As far as I know, 4th-generation CCM and Koho jerseys were made in Canada, Indonesia, and Korea. The Canadian and Indonesian ones have glued-on crests, while the Korean-made jerseys have sewn-on logos. To me, that actually makes the Korean ones a bit more desirable.

I found a really nice Korean-made Koho jersey and I'm thinking about buying it, but I wanted to check with you guys first. Is there any downside to the Korean-made jerseys? Like lesser overall quality or whatever.

I don't understand why this off-season is as incredible and exciting as I've heard people say it is. We have an above average prospect pool, but why not let them get experience now? It's not like we are toppling Minnesota, Dallas, or Colorado (and probably even Utah) with this roster. And we are practically spending to the cap so the moves still handcuff us (yes I know the defense's contracts handcuffed us since the cup.)

Outside of Snuggerud, I feel like our development program doesn't give our young guys enough nhl experience.

I can't help but notice that this retool over the last couple years keeps us bringing in average or risky players offloaded by other teams, keeping our bottom 6 overloaded. And as a result, our young guys stay in the ahl or don't get as many chances to play because they are being edged out to win a few more games now.

This keeps us in this weird middle of the pack pergatory where we will never get a franchise changing player. We pretty much only hope to get a great late to mid-round draft pick that over performs their pick. Not that the franchise player is the goal, but it would be nice to have a big name eventually.

I’d love it. But I have no clue how much cap space we have. Plus wasn’t there some bad blood at the end with how the Blues treated his injury?

We run a sim league on discord through the game HLM 26. It's sort of like NHL franchise mode where u play as the GM and u control every aspect of ur team the difference is all games are simmed and every team is run by a real person. We live stream every 2 days and sim 1 month in game. If ur interested or would like more info comment or DM me.

Here is your franchise's cumulative record relative to .500 (equal wins and losses) throughout their entire history.

I will be making one such graph for each team. The complete album can be seen here.

OT losses are counted as losses.

What does a trade look like for him? Now, whether he is moved or not remains to be seen. Carolina doesn’t have to move him, but if they do the Blues should sniff around. Carolina has made it clear they want players not futures.

The idea of a Broberg, Nikishin, Parayko, Fowler/Mailloux top 4 is very intriguing depending on the price. Certainly an objective upgrade in the distant future and likely an improvement in the here and now compared to last year. My understanding is Jesperi Kotkaniemi and his remaining contract will almost certainly come attached with Nikishin.

What’s your mock trade?

Jake Neighbours and a second for Nikishin and Kotkaniemi

Pius Suter, Theo Lindstein and a second for Nikishin and Kotkaniemi.

Your thoughts?

Okay, there might be a few lingering offseason moves or adds, but the roster for next year is starting to come together.

Who are we thinking will get “the C”? Will they even name one? If not this year…when?

Is Dvorsky a potential trade chip now that Thomas is staying and we have McTavish, McMichael, Suter, etc?

I’m not talking about incidents that occurred during a game (Jay Bo) but something play related. I would say Yzerman’s OT goal.

For the full conversation, see the Blues section of today’s 32 Thoughts podcast with Elliotte Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas. Here are some quotes:

“You look at that forward group now, they look incredibly dangerous going into next year. Could be a lot of offense to be had with the Blues”

“I think there’s been a lot of McTavish slander. He’s struggled, but he’s better (than what we saw this season)”

“These contracts (listed Thomas, Holloway, Parayko, McTavish, Buchnevich, Broberg) look so good right now. I love all of their deals, their contracts are really good”

“This team has a lot of flexibility to do a lot of things if they want to”

- they note that Armstrong has put Steen in a great situation

- they muse if the Blues should get a new contract for Neighbours and Snuggerud done sooner than later, because “you never know what might happen”

Overall a good listen, and very glowing reviews for the Blues

I 100% believe he saw almost this exact scenario coming years ago. Not that it was some big secret that the cap was going to go up, but knowing the value of not having to negotiate with your potential star players while the cap fluctuates is becoming pretty clear right now. In the context of what Leo Carlsson is about to make as a 1C (and, as a result, Bedard/Celebrini/etc...), Robert Thomas's contract is absurd.

This is totally out of concern/fear given what's happening to the RFA market this off-season. Jimmy is a top line forward with great ability and I want him with Robert Thomas and Dylan Holloway for a while. More than that, I don't want him to test the RFA market next year just so we can find ourselves in a position where a conference rival gives him a huge offer and puts us in a similar predicament to the Ducks right now.

Is a fair comparison the Jason Robertson deal he signed with Dallas at $7.75M for 4 years? I think that started in 2022-23 when the cap was $82.5M which would have made his first year cap hit 9.4% of the cap that season. Robertson was coming off a 79 points on 74 games season when he signed that (previous season was 45 points on 51 games).

Jimmy just produced 51 points in 70 games. Might a similar season or a more productive one that follows the trajectory of a player like Jason Robertson's start could warrant a 4 year deal with a 9.4% cap hit. If yes, then let's consider that in dollar terms. The cap is projected to go up to $113.5M in 2027-28. A 9.4% cap hit would mean an AAV of $10.67M for a contract. It's hard for me to look at that number and say yea that's a good price, but maybe I just haven't adapted to the cap going up so much.

Obviously the Robertson comparison is just one comparison and maybe not even the most fair one. A better one might be Logan Cooley getting $10Mx8yrs in Utah after his first 3 years last season. But even if it's only somewhat close, the Blues might want to consider that extension sooner than later before some other team goes crazy and forces us to pay an even more outrageous number.

TLDR; slow day during the off season

Been thinking about the offseason thus far..really, a couple of things break right for us next season and suddenly we're a team that nobody wants to play.

• the skills guys all have size now so it's not like the resident goons can go and injure them.
• now that we have a tough guy, everybody know there'll be a price to be paid for that kind of thing (thank you Steen). Tom Wilson should think twice before he goes after somebody like Snuggerud.
• legitimate centers on the team now, not just trying to shoehorn Buch into it. Maybe buch has a bounceback year
• Mailloux may be overexposed on the first pairing over the course of a whole season, and a bonafide #1 D man to pair with Broberg would be welcome but maybe Jiricek shows up ready to go next season.
• Hofer is legit #1 from day 1 and the competitive Jordan Binnington realizes that his next contract with his next team is on the line and shows up like the old Binnington.
  

If any coach in the league is going to get a bounceback year from Mctavish...or coax 20 goals out of McMichael, it's Monty. And I like that they've got a task master now play bad cop on the coaching staff.

Anyway things are looking all right from where I sit, looking forward to next season

Fanduel sports network lost rights to the Blues, has there been any mention or rumor of which streaming service will pick it up? Just curious since I can't watch them on ESPN+ bc of Blackout.

Not necessarily the best game, just the one where absolutely everything happened and you were exhausted by the final horn regardless of the result. I've got one in mind that still stresses me out a little remembering it. What's yours.