Nathan Walker

The St. Louis Blues are returning a bottom-six forward much earlier than expected. Earlier this afternoon, the Blues announced that forward Nathan Walker will rejoin the lineup for St. Louis’ contest tonight against the Chicago Blackhawks.

Walker sustained an upper-body injury against the Anaheim Ducks on December 1st. The team quickly placed him on injured reserve and shared that they expected Walker to miss eight weeks. Returning tonight, Walker will have only missed five weeks.

Much like he has been the last several years, Walker was a cog in the bottom-six of the Blues’ forward core before succumbing to the upper-body ailment. Outside of being a healthy scratch on a few occasions, he was a fairly consistent piece of St. Louis’ forward core, scoring three goals and nine points in 25 games while averaging 12:38 of ice time per game.

Despite the tepid offensive output at first glance, Walker was actually trending toward the highest production of his nine-year career. Had he continued his current pace across 82 games this year, Walker would have finished with approximately 10 goals and 30 points. That’s much more than last season, at least in the assist department, when he scored eight goals and 16 points in 73 games while managing a 12:01 ATOI.

Regardless, the Blues have never counted upon Walker for his offensive prowess. He’s been one of the most physical forwards on the team for the past three years, giving out 471 hits in his previous 143 contests, averaging out to 3.29 hits per game.

The Blues have agreed to a two-year extension with forward Nathan Walker, the team announced. The diminutive lefty earns a $1.775MM commitment that will count $887,500 against the cap in 2026-27 and 2027-28, just above a league-minimum deal covering those campaigns.

Walker, 31, has been a fan favorite wherever he’s played. Either a high-end AHLer or press box piece for most of his career, he’s the only Australian skater in league history and has slowly begun to establish himself as an everyday NHLer over the past few seasons, more than a decade after the Capitals made him an overage choice in the third round of the 2014 draft. He’s now appeared in each of the last eight NHL seasons, but hadn’t breached the 40-game mark until three years ago.

Last season was Walker’s sixth in the Blues organization after signing there as a free agent in 2019. It also marked a considerable breakthrough for the 5’9″ winger, who worked his way into a career-high 73 appearances and recorded an 8-8–16 scoring line in fourth-line minutes. He also became something of a fringe penalty killer for them, averaging a few ticks over 12 minutes per game. His small stature doesn’t mean he doesn’t play a high-energy game – in fact, he led St. Louis in hits by a wide margin last season with 281 and blocked 61 shots, most among Blues forwards.

Walker also had a mini-breakout in the postseason. In his first playoff action since appearing four times for the Blues in 2022, Walker skated in all seven games in St. Louis’ first-round loss to the Jets and had three goals and four points – all coming in Games 5, 6, and 7.

He’ll now fight to keep his regular role in the lineup in training camp. He’ll be challenged by returning depth pieces Mathieu Joseph and Alexandre Texier, free-agent pickups Nick Bjugstad and Pius Suter, and young names like 2023 first-rounder Dalibor Dvorsky for ice time. He’ll do so with some added financial security after signing his second two-year extension with the club in as many years.

The Blues have agreed to a two-year, one-way extension with depth winger Nathan Walker, per a team release. Walker’s new deal carries the league minimum salary of $775K each season and keeps him from hitting unrestricted free agency this summer.

Walker, 29, will remain in St. Louis through the 2025-26 season. The first Australian national in league history is now in his eighth season, having played NHL games every year since debuting with the Capitals in 2017-18. A third-round pick of the Capitals in 2014 after suiting up for their AHL affiliate in Hershey, Walker immediately signed his entry-level contract and spent most of the next five seasons in the Capitals organization aside from a two-game stint with the Oilers, including one appearance in the team’s run to the 2018 Stanley Cup.

After reaching Group VI UFA status, Walker inked a two-year deal with the Blues in July 2019. He’s stayed in the organization ever since, racking up 13 goals and 13 assists for 26 points in 101 games, averaging 10:55 per game. Added to his career regular-season totals with Washington and Edmonton, Walker has 14 goals and 28 points in 113 NHL appearances.

He’s primarily been a tweener player for most of his career, always seeing significant AHL time but consistently finding himself in the mix for NHL call-ups. That changed last season, however, as Walker spent the entire campaign on the NHL roster for the first time, recording two goals, eight assists and ten points in 56 games in a fourth-line/depth role.

It hasn’t been the same story this season, however. Walker cleared waivers on the day before the regular season began and returned to AHL Springfield, where he took the demotion in stride. His 16 assists and 29 points in 30 games are second on the team behind Matthew Peca and Adam Gaudette, respectively, leading the Blues to bring Walker back to the NHL when the calendar turned to 2024 last week. In the two games since his January 1 recall, Walker has one goal and a +1 rating, averaging 8:06 per game.

Walker will likely continue to intermittently factor in on the Blues’ fourth line throughout the deal. Extending him now makes it much less likely that a team will claim him on waivers if he ends up on the wire later this season, as a three-year term (including this season) would make a claim challenging for most teams looking for short-term help. He will be a UFA when his deal expires in the summer of 2026.