I’m told not to expect highly regarded prospect Vladimir Tarasenko to finish the season in North America. Tarasenko injured his shoulder playing in Russia shortly after the World Junior Championship and there’s little point in risking further injury in the American League where he is eligible to play in the AHL playoffs. Tarasenko is expected to come to St. Louis soon to be evaluated by Blues Doctors.  News of him officially signing with the Blues won’t be too far behind.

St. Louis has re-called D-man Ian Cole from Peoria who will replace Tyson Strachan who’s been assigned back to the AHL.

The Blues are down to one more available recall from the minors they can use from this point moving forward.

The combination of trades and injuries has impacted what the Peoria roster will look like if they do earn an AHL playoff birth.

Adam Cracknell, who is up with the NHL club on emergency recall replacing the injured Vladimir Sobotka, remains eligible for the AHL playoffs..

Players such as Ryan Reaves and Chris Porter were assigned to the NHL following the trades to both Brad Winchester and Brad Boyes.  Both Reaves and Porter will not be eligible to play in the AHL playoffs since they were not on the Peoria roster at the time of the deadline. Trades can not open up spots for players to be called up on emergency.

Phillip McRae was not eligible to go to Peoria since injured players can not be sent down. This may explain why there was some confusion as to whether or not McRae was hurt as the team would have preferred to get him some valuable playoff experience in the AHL. He’s since been declared out with a knee injury and is expected back in about two weeks.

Same goes with D-man Nikita Nikitin whose injury prevented him from being added to the Peoria roster before the deadline.     
 
There is a chance the Blues sign prospects Jay Barriball and D-man Cade Fairchild to an ATO (amateur tryout) after their season at the University of Minnesota is finished. Fairchild is considered the better prospect of the two.

Former third round pick Jori Lehtera is not eligible to join the Rivermen for a playoff run since he’s already signed with the Blues. He would have had to be on the Peoria roster before December 15th.

Would they do it again??

The Blues don’t seem to be too concerned about the financial losses they’re facing from a promotion that didn’t go as planned. Before the season the Blues allowed 600 season ticket holders to pay half of their balance up front while the other half would only have to be paid if the Blues made the playoffs. They obviously were confident in the Blues chances heading into the season.

Sources tell me the team is just as confident moving into next year and they’re strongly considering running a similar promotion. Stay tuned for me info on this.

The Blues are excited for Monday night when they will honor Keith Tkachuk, Red Berenson, Joe Mullen, and Gary Unger. The team is expected to unveil a permanent structure to be placed inside the Scottrade Center to honor four of the greatest Blues in franchise history. All four players wore the #7.

Feel free to weigh in on the Blues loss in Washington. It was a pretty good game throughout as the Blues had plenty of chances. Washington capitalized on a bad neutral zone turnover by Roman Polak who left Barret Jackman all alone defending a two on one.

More to come,

Andy Strickland

strickland.andy@gmail.com