u crazy if you think blues are going to help vegas

blues decline

The Blues shouldn't be opposed to "helping" any team that will give them solid value for Tarasenko, but this trade is not doing that.

As a Vegas fan, Tarasenko would be good to have. But you would definitely have to give up a first in order to get the Blues to retain salary.

The Blues are not handing Tarasenko to Vegas, they're not retaining, and they're certainly not doing either for a trash offer.



The Blues do not trade loaded weapons to rivals unless it's complete larceny. It has been nearly three decades since they did a deal like that.

Am I living in an alternate reality or did the Erik Johnson to Colorado trade not happen like ten years ago? Forty point defenseman, top player pedigree, injury history...hm...

You take the best deal you can get. It's stupid not to. Putting arbitrary restrictions on where not to trade a guy just artificially limits a market that is barely there. That's how you end up like Ottawa and burned on a Mike Hoffman deal because you didn't want to make a deal with Florida and instead San Jose makes you look like a bunch of fools.

And again, this is a bad deal for Tarasenko so you don't do it for this anyway. But if they're offering real stuff for him, you have to consider it.

1- I'd hardly call Johnson a weapon, and the Avs weren't really a rival then. Plus, they weren't a playoff team. So I don't think that qualifies, buddy.

2- Erm, Florida is not a rival of Ottawa, so I have no idea how that correlates. And, no, you don't just desperately take anything while also helping a hated rival who is one of the best teams in the West while you;re also trying to compete. This should not be any sort of hot take.

3- Well, if someone offers real stuff for him, I'll consider that when it comes. But for a team lke Vegas to have him, it will need to be a supersonic overpay.

Florida and Ottawa might not have been hated rivals, and I guess we weren't technically rivals with Colorado at that point (Johnson definitely had the pedigree though, like that's revisionist history to say he didn't). But both of those teams are in division with the teams they traded with (or they wouldn't trade with and then got owned).

Why exactly is Vegas a hated rival again? Because they signed Pietrangelo? Because they made the finals in their first year? They're not in our division. We've literally never played them in the playoffs so I have no clue where this beef is coming from. They are so far down on list of teams I don't like. If it's a deal that makes the Blues better, you do take it even if it also makes Vegas better. There's not many scenarios where Vegas can add Tarasenko without sending a good player back. I'm not saying Vegas would do this, but If they're offering Pacioretty (whom they love to talk about moving) or Marchessault, you consider it heavily, that's miles ahead of what anyone else is offering. Who cares if they're "better", I'm not passing up on a bonafide twenty or thirty goal scorer in favor of Jesper Boqvist or whoever just so I don't have to see Tarasenko play for Vegas.

1- Pedigree? He was coming off two rather poor seasons. In no way, shape or form was Johnson some star or major weapon. I'm not revising history at all.

2- Because Vegas are the dirtiest team in the league and the league lets them get away with it. Because the games have quickly become incredibly intense and rough. And yes, because they are prime competition in the West. None of this is a secret.

The dirtiest team, even though I like them, is Calgary, not Vegas.