Size

[SRV1990]

There’s room for the Blues D to get bigger once Faulkis gone and possibly Tucker, to be replaced by Fischer and Jiricek, assuming they reach their potential. That’d make the D much more mean and nastier, as well as more skilled.

You just cant win much with diminutive dmen. Speaking of…I could of sworn I saw our old buddy Perunovich got waived the other day. Thank gawd them days are in the rear view.

One of the few missteps in the Doug Armstrong era: thinking small puck moving defensemen could win in the post-season.

Yes sirrr, as an occasional Army critic, that was probably my biggest criticism of all, his, or whoever’s obsession that he trusted their opinion’s, penchant for aquiring midgets. Shatty, Perunovich, Krug, Faulk to a degree as far as Dmen size goes, etc. Army seems to have changed course in thinkin now tho thankfully, and he’s also done excellent work in reconstructing this team that he deconstructed after the Cup, so all is groovy in Bluesland lately and I have nothin of significance to beeetch about.

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

[SameOldBlues]

There’s room for the Blues D to get bigger once Faulkis gone and possibly Tucker, to be replaced by Fischer and Jiricek, assuming they reach their potential. That’d make the D much more mean and nastier, as well as more skilled.

You just cant win much with diminutive dmen. Speaking of…I could of sworn I saw our old buddy Perunovich got waived the other day. Thank gawd them days are in the rear view.

One of the few missteps in the Doug Armstrong era: thinking small puck moving defensemen could win in the post-season.

Yes sirrr, as an occasional Army critic, that was probably my biggest criticism of all, his, or whoever’s obsession that he trusted their opinion’s, penchant for aquiring midgets. Shatty, Perunovich, Krug, Faulk to a degree as far as Dmen size goes, etc. Army seems to have changed course in thinkin now tho thankfully, and he’s also done excellent work in reconstructing this team that he deconstructed after the Cup, so all is groovy in Bluesland lately and I have nothin of significance to beeetch about.

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Yea, agreed. To complain about some of his bad past moves, without giving grace and tons of credit for all the excellent moves he and his staff have done with offer sheets, trades and the draft, is simply complaining just to complain and ya lose all credibility if ya ever had any to begin with. Ive definitely come around and am more than happy to sing his praises currently, simply cause everything he touches has turned to tiiits lately .

[blues2112]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

[rezero]

Just saw a thing on the pens game where the past 2 years a record number of players 6’4 and beyond drafted the past 2 years.

Pens running a line tonight 6’3, 6’5, 6’6

As a defender, that’s a line you don’t want down low in your zone.

I think you could say this about almost every sport. Basketball is now loaded with 6’10” guys playing the wing. Football linemen are now all over 6’4” and 320lbs. Baseball pitchers are now all 6’3”. Natural progression in all sports as kids are starting with conditioning much sooner which is allowing taller and bigger kids are far more athletic than previous generations.

[SRV1990]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

Good point, and at the time may not have seemed like a bad pick to some. But he was clearly undersized and it proved to be something he couldn't overcome. Some players can, he couldn't. Not all picks hit. Not all trades are huge wins. Army adjusted course and we're better now for it.

[somni]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

Good point, and at the time may not have seemed like a bad pick to some. But he was clearly undersized and it proved to be something he couldn't overcome. Some players can, he couldn't. Not all picks hit. Not all trades are huge wins. Army adjusted course and we're better now for it.

There seems to be a bit of a change on approach since Bill Armstrong left in 2020.

[STL fan in MN]

Agree the Blues made a mistake in not continuing to prioritize size on the blueline after the Cup win. You can have 1-2 smaller guys but we ended up with too many. Perunovich was a miss but about 75% of 2nd rounders miss so I’m not sure why we tend to focus on him so much. Because he won the Hobey maybe? But anyway, we seem to have rectified that for the most part and like the direction they’re going.

Here’s a link where you can sort the teams by average height, weight and age.
https://www.eliteprospects.com/league/nhl


The Blues are 7th in height (6’2” average), 18th in weight (196 lb average), and 18th in age (27.83 year old on average).

Keep in mind, this is based on the heights/weights this website has, which might either be out of date or exaggerated…but it probably balances out pretty well across the league I’d guess.

[STL fan in MN]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

Good point, and at the time may not have seemed like a bad pick to some. But he was clearly undersized and it proved to be something he couldn't overcome. Some players can, he couldn't. Not all picks hit. Not all trades are huge wins. Army adjusted course and we're better now for it.

There seems to be a bit of a change on approach since Bill Armstrong left in 2020.

Which is funny because Bill Armstrong himself is 6’5” and there’s no team in the league that’s drafted for size more lately than Utah/Arizona.

[somni]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

Good point, and at the time may not have seemed like a bad pick to some. But he was clearly undersized and it proved to be something he couldn't overcome. Some players can, he couldn't. Not all picks hit. Not all trades are huge wins. Army adjusted course and we're better now for it.

There seems to be a bit of a change on approach since Bill Armstrong left in 2020.

Which is funny because Bill Armstrong himself is 6’5” and there’s no team in the league that’s drafted for size more lately than Utah/Arizona.

Interesting. Especially about Utah.
I have no real basis on if the philosophy changed. Maybe it's just my impression because the Blues have found some good talent...or what is seemingly to be good talent. It seems they put more weight on the intangibles (drive, leadership, smarts, etc.) than say players before...like Dominik Bokk

So, I thought maybe it started with a player like Neighbours, who has those intangibles. But then I saw that Bill didn't leave until Sept 2020, after he was drafted.

So it could just be in my head. But I'm ecstatic with the Blues farm system right now.

[callitwhatyouwant]

Solid and logical take. Army deserves criticism for drafting Perunovich. Not a good pick, we all know that. Fortunately, those types of mistakes are outweighed by the good, and sometimes great, moves he's made. So basically Army is human and like every other GM, he's going to make mistakes. But as you also note, he's adept at changing course, making corrections where necessary and moving on.

Landing Hobey Baker Award winner at 45th overall was a bad pick?

Good point, and at the time may not have seemed like a bad pick to some. But he was clearly undersized and it proved to be something he couldn't overcome. Some players can, he couldn't. Not all picks hit. Not all trades are huge wins. Army adjusted course and we're better now for it.

There seems to be a bit of a change on approach since Bill Armstrong left in 2020.

Which is funny because Bill Armstrong himself is 6’5” and there’s no team in the league that’s drafted for size more lately than Utah/Arizona.

Interesting. Especially about Utah.
I have no real basis on if the philosophy changed. Maybe it's just my impression because the Blues have found some good talent...or what is seemingly to be good talent. It seems they put more weight on the intangibles (drive, leadership, smarts, etc.) than say players before...like Dominik Bokk

So, I thought maybe it started with a player like Neighbours, who has those intangibles. But then I saw that Bill didn't leave until Sept 2020, after he was drafted.

So it could just be in my head. But I'm ecstatic with the Blues farm system right now.

I think it's somewhat simple, for a minute there the blues had a devastating forecheck. So the thought process was adding some speed on the backend balances that out. We definitely weren't the fastest team in the world with our forward group from 2016-2020ish, but they laid the wood on the forecheck. They liked that style of play. They saw what the Avs had going in that 2018-on era and saw them as the next team. What did they have? Breakneck speed and some of it was on their backend.

Now the Blues have a lot of speed up front and some of those guys have good length but they certainly wouldn't qualify as heavy. So it makes sense to beef up the backend again, and because of their luck getting Broberg and their trade for Mailloux, now they have length guys filling out everything.

One of the best qualities about Army is he acknowledges when something isn't right, and he admits it. The fact that he is willing to own those mistakes to the media is something that 90 percent of GM's would never do. Why? Because Army has full belief he can make the change. Definitely one of the better GM's to do it. If this team successfully turns into a competitive year in and year out team. He will have literally did 3-4 different direction changes in Blues history and pulled it off.