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Blues Ink Scottie Upshall To One-Year Deal

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Per a team release, the St. Louis Blues announced that forward Scottie Upshall was re-signed to a one-year deal. Frank Seravalli reports that the deal is for $900,000.

Upshall was a training camp invitee for the Blues last season and made the most of that invite. After an injury plagued campaign with the Florida Panthers, Upshall rebounded in St. Louis, posting 14 points (6-8), and adding a wrinkle to a stingy Blues penalty kill. For $900,000, Upshall is a bargain signing for a team that has a number of names still looking to be signed.

Those names include Steve Ott, captain David Backes, Troy Brouwer and Kyle Brodziak.

Boston Bruins Interested In Shattenkirk; Kulikov

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UPDATE 4:40 PM CST: Jimmy Murphy of VICE Sports adds that in their search for defencemen, the Bruins have offered their first round pick (29th overall) to the Florida Panthers for Dmitry Kulikov as a “starting point”.

4:35 PM CST: In a tweet that assuredly caused panic in St. Louis, Darren Dreger reports that “The Shattenkirk watch is on” and that Boston among other teams are heavily interested in the blueliner.  Jeremy Rutherford of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch adds a quote from Blues’ GM Doug Armstrong: “I don’t think either of us are naive. I’d love to find a way to keep Shatty here and we’re going to work toward seeing if there’s common ground. But you just can’t keep everybody.”

Kevin Shattenkirk is owed $4.25MM in the final season of his current deal, and is set to become an unrestricted free agent next summer.  He’s basically a lock for 40 points from the back end, as he’s eclipsed that mark in the last four full seasons (and was on pace to do so in the lock-out shortened 2012-13).

If Boston was to acquire Shattenkirk, he’d immediately become the second highest paid defenceman on the team behind Zdeno Chara, and would seemingly join Chara on the top pairing. With the Bruins being rumored as trying to trade away Dennis Seidenberg and his $4MM cap-hit before a potential buyout, they would be creating room for Shattenkirk under their current payroll.

Vladimir Sobotka Coming Back To NHL

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According to Jeremy Rutherford of the St. Louis Dispatch, and confirmed by KHL Insider Aivis Kalniņš, Vladimir Sobotka has opted out of his deal with Avangard Omsk of the KHL and is headed back to North America.  Sobotka originally signed a three-year deal for $4MM per season after leaving the NHL in 2014, but after a dispute with his Russian club, has decided to opt out and return to the NHL.

Because he was signed to a $2.725MM contract through arbitration before he left for Russia, the 28-year old winger will have to fulfill that contract before hitting the NHL free agent market. One season for the Blues would be a big help for a team set to lose captain David Backes along with wingers Troy Brouwer and Steve Ott.

Sobotka had 24 points in his final season before departing for the KHL and has never found much scoring success in the NHL. He found some in KHL however, where last season he scored 18 goals in just 44 games.  Time will tell whether he will be able to replicate that in the different NHL game.

Snapshots: Puljujarvi, Lalonde, Backes

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With the Entry Draft getting closer and closer, there has been lots of chatter over who will go after Auston Matthews and Patrik Laine go in the top two selections. The expected #3 pick, Jesse Puljujarvi hasn’t exactly helped his stock as Aaron Portzline of the Columbus Dispatch reported yesterday that the Finnish winger underwent knee surgery after winning gold at the World U-18’s in April. He will be missing all the summer development camps, but should be ready for the regular season. While Columbus wonders what to do with the third overall pick, here’s more from around the league:

  • Up-and-coming coaching prospect Derek Lalonde has been hired on as the newest head coach of the Iowa Wild, reports Jeff Cox of ESPN. Lalonde previously coached in both the USHL and ECHL and is considered by many to be a coach on the rise. The Wild, who finished last in the AHL last season were coached by John Torchetti until he moved up to Minnesota after the mid-season firing of Mike Yeo.
  • Although they’d be open to a return, it sounds like the St. Louis Blues will not be re-signing captain David Backes.  When asked by Jeremy Rutherford of the St. Louis Dispatch, GM Doug Armstrong related as much: “I think the unrestricted guys will most likely hit the open market. We’d like to have David back…but it has to work for both sides, not just one. We’re willing to invest a little bit of ’thank you’ money, but it has to make sense.”

Coaching Notes: Groulx, Shaw, Pollock

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After being confirmed earlier this week that Glen Gulutzan would be hired as the Calgary Flames head coach, the team held a press conference Friday to officially announce him. Gulutzan will try to take the Flames back to the playoffs after an underwhelming season in which they 35-40-7 and were surrounded by controversy all season, from Dennis Wideman’s collision with an official and eventual suspension and appeal, to the benching of star players Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan for “disciplinary reasons”. He’ll come in as a much different voice than outgoing coach Bob Hartley, and will try to instill a different tone in the locker room.

Here are more coaching notes from around the league:

  • The Ottawa Senators have hired Pierre Groulx as their next goalie coach, replacing the outgoing Rick Wamsley who was jettisoned along with head coach Dave Cameron and the rest of the staff in April. Groulx, formerly the goalie coach in Florida and Montreal, will lead a group that allowed the third most goals in the NHL last season, and had poor performances throughout the season. Number 1 goaltender Craig Anderson should appreciate the familiar face; Groulx was his coach for three years in Florida.
  • Former St. Louis Blues’ assistant Brad Shaw has been brought into Columbus to work with head coach John Tortorella according to Aaron Portzline with the Columbus Dispatch. Shaw spent nine seasons with the Blues, and actually was the New York Islanders’ head coach for half a season in 2005-06, after the firing of Steve Stirling midway through a disappointing year.
  • According to Gary Lawless of TSN, while not as a coach, Richard Pollock has been hired by the Florida Panthers as a pro scout. This comes after the organization has changed direction in scouting, firing long time director Scott Luce and hiring the more analytics-based Cam Lawrence and Josh Weissbock. Former Panther and veteran-NHLer Bryan McCabe, currently the team’s manager of player development, has also taken a larger role.

Blues Re-Sign Dmitrij Jaskin

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The Blues have announced the re-signing of forward Dmitrij Jaskin to a two year contract.  According to Fox Sports Midwest’s Andy Strickland, the deal is worth $1MM in each of the two years.

Jaskin played in 65 regular season games with St. Louis last season (his first full NHL campaign), collecting 4 goals and 9 assists while averaging 11:52 of ice time per game.  He also suited up in 6 postseason contests, picking up a goal and an assist though his average time per game dropped all the way down to 8:08.

The 23 year old Jaskin was a second round selection of the Blues (41st overall) in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft.  In 139 career NHL games, he has 18 goals and 15 assists.

Free Agent Focus: St. Louis Blues

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While the St. Louis Blues were able to advance to the Western Conference Final, they still fell short of getting to the Stanley Cup Final, instead falling to San Jose in the third round.  Now, they will retool their roster in an effort to take that next step.

One area they have already made some considerable changes in is behind the bench.  Assistant coaches Kirk Muller and Brad Shaw opted to decline one year extension offers; Muller has already signed a multi-year deal in Montreal.  Yesterday, the Blues replaced them with Mike Yeo and Rick Wilson.  With head coach Ken Hitchcock set to retire following 2016-17, Yeo will take his place as the bench boss at that time.

As for their player personnel, here is a closer look at their free agent outlook.

Key Restricted Free Agent: W Jaden Schwartz – Big things were expected of Schwartz this past season but missed nearly four months with an ankle injury that held him to just 33 regular season games.  He managed to put up 22 points but that was still off his point-per-game average of 0.84 from 2014-15.  Schwartz was a bigger factor in the Blues’ playoff run, tying for third in team scoring with 14 points in 20 games.  He’s coming off his bridge deal and is due a qualifying offer of $2.7MM.  It’s expected that GM Doug Armstrong will be seeking a long-term deal to keep him in the fold.

Other NHL RFA’s: W Dmitrij Jaskin, W Magnus Paajarvi

Key Unrestricted Free Agents: Team captain David Backes has been one of St. Louis’ more consistent producers over the last few seasons, scoring at least 20 goals in each of the last five full NHL campaigns while tying Schwartz for third in postseason points.  He’s also one of the rare ‘power centers’ in the NHL and is going to get a long-term, big money contract.

Troy Brouwer was acquired last offseason to bring more grit to the lineup and he delivered not only that but some secondary scoring as well, picking up 39 points in 82 regular season games while adding eight goals in the playoffs, good for second best on the team.  Power forwards are always in high demand on the market and Brouwer will be no exception.

Other NHL UFA’s: C Kyle Brodziak, C Steve Ott, W Scottie Upshall

One other player to watch for this offseason is C Vladimir Sobotka.  He was awarded a $2.725MM salary in 2014 from an arbitrator but opted to play in the KHL instead.  Sobotka is reportedly considering coming back across the pond to rejoin the Blues and if he does, will receive the salary he was awarded two years ago; he must play out that contract before being eligible for unrestricted free agency.

Projected Cap Space: St. Louis has just over $12MM in cap space according to Cap Friendly.  However, they still have a minimum of five forwards to get under contract which will make it difficult to retain Backes or Brouwer without freeing up some salary via trade beforehand.

St. Louis Blues Hire Mike Yeo As Associate Coach

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With the retirement of head coach Ken Hitchcock expected after the 2016-2017 season, the St. Louis Blues added former Wild boss Mike Yeo as an associate coach and head coach in waiting. According to the team’s official release, Rick Wilson will also be brought aboard as an assistant coach and the expectation is that Yeo will take over as the head coach upon Hitchcock’s retirement. The deal is over three years.

The news is an interesting wrinkle as Yeo was tasked with guiding a winner in Minnesota, which never materialized despite consecutive playoff appearances. Yeo failed to move the team past the second round of the playoffs, losing both times to the Chicago Blackhawks in both the 2013-2014, and 2014-2015 seasons. Yeo’s Wild also lost to the Blackhawks in the 2013 playoffs, but that time in the first round. Upon his firing this past February, General Manager Chuck Fletcher said that the team’s struggles led to Yeo’s departure.

Yeo is now tasked to work alongside Hitchcock with a team that exorcised some playoff demons by finally advancing to the Western Conference Final for the first time since 2001. The pressure remains on as the Stanley Cup Final drought extends another year.

Hitchcock’s future has been murky at times, but this year’s success earned him a final year on the bench and the ability to retire on his own terms. Though the Blues roster is more complete in terms of talent, especially in the net, Yeo is hardly walking into an ideal situation.

The Blues first have to determine who to re-sign with captain David Backes, and winger Troy Brouwer among others scheduled to hit the market. Jaden Schwartz is a restricted free agent, and will command a much higher salary than the $2.35MM he was making before. General Manager Doug Armstrong has his work cut out for him in deciding who to keep, and possibly, who to shuttle to maintain the depth and prowess that powered the Blues out of past playoff failures.

Inevitably, Yeo will be measured against the more recent success and his ability to take the Blues to not only a Stanley Cup Final, but to finally bring the trophy home for the franchise. His failures with the Wild serve as a cautionary tale, but that was a team heavily dependent upon stars Zach Parise and Ryan Suter. With more balance throughout the lineup and a much more stable presence in the net, Yeo and the Blues might be what each other need to finally reach the promised land once Hitchcock steps away.

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