2007-2008 Blues Draft and Off-Season thread

[stlmark]

Also, I heard on XM that Mike Keenan will be announced as the Calgary Flames head coach tomorrow. Apparently Darryl Sutter and Keenan are friends. Good luck Calgary.

Chris Gratton was traded back to the Lightning for a 2nd round pick. Gratton's 3rd go round with the Ning.

Edit: Go back a page for the new Strickland article.

[cabby7588]

Also, I heard on XM that Mike Keenan will be announced as the Calgary Flames head coach tomorrow. Apparently Darryl Sutter and Keenan are friends. Good luck Calgary. :shock:

Chris Gratton was traded back to the Lightning for a 2nd round pick. Gratton's 3rd go round with the Ning.

Edit: Go back a page for the new Strickland article.

Yikes. Nothing worse than Keenan as your head coach....Best of luck, Calgary.

[cabby7588]

More Strickland:

Sanford gone?

Jackman signed?

Deal for a scorer at the draft?

Here it is:
http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=8017

Good read, thanks for posting!

Sanford played so amazing two years ago it's sad to see him leave. Martin St.Louis would sure solve our scoring problems but he may be way too expensive to trade for. He's also getting old. We are also going to have a lot of money wrapped up in Jackman, Backman, Brewer, and McKee, so they better be solid defensemen next year.

Don’t expect the club to sign more than one maybe two players after the first of July. The Blues are only in the market for a center. They will not pursue a winger in July.

Yikes. That's a scary thought, we need some wingers badly. The Blues may be better next year, especially with Murray, but they probably won't be great yet.

[stlmark]

More Strickland:

Sanford gone?

Jackman signed?

Deal for a scorer at the draft?

Here it is:
http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=8017

Good read, thanks for posting!

Sanford played so amazing two years ago it's sad to see him leave. Martin St.Louis would sure solve our scoring problems but he may be way too expensive to trade for. He's also getting old. We are also going to have a lot of money wrapped up in Jackman, Backman, Brewer, and McKee, so they better be solid defensemen next year.

Don’t expect the club to sign more than one maybe two players after the first of July. The Blues are only in the market for a center. They will not pursue a winger in July.

Yikes. That's a scary thought, we need some wingers badly. The Blues may be better next year, especially with Murray, but they probably won't be great yet.

Remember cabby, Strickland did say we would trade for a scoring forward then sign 1 or 2 free agents. So that would be 2 or 3 new players. I also think the Blues can talk Oshie into turning pro.

[thrill]

Yikes. Nothing worse than Keenan as your head coach....Best of luck, Calgary.

Iginla and Kiprusoff are in contract years too. Sucks to be Calgary.

[JCShutout]

My take on parts of Strickland:

Re-signing Jax - Teh awesomeness! :thumbup:

Not re-signing Sandman: If only he stayed healthy. Makes sense. Cash backs up Legace, Riskman backs up Schwartz.

Look for the Blues to package a player with one of their three first round picks in hopes of nabbing a quality goal scorer. A pick won’t be enough if the Blues truly want to upgrade in the scoring department. When you look at the Blues returnees scoring is once again going to be a major concern. If they truly want to make the playoffs they will address this area.

Wow. It had better be one of our later 1st round picks, and maybe Christian Backman for a really quality guy.

The one position the Blues have serious depth in is defense. Don’t be shocked if Christian Backman’s name is thrown out there as being made available via trade.

Those of you who know me know I like this bit. I like Backman, but with our depth on D and his inconsistency (and lack of speed), I think losing him is fine... especially since Jackman was better offensively last year.

In reality the Blues have very few open spots available on their roster. Don’t expect the club to sign more than one maybe two players after the first of July. The Blues are only in the market for a center. They will not pursue a winger in July.

I was only expecting one or two players signed for the NHL club, but I'm sad at the comment about no wingers. I was hoping we'd sign Scott Hartnell. I think he could score 20 goals and be a tough, hard worker... I'll bet this means we sign Tkachuk to play center.

If only we could drop Cajanek (2 mill) and Ruchinsky (2.5-3 mill)...

The Blues need to simply concentrate on having a smart draft and realize there is no quick fix to turning a club around. The Blues are entering the second year of a rebuild and must stick to the plan they have established which is to draft well and to develop kids.

TIT

Please squash the Martin St. Louis to the Blues rumors! His name has never come up and Tampa Bay has not contacted the Blues offering up the sniper. Not to mention St. Louis’ has a no-trade clause in his contract. Would he accept a trade to a club who is rebuilding?

I too would love St Louis in St. Louis. Oh well.

Prospect T.J. Oshie will also be in attendance. He recently told me he is returning to the University of North Dakota because he thinks they have something special there. I’m pretty sure he is aware that Jonathan Toews left school. Several people have certainly tried to tell Oshie it is in his best interest to turn pro. There will be plenty of people in his ear at the prospect camp looking to convince Oshie he should cut the cord with the Fighting Sioux.

He's small enough that I woulden't mind him playing college for another year while he gains size, but what do I know?

[cabby7588]

More Strickland:

Sanford gone?

Jackman signed?

Deal for a scorer at the draft?

Here it is:
http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=8017

Good read, thanks for posting!

Sanford played so amazing two years ago it's sad to see him leave. Martin St.Louis would sure solve our scoring problems but he may be way too expensive to trade for. He's also getting old. We are also going to have a lot of money wrapped up in Jackman, Backman, Brewer, and McKee, so they better be solid defensemen next year.

Don’t expect the club to sign more than one maybe two players after the first of July. The Blues are only in the market for a center. They will not pursue a winger in July.

Yikes. That's a scary thought, we need some wingers badly. The Blues may be better next year, especially with Murray, but they probably won't be great yet.

Remember cabby, Strickland did say we would trade for a scoring forward then sign 1 or 2 free agents. So that would be 2 or 3 new players. I also think the Blues can talk Oshie into turning pro.

Ahhh OK good point. Didn't think of that, phew. They have three first rounders but I'm sure they trade at least one. If teams want to trade into the first round, they will come to the Blues first. We really need some scoring...We are set on defense, I bet we won't sign one defensemen. They also probably won't make any goalie changes, so they can focus 100% on forwards.

[stlmark]

More Strickland:

Sanford gone?

Jackman signed?

Deal for a scorer at the draft?

Here it is:
http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=8017

Good read, thanks for posting!

Sanford played so amazing two years ago it's sad to see him leave. Martin St.Louis would sure solve our scoring problems but he may be way too expensive to trade for. He's also getting old. We are also going to have a lot of money wrapped up in Jackman, Backman, Brewer, and McKee, so they better be solid defensemen next year.

Don’t expect the club to sign more than one maybe two players after the first of July. The Blues are only in the market for a center. They will not pursue a winger in July.

Yikes. That's a scary thought, we need some wingers badly. The Blues may be better next year, especially with Murray, but they probably won't be great yet.

Remember cabby, Strickland did say we would trade for a scoring forward then sign 1 or 2 free agents. So that would be 2 or 3 new players. I also think the Blues can talk Oshie into turning pro.

Ahhh OK good point. Didn't think of that, phew. They have three first rounders but I'm sure they trade at least one. If teams want to trade into the first round, they will come to the Blues first. We really need some scoring...We are set on defense, I bet we won't sign one defensemen. They also probably won't make any goalie changes, so they can focus 100% on forwards.

Although, there's a rumor going around that we are interested in Martin Gerber from Ottawa. I don't know why that would be.

[Leroy]

[stlmark]

Check out the Flyers. They traded for Hartnell and Timmonen rights and then sign them both. I hate the Flyers.

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story/?ID=211182&hubname=nhl