Blues trades and woes

Well the St. Louis Blues pulled of 2 deals last week as the trade deadline approaches and personally I am a hugh fan of both of the trades.

Brewer Trade:

The first trade we will go over is the Brewer trade.  I think this was a great move!  I have not liked the style of play that Brewer brought to the Blues and was completely befuddled that they made him captain of the team.  After hearing his interview about being traded I understood a bit better the personality & character that he has, but watching him play hockey has been painful for me the entire time he played on the team.  He often appears to not be trying hard, and makes critical mistakes reliably.  I was just happy to see the team cut ties with him and end the saga of having a captain that the majority of the town didnt even think was the best defensmen on the team much less the best player.

Johnson/Mclement Trade:

This trade, as has been widely reported, was a blockbuster.  I was truly shocked that the Blues made this move… I also was extremely excited that they made the move as well!  I think we addressed a critical need at forward, got a very productive defender in return and overall improved our team greatly.  Thinking about the team over the next 2-4 years gets me very excited… our top forwards could be Backes, Stewart, Mcdonald, Steen, Oshi, Berglund, Peron, & Tarasenko… that is as good as it gets and would be a very competitive team up front.  Combine that with the promising young defense we are still crafting and assuming we can get a #1 net-minder out of the crop of Halak, Shields, & Bishop the team looks to be in great shape moving forward.

I think it is true that this trade is very risky, but I would not be surprised to be looking back on the trade in 5 years and saying that this deal was one of the best in Blues history, and that both players we got ended up being better than Johnson.