded from the first line to the fourth playing with Torp Foxa. And then the third line is Neighbors, neighbors. Sunquist is back and bull duke. So I I don't really know what to say on that. Yeah, I, I understand why montgomery wants to play with lines, but there's there is a diminishing returns factor for playing with all these lines. These guys need a little bit more chemistry.
Nick:You, you can't put Matthew Joseph on a line with Dylan Holloway and Braden Shen. I don't know why you would. I like Matthew Joseph. I think he's a big effort guy. I appreciate his play. But is he a second liner in the NHL? God, you can even make a case that Braden Shen shouldn't be on the second line in the NHL. And we have two of them. We have Joseph and Braden Shen on the second line of our team, and it's just something that I don't understand. What needs to change there? Maybe Bull Duke and neighbors take steps up, but it's concerning. And then you have Broberg, fowler, suter, kessel, tucker, falk. So what are your thoughts on those?
Luke :Interesting, I don't know. I think the defense, I think no matter how you structure it, I think you're going to get pretty similar outcomes each time. I don't worry about the defense as much as I used to on them, but the Falk Tucker thing, you see it, he's a third pairing. He's a third pairing that shows a lot and is concerning. I want to kind of wrap up. You wanted to talk about some of your picks for tonight.
Nick:Yeah, I know that betting has just become legalized in Missouri. We don't have access to those major platforms though, so I'm going with underdogs for mine, because it's legal and they have a lot of different prop plays for individual players, so I think that's fun. I did this last week because I am pretty much just going to keep doing it until it happens, because he has to break out of the slump that he's in, whether it's Bucinavich or Thomas, but I'm putting both of them to register. I'm putting Thomas to register more than a point, and I'm putting thomas to register more than a point and booch to have more than a point as well. Multi-point games for both of them. This is a huge game, and they struggle at utah all of the time. That's where our dreams go to die as a hockey team clayton keller clayton keller.
Nick:Oh, maybe I should just redo that then.
Luke :I wouldn't even.
Nick:Clayton Keller to have five goals. I would love it, I would take that over. I would take that over Booch having a point. But I think Clayton Keller whatever his point, total is and what that spread would be for his prop if it's a point and a half, take it, take it total is and what that that spread would be for his prop. If it's a point and a half, take it, take it. He murders the st louis blues and has been for four years. Yeah, so take that. That's my pick. Scratch boog and thomas well, okay, that's yeah.
Luke :And also, if we're talking money line, then and obviously that's an underdog, but if we're talking money line, I think I think the blues will break the four game streak today. I tonight, wow, I, I think they do. I think five would just be the end of it all and I think they know it. I don't think they'd let that happen tonight, especially against a team who is, they know that, know that they can match up pretty well against and even though it's stupid, keller, I think they can figure it out. But my prop would be Benner, over 30 and a half tonight, absolutely Whatever it is, whatever the over is on his saves, give it to me. Probably Either way, I don't care.
Nick:Yeah, we'll do a better job of that next time to actually have those lines, but, um, I would also. I like that one too. I think that should be a good play. If bennington doesn't get pulled, I don't even know what's going on with him. Yeah, uh, but yeah, I, I am not very hopeful. You said, said they're going to win. I'm going to say they're going to lose, unfortunately. And then I'd say I think after if they were to lose tonight, I think that tank that elusive concept that we talk about, where no fan really wants to hear it but sometimes just kind of needs to happen may be on and then dialed up to 11 after if they were to lose this game. So we'll see. We'll see how tonight goes. It's at six o'clock, uh, central time. Uh, taking on utah hockey club, and they're back at home on tuesday against um connor mcdavid and the edmonton oilers. And then you have kachuk homecoming in St Louis with Florida, and then Bedard and Co coming to St Louis on Saturday.
Luke :Can't wait for all those and we'll be back next Sunday, similar time, maybe a little bit earlier. We'll get that out in the socials when need be. But this is it for the first episode of Puck Watching. We hope you've all enjoyed. We enjoyed it and we're going to be doing this hopefully every Sunday for the next couple weeks, and so we look forward to that and have a great week everybody. Thanks for tuning in.
Nick:Appreciate it, guys. Thank you.
