Jason Millen: Blues face Carolina and Ty Rattie and Winter Classic photos and notes Blues face Carolina and Ty Rattie and Winter Classic photos and notes

Excellent photos. Glad the rain didn't ruin the fun, would have been awesome if it had been a bit colder and ended up being a light snow. Good ol, MO "winter."

Haven't followed along much on HB lately. Do you guys think Shatty will be traded before the deadline, resigned, or lost to free agency?

Excellent photos. Glad the rain didn't ruin the fun, would have been awesome if it had been a bit colder and ended up being a light snow. Good ol, MO "winter."

Haven't followed along much on HB lately. Do you guys think Shatty will be traded before the deadline, resigned, or lost to free agency?
- MOhawk

my 2 cents on Shatty - various options in no particular order 1) trade and sign (well let the other team talk to him and have a deal in place first then trade) for a decent forward return; 2) try and make a playoff run with him knowing he is likely gone after the season; 3) by some miracle figure out how to move bouwmeester and/or gunnarrson

In scenario 3, Hunt would essentially replace gunnarsson and with the money saved on the others you could sign shatty. This is not very likely imho. Jaybo really has to be gone if you have any shot at keeping shatty.

my 2 cents on Shatty - various options in no particular order 1) trade and sign (well let the other team talk to him and have a deal in place first then trade) for a decent forward return; 2) try and make a playoff run with him knowing he is likely gone after the season; 3) by some miracle figure out how to move bouwmeester and/or gunnarrson

In scenario 3, Hunt would essentially replace gunnarsson and with the money saved on the others you could sign shatty. This is not very likely imho. Jaybo really has to be gone if you have any shot at keeping shatty.
- Jason Millen

I think he is gone by the deadline

Blues have plenty of capable D Men that can produce maybe not at a Shatty level but a decent enough clip

I think he is gone by the deadline

Blues have plenty of capable D Men that can produce maybe not at a Shatty level but a decent enough clip
- sycsam

Mostly likely scenario is borderline prospect and a pick imho or just keep him for a run..

Rattie might be a bit overworked playing on Carolina's first line and the Blues fourth line.

fixed

Welllll I skipped watching the juniors for that.

Hunt is a UFA after the season, I believe. So he could fly to better playing opportunities if he has opened any eyes around the league. He is nice insurance though.

Maybe our 3rd D-pair will be a little more suspect going into next year, but it could be a good thing long-term. Assume you keep Petro, Edmundson & Bortuzzo in the expansion draft, leaving Gunnar & Bouw exposed. (Assuming Shatty leaves in some form and does not bring back an eligible ED defender.) You lose one. You keep Lindbohm (assuming he's not tabbed to be a Knight), Schmaltz & Bortuzzo to round out the 3rd pair, along with either Gunnar/Bouw. Personally, I like having Borts playing pretty well on either side to spell the growing pains of Lindbohm/Schmaltz and not expecting them to do too much. It may not be as solid as our D heading into the past two season, but if we can upgrade on the forward side, may be worth it. If the 3rd pair is really struggling at trading deadline 2019, then maybe you pick up a veteran guy and go that route.

I'd be quite intrigued by Alzner on the FA market, but not sure if he fits into the Blues salary equation and they probably need center ice help more than D.

Welllll I skipped watching the juniors for that.
- Blue Clam

I didn't. That was some quality hockey right there.

The Blues on the other hand - yawn. Hitchcock gets it right every once in a while, calling the Blues problems a lack of "attitude consistency".

Which of course is code for "lazy".

Thanks for not being too hard on us! Need the energy to try and take another bite out of chicago tonight.

Great write up, Jason.

The WC was an event I won't ever forget. We sat low on the end the Blues shot 2x, and admittedly watched alot on the jumbotron. But man, being in the company of 40,xxx blues fans was something else. The energy can't be put into words. We do have an awesome fanbase.

That Carolina game was not good.

Best of luck to Ty Rattie out there.

Hopefully everyone is healthy tommorow and the Blues can right the ship. Man that game yesterday was terrible. Is it wrong to boo your hometown team at the end of that pathetic showing??? Big points available tomorrow.


On Rattie being placed on waivers; kind of have to think he might have requested a trade. Whatever happened, good for him to get a chance to actually play. He did nothing wrong that I've heard of and basically everything we asked. He just couldn't crack this lineup. That also means when a forward goes down due to injury Paajarvi might get the next call up. Haven't looked at the ahl stats in a bit, wonder what Barbashev is doing

Photo album updated with a dozen or so more photos.

The Winter Classic was very well done. Great job by the Blues and Cardinals to bring it to the city.

It was kind of neat to see the Arch disappear into the fog.

The only thing I wish had been better was a higher quality of Blackhawks alum. They were scraping the bottom of the barrel. No Belfour, Chelios, Roenick, etc. would have made for better reminiscing.

But this was a great event for the city.