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Blues Place Brandon Saad On Unconditional Waivers

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Jan. 30: Saad is on unconditional waivers today and will have his contract terminated assuming he clears Friday, Friedman confirms.

Jan. 29, 1:56 p.m.: The Blues and Saad are now heading toward a mutual contract termination, Friedman adds. The move will make him an unrestricted free agent, so he’ll be able to sign with any team down the stretch with new contract terms. However, he’ll be walking away from north of $5MM of cash he was still owed on his deal with St. Louis.

Jan. 29, 1:05 p.m.: Saad and Sylvegård cleared waivers Wednesday, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports. Saad heads to the AHL for the first time in over a decade, while Sylvegård has had his contract terminated and is free to return to Europe.

Jan. 28: Blues general manager Doug Armstrong announced Tuesday that they’re placing veteran winger Brandon Saad on waivers, per Jeremy Rutherford of The Athletic. St. Louis also placed winger Marcus Sylvegård on unconditional waivers for the purposes of contract termination, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports.

Saad is in the fourth season of a five-year, $22.5MM contract he signed with the Blues as an unrestricted free agent in 2021. The deal carries a $4.5MM cap hit, but he’s only owed $4.375MM in salary this season and $3.625MM in 2025-26.

Saad, who has struggled to the tune of seven goals, nine assists, and 16 points in 43 games this season, was a speculative trade candidate before the deadline but carries a full no-trade clause until July 1. Placing him on waivers will allow interested clubs to acquire him even if he would have otherwise blocked a trade. Notably, the Blues can’t retain any salary on Saad if he’s claimed off waivers rather than traded.

Armstrong told reporters, including Lou Korac of NHL.com, that Saad will report to and play for AHL Springfield if he goes unclaimed tomorrow. David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period reports that Saad had told the Blues he was willing to waive his NTC, but no trade materialized. They won’t be making a corresponding recall after Saad is removed from the roster, Armstrong added (via Matthew DeFranks of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch).

While things haven’t panned out for the 32-year-old Saad in St. Louis this season, he was a decent secondary scorer as recently as last season, when he turned in 26 goals and stayed healthy for all 82 games. It was Saad’s second-best goal-scoring season of his 14-year NHL career. However, his overall offense has continuously dropped off from his days of routinely producing around 50 points per season for the Blackhawks and Blue Jackets early on.

In Saad’s defense, a good portion of his struggles can be attributed to a significant dropoff in shooting percentage. He’s clicking at just 9.3%, the second-lowest rate of his career and down nearly 50% from last year’s 18.1% success rate. He’s due for regression, especially considering his 36 individual high-danger chances at 5-on-5 are tied for third on the Blues, per Natural Stat Trick.

A second-round pick by Chicago in 2011, Saad reached the NHL one year later and won championships with the Hawks in both 2013 and 2015. A salary cap crunch forced Chicago to trade him to the Blue Jackets for a package centered around Artem Anisimov following the second of those Cups, but the Blackhawks re-acquired him from Columbus two years later – unfortunately giving up superstar winger Artemi Panarin in the process.

But on the wrong side of 30 and with another year left on his deal, Saad finding a new home on waivers seems unlikely – especially if the Blues were previously willing to retain salary to facilitate a trade. Most teams interested in adding a veteran piece instead of subtracting likely won’t have the cap space for Saad at his full impact.

The Blues signed Sylvegård, 25, as an undrafted free agent from Sweden’s Växjö Lakers last offseason. He’s done well on assignment to Springfield, ranking fifth on the team with 21 points (10 G, 11 A) in 35 games, but has yet to receive an NHL recall. Evidently, both parties are satisfied with breaking ties early and allowing him to return to Europe. He’ll become an unrestricted free agent upon termination.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Islanders Acquire Scott Perunovich From Blues

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The Islanders acquired defenseman Scott Perunovich from the Blues on Monday in exchange for a conditional 2026 fifth-round pick, both clubs announced.

Perunovich, 26, slots into the Islanders’ blue line after righty Ryan Pulock landed on injured reserve this morning. His acquisition signals the latter is expected to miss significant time, so he and recent free-agent signing Tony DeAngelo now slot in to relieve the void left by Pulock and Noah Dobson, who’s week-to-week with a right leg injury.

While the 5’10” puck mover is a left shot, he has experience playing on his offside. New York will rely on that experience and presumably utilize him on the right, giving them another offensive option in addition to the historically one-dimensional DeAngelo.

A 2018 second-round pick, Perunovich was once one of the most highly-regarded defense prospects in the game. But after winning the Hobey Baker Award with 40 points in 34 games for Minnesota-Duluth in 2019-20, he missed his entire rookie campaign with St. Louis after undergoing left shoulder surgery. Wrist surgery limited him to 19 games with the Blues the following year, and yet another shoulder injury cut into his 2022-23 campaign. Throughout those three seasons, injuries limited Perunovich to just 58 games with the Blues and AHL Springfield.

While wholly healthy for the first time since college in 2024-25, Perunovich hasn’t found much playing time. He’s been a healthy scratch for about half the season, including the last nine games, and has only averaged 14:37 per game when in the lineup. He has six points and nine shots on goal in 24 games, adding 21 blocks and nine hits. The acquisition of Philip Broberg via offer sheet this summer as a young puck-moving lefty largely made Perunovich a redundancy heading into the campaign, so seeing him on the move is not entirely surprising.

He’s far from being the two-way presence Pulock is for the Isles, but he more accurately fills the void left by depth defender Mike Reilly, who remains on LTIR after undergoing heart surgery. He has 29 points in his 97 career NHL appearances but will be in line for a bump in minutes on Long Island, which both sides hope will boost his production.

Perunovich signed a one-year, $1.15MM extension with the Blues last June to avoid hitting restricted free agency. He’ll be an RFA again at season’s end and is arbitration-eligible.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Viktor Lodin Could Return To The NHL Next Season

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Viktor Lodin’s first stint in North America came and went with little fanfare.  However, now that he’s having a strong season back home in Sweden, a return could be back on the radar.  Aftonbladet’s Tomas Ros and Hans Abrahamsson report (subscription link) that there are multiple NHL teams (including the Blues and Red Wings) believed to be scouting the forward and that Lodin could look to take another crack at the NHL next season.

The 25-year-old was a fourth-round pick by Ottawa back in 2019, going 94th overall.  After spending the first season of his entry-level deal with SHL Timra, Lodin came to North America late in the year, getting into one appearance with the big club and ten more with AHL Belleville where he impressed with eight points.  That seemed to position himself to push for an NHL roster spot for 2022-23.

That didn’t happen, however.  Lodin was limited to just 28 games with Belleville that year and while he held his own with 15 points in those outings, the Senators elected to walk away at the end of the season, non-tendering him instead of issuing a qualifying offer.

Lodin returned to Sweden last season, spending the year with IK Oskarshamn where he fared well with 11 goals and 20 assists in 40 games.  However, that team was relegated for this season so Lodin moved on to Farjestad for this year and his production has improved.  Through 31 outings in 2024-25, he has 12 goals and 21 assists, good for a tie for second in SHL scoring.

Because Lodin already had his entry-level contract, there are no more restrictions on what type of deal he can sign.  With the year he’s having, it’s possible that he could command a strong two-way deal or even a one-way pact which makes him someone to keep an eye on when the international transfer window opens up in the spring.  If Lodin doesn’t get an offer to his liking, he can fall back on the security of his current deal with Farjestad, one that runs through the 2028-29 season.

Blues Reassign Otto Stenberg To AHL

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1/11: St. Louis has officially assigned Stenberg to the AHL.

1/10: The Blues will likely have center prospect Otto Stenberg finish his 2024-25 season in North America after starting the year on loan to the Swedish Hockey League’s Malmö Redhawks, Jeremy Rutherford of The Athletic reports. Malmö confirmed that Stenberg won’t be returning to the club this season after representing the Swedes at the 2025 World Junior Championship.

Stenberg, 19, was the second of three first-round picks that St. Louis made in the 2023 draft. Going 25th overall after Dalibor Dvorský (10th) and fellow Swede Theo Lindstein (29th), the offensively-inclined pivot was expected to go higher coming into the year but fell to the late first after a stagnant offensive showing in Sweden’s top junior league.

Since his draft day, Stenberg has barely touched junior competition aside from back-to-back showings at the WJC. He’s played primarily in the SHL with Frölunda and Malmö, but as per usual with youngsters in Europe, he hasn’t climbed high enough up the depth chart to see his point totals pop.

In 25 games with Malmö this year, Stenberg had three goals and three assists for six points with a minus-seven rating, second-worst on the team. The Blues signed him to his entry-level contract in May, and since he was a first-round pick, he could have been sent to the AHL to begin the season without his Swedish team’s permission, but they opted to keep him at home regardless.

Now, after Stenberg posted eight points in seven games en route to a bronze-game loss to the Czechs, he’ll be coming stateside after all. He’ll link up with fellow 2023 first-rounder Dvorský, who leads Springfield in goals with 11 in 27 games as the pair come back from their WJC loans.

The move opens the door to a potential NHL recall for Stenberg down the stretch, although he’ll likely get a long leash in the AHL before that’s something the Blues consider.

Faksa Could Return Thursday

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  • Blues center Radek Faksa is nearing a return to the lineup and could be an option to suit up on Thursday, relays Jeremy Rutherford of The Athletic (Twitter link). The soon-to-be 31-year-old is dealing with a lower-body injury and has played just once in the last four weeks.  In his first season with St. Louis, Faksa hasn’t been a big offensive contributor thus far, carrying that over from his time in Dallas.  He has two goals and five assists through his first 30 outings and if the Blues wind up selling before the March 7th trade deadline, he could be on the move with several teams undoubtedly looking to add center depth in the coming weeks.

Texier Returns To Lineup, Faksa Still Out With Lower-Body Injury

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Lou Korac of The Hockey News reported earlier that forward Alexandre Texier would be a game-time decision for the St. Louis Blues this afternoon. Additionally, Korac shared that bottom-six forward Radek Faksa would miss his third straight game with a lower-body injury.

Texier has been battling an illness and missed St. Louis’ recent game against the Nashville Predators on Friday. He’s apparently all set to go as the Blues organization later confirmed that they’ve welcomed Texier back to the active roster for this afternoon’s game. He’ll join Pavel Buchnevich and Robert Thomas on the team’s first line and look to build upon his two-goal, five-point effort this season.

Despite being absent for nearly 10 days, Faksa isn’t expected to miss much longer. His lower-body injury was suffered in the Blues’ overtime loss to the Florida Panthers on December 20th but the team never placed him on the injured reserve. Faksa has added two goals and seven points in 30 games to the St. Louis roster this year.

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Blues Recall Tyler Tucker

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The Blues announced Thursday morning that they’ve recalled defenseman Tyler Tucker from AHL Springfield. He takes Pierre-Olivier Joseph’s spot on the active roster after the fellow left-shot was traded to the Penguins last night for future considerations.

It’s Tucker’s first recall of the season after he landed on waivers in early October. The 24-year-old was the odd man out in a battle for depth spots that included Joseph, Matthew Kessel and Scott Perunovich. The pending Group VI unrestricted free agent is now in his fourth season as an alternate captain for Springfield and is on pace for a career-best season offensively, posting 10 points in 19 games with 39 PIMs and a +6 rating.

Tucker, a seventh-round pick out of the Ontario Hockey League’s Barrie Colts in 2018, has 52 NHL appearances with the Blues in the past two seasons. The 6’2″, 205-lb checker has two goals and four assists with a -8 rating while averaging a light workload at 13:33 per game. Tucker also leads Blues defensemen in hits per 60 minutes (9.71) since the beginning of the 2022-23 season.

Unfortunately, his physicality hasn’t translated into an effective defensive presence, at least at even strength. Despite Tucker starting 54.4% of his shifts in the offensive zone, St. Louis has only controlled 45.5% of shot attempts and 45.3% of expected goals with him on the ice.

Tucker will likely stick around on the Blues’ roster as a No. 7 option until Nick Leddy is ready to return from the lower-body injury that’s kept him out for over two months. He can remain on the active roster for up to 30 non-consecutive days or appear in 10 games until he requires waivers again to head back to Springfield.

Penguins Acquire Pierre-Oliver Joseph

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After leaving the Penguins this summer, Pierre-Olivier Joseph is heading back there.  The team announced (Twitter link) that they’ve acquired the blueliner from St. Louis in exchange for future considerations.

The 25-year-old spent five seasons in Pittsburgh’s system, split between them and AHL Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.  Over his time with the Penguins, Joseph primarily played in a depth role and was generally sixth or seventh on their depth chart.  Last season, he got into 52 games with Pittsburgh, recording 11 points while averaging a little over 15 minutes a night of ice time.  However, they elected not to tender him a qualifying offer of $935K, knowing that doing so would have given him arbitration rights.

That made him an unrestricted free agent and while the Penguins were believed to have interest in keeping him around, Joseph instead elected to sign a one-year, $950K deal with St. Louis on the same day that the Blues acquired his brother Mathieu Joseph from Ottawa.  However, the change of scenery hasn’t changed his role as Joseph has remained in that depth role.  He has played in 23 games so far this season, picking up two assists while averaging just 13:06 per night, a career low.

With the Blues bringing in Cam Fowler recently, playing time was going to be that much harder to come by for Joseph while they also have Matthew Kessel and Tyler Tucker in the minors, players with some NHL experience.  Presumably, they’ll be bringing up a defender – quite possibly one of those two – before long.  As for Pittsburgh, Marcus Pettersson landed on injured reserve yesterday while Jack St. Ivany was injured with AHL Wilkes-Barre/Scranton per Seth Rorabaugh of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (Twitter link), leading GM Kyle Dubas to seek out some low-cost depth in the interim.  Joseph will once again be arbitration-eligible this summer but barring a change in role in the second half of the season, he could be trending toward being non-tendered for the second year in a row.

Following the swap, the team announced (Twitter link) that defenseman Nate Clurman was re-assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.  He was recalled on Tuesday but Joseph will take his place on the active roster.

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman was the first to report that Pittsburgh was acquiring Joseph.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Evening Notes: Pegula, Gourde, Bannister

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Elliotte Friedman reported on his 32 Thoughts podcast that Buffalo Sabres owner Terry Pegula met with the team in Montreal to discuss their recent woes. The Sabres are 0-7-3 in their last ten games and have had trade rumors swirling around the team as they are on the way to extending their 13-year playoff drought.

Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff is reporting that Pegula’s message to the Sabres was largely a positive one as he believes the solution to the teams problems are within the room and he said he has faith in general manager Kevyn Adams and head coach Lindy Ruff. Many believed that Pegula could be headed to Montreal to make major changes, however, that doesn’t appear to be the case, for now.

In other evening notes:

  • Seattle Kraken forward Yanni Gourde was in a regular contact jersey and fully participated in team practice today (as per Kraken contributor Alison Lukan). The Kraken are going to monitor the 33-year-old to see how he responds to the practice before they decide on whether or not he will play tomorrow night. Gourde has been dealing with a lower-body injury that has kept him out of the last two games, and unfortunately broke up a bit of a hot streak as he had 11 points in his last 14 games, after posting just three assists in his first 15 games of the season.
  • Former St. Louis Blues head coach Drew Bannister made his first public comments today since being fired by the team (as per St. Louis Today). Bannister said that he holds no resentment towards the organization because they were so good to him during his time there and he forged a lot of good relationships with people inside the club. Bannister was the head coach for just 76 games after spending seven years with the Blues in various roles and was replaced by former Bruins bench boss, Jim Montgomery.

Radek Faksa Missed Third Consecutive Game

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The Vancouver Canucks announced today that they’ve assigned forward Aatu Räty to the Abbotsford Canucks of the American Hockey League. The 22-year-old was recalled on Saturday before the Canucks game against the Bruins but didn’t end up dressing and served as a healthy scratch.

The former second-round pick has spent considerable time in the NHL this season, dressing in 20 games and picking up two goals and two assists. His AHL campaign has been limited, playing just eight games with Abbotsford, but Räty has been very productive posting four goals and three assists.

In other Western Conference notes:

  • Chicago Blackhawks forward Nick Foligno was sick today and didn’t dress today in Chicago’s 5-3 win over the New York Islanders (as per Mario Tirabassi of CHGO Sports). The 37-year-old had points in each of his previous two games and is having a decent offensive season with seven goals and six assists in 30 games. He was replaced today by Joey Anderson who went scoreless in 13:27 of ice time.
  • Jeremy Rutherford of The Athletic tweeted that St. Louis Blues forward Radek Faksa missed his third consecutive game tonight due to a cut on his leg. The 30-year-old suffered the injury in a game against Vancouver and is making progress towards a return. Veteran Brandon Saad replaced Faksa in the lineup. Faksa is in his first season with the Blues after spending the first nine years of his NHL career with the Dallas Stars.
  • Michael Russo of The Athletic writes that Minnesota Wild goaltender Filip Gustavsson is dealing with some soreness in his lower body and was getting looked at today. The ailment is reportedly nothing major, but it was enough to prompt the Wild to take a longer look at the issue. The 26-year-old is having a terrific bounce-back season with a 14-5-3 record along with a. 2.24 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage. Gustavsson took warmups last night and did serve as the backup, but the issue prompted the team to act today as well as call up top prospect Jesper Wallstedt.

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