St. Louis may have won the 2019 Stanley Cup Championship, but that doesn’t mean every player will be around for the banner raising ceremony. Here’s a look at who may stay or leave the St. Louis Blues this off-season.
All good things must come to an end, including the St. Louis Blues Stanley Cup celebration. The championship parade for the franchise’s first Stanley cup win can’t last forever. Eventually, the Blues are going to have to turn down “Gloria” and leave partying Brett Hull behind as they enter the cold unforgiving world of the NHL offseason.
While St. Louis’s fans will be celebrating until the puck drops again in October, with the upcoming NHL draft, that means free agency is right around the corner. Though the Blues have most of their major players signed for next season, there’s a few notable contracts and players general manager Doug Armstrong will have to work on this off-season.
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In a recent interview with NHL.com, Armstrong said as much as he’d like to see all his free agents return, but knows some will have to leave their St. Louis jersey behind after the cup celebrations cease.
St. Louis has seven players becoming restricted free agents, most notably their cup winning savior Jordan Binnington. Binnington is in for a well-earned substantial pay increase and after all, he’s done for the franchise in his short tenure, the Blues should be more than willing to open their checkbooks.
The more the cup winning goaltender gets paid means there’s less to spread around for other restricted free agents Joel Edmundson, Ivan Barbashev, Robby Fabbri, Zach Sanford, Oskar Sundqvist, and Sammy Blais.
While Armstrong would love to keep Edmundson and Barbashev, Edmundson would probably be the most valuable commodity on the trade market as a young defenseman. If anyone has to go, at least the Blues would get a decent return in comparison to what other players might attract.
Sundqvist could be a good trade chip as well. He put up 31 points to be a beyond productive player who found himself on the fourth line. Sundqvist may be young at 25, but the two-time Stanley Cup champion can bring leadership and experience to an organization. Plus, the fact the Blues acquired him in a trade might make him easier for the organization to move on from.
While most of the Blues headaches are going to revolve around re-signing their restricted free agents, their unrestricted free agents should be much easier to deal with. Although Chris Thorburn was nothing more than an AHL journeyman with a feel-good story for the Blues, he should be easy to cut ties with, along with late-season trade piece Michael Del Zotto.
Thorburn seems like a perfect candidate to retire at the season’s end, with his career going out on a high note. Goaltender Jared Coreau has been buried in the AHL and after the emergence of Jordan Binnington the only place in the organization that even remotely makes sense for him is the minor leagues, but of course, Armstrong would understand if he sought a big league opportunity elsewhere.
The only two major decisions the Blues need to make in free agency are about winger Pat Maroon and defenseman Carl Gunnarsson. Jay Bouwmeester was a pending unrestricted free agent but was recently signed to a one-year contract extension.
Gunnarson is a top pairing defenseman for the Blues, so Armstrong should want to hold onto him, especially if he decides to move Edmundson for the potential return. As if there was any doubt of Gunnarson’s contributions to the Blues, that overtime game-winner in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup final raised his stock immensely come contract time.
That leaves Maroon. Throughout the playoffs, Maroon paid the role of hometown hero and ending it with a Stanley Cup is the type of ending you can only dream up. Maroon was last an unrestricted free agent and turned down larger contracts with longer terms to sign a one year deal with the Blues, citing the desire to be near his family.
Now with a Stanley Cup championship in tow and his roots firmly established, Maroon seems more determined than ever to stay in St. Louis. Re-singing him shouldn’t be a hard task for Armstrong because, if we’re being honest, Pat Maroon would probably offer to play for free just to stay here. That’s how much he loves the Blues. Whatever team-friendly contract is thrown Maroons way he’ll sign in a heartbeat.
Luckily for the Blues and their fans, the heavy hitters of Ryan O’Reilly, Jaden Schwartz, and Vladimir Tarasenko are all destined to return next season. Even though he needs a new contract, there’s zero chance the Blues get rid of Jordan Binnington. The core of the cup run will be back next season, although some of the young guns might find themselves on a different roster with a Stanley Cup ring in tow.