ST. LOUIS -- The St. Louis Blues were interested in acquiring hometown's Brady Tkachuk, according to general manager Doug Armstrong on Monday.

Tkachuk, younger brother of Matthew Tkachuk and captain of the Ottawa Senators before the blockbuster trade Sunday that sent Brady to the Florida Panthers to join his brother for three first-round pucks and a second-round pick in 2027, had a reported short list of teams he was willing to waive his no-move clause for: the Panthers, Carolina Hurricanes, Vegas Golden Knights and Minnesota Wild.

The Blues were not on the short list.

"With the player that got traded yesterday, we knew he was available, we inquired about him, we were told (we weren't) on the list and that's the end of it," Armstong said in his pre-draft media availability. "You can't create something that's not there."

Armstrong said there was no disappointment given Tkachuk's status as having grown up in St. Louis and his father, Keith, playing the end of his career here and still living here. It's something the Blues, who have missed the playoffs in three of the past four seasons, understand that they have a bit of a disadvantage when it comes to destinations of top players anymore.

"There is a market for certain players. The landscape of the NHL, this is a personal belief; there is no personal data. We're a time length behind other sports and how we move ahead," Armstrong said. "I think I was telling Alex [Steen] this the other day watching Michael Jordan on an interview that he did back at the Ascension golf tournament maybe 15 years ago when I think it was LeBron [James] having the show and where he was going to go. We're sort of there now. Michael said in that interview, 'I never thought like that. I didn't want to play with Isaiah [Thomas], I didn't want to play with Larry Bird, I didn't want to play with Magic Johnson; I wanted to beat those guys.' Then a group of athletes came together and said, 'Hang on. Why don't we dictate how the league operates?' We're seeing that in our sport now too.

"There's certain teams that have an advantage to that right now, but I talked to someone today and I truly believe this that our job is to get into that group. We were in that group for a long time. I use the reports yesterday of the player that had Carolina on his list. Well, he wasn't on their list six years ago. He's on their list now because they've done a helluva job and they're a good team. You can work your way onto that list. Some teams never leave that list. And again, this is just my personal belief. So I'm a player and, "OK, I can go to a place that's got nice weather and no taxes and I can wait for them to grow into a good team. I can live with that.' We're more of a market where you have to be a good team to acquire those players. They're not going to come and grow with us."

Not only are the Panthers, who were decimated by injuries this past season, one year removed from winning the Stanley Cup in back-to-back seasons, but getting the chance to play with his brother trumped everything, and but the fact Florida is a winner with great weather on the beach and a no-tax state only enhanced the chances instead of, say, to become the next "hometown hero."

The Blues have to figure out how to overcome those highly-emphasized points again.

"I don't think it personally changes. I just think it's how you go about doing it. I've been fortunate enough to work in two organizations,m" Armstrong said. "In Dallas, I never realized the ability we had until I came to a market that didn't have the ability. We had the good weather, and we had the no-state taxes. Now the difference there is we were good at that point. My ego thought, 'No, no, they want to come here because we're good.' It was a combination of everything. And then when I got to St. Louis, we were building and then as we started to build, players said, 'You know what?" Then they talked to the alumni. 'Tell me about St. Louis, is it that good? Tell me about the city, how does it operate?' And when we get to the level where we're competitive, then St. Louis will sell itself, but we have to take that next step and that's a process and that's what Alex and I was working towards every day. But we know what we want to do is build a foundation like we were for a decade where we're there. We don't want to do something today that doesn't make us good over a window of period of time. The trades that we're contemplating, if they arrive, will be for players that we see some form of building around for three-plus years, four-plus years or in an age group where we control them, or the belief that they're going to stay if you get them here.

"Just to emphasize the point, I think (Wild GM) Bill Guerin made Minnesota a destination. Nothing against Minnesota, I lived there, if he can make that a destination, then we can make St. Louis a destination."

The fact that Brady Tkachuk shortened his list, as has Dylan Larkin of the Detroit Red Wings and his widely reported desire to be traded out of Motown, speaks of the landscape of the league and its top players in the current market.

The Blues, who are not currently in the same boat that they were a handful of years ago just removed from winning the Cup in 2019, know they must check off all the necessary boxes in order to become that attraction again. Having a sound, stable alumni has been a solid foundational block and certainly, an advantage.

"My experience is when a player gives teams he's going to talk to, the player talks to those teams," Armstrong said. "You would want an indication of why any player is coming to or any market, is it for a year, is it for two years, is it to put your toe in and see what the water's like and then leave later or you're going to commit? That's my experience what they want to know. That's not about anything except what the value is to that player, what's important to him at that time. There are certain markets now that have what I had in Dallas: good weather, great taxes, good team. I would say you don't have to be Einstein to figure out who those markets are now. What I think the 28 other teams, we have to knock those four or five off, and then make them not quite as desirable because they haven't won in a while. We haven't done that yet."

Have the Blues expedited their retool? Armstrong thinks so. How do they go about in continuing that process? They head into the draft this weekend with three first-round picks at their disposal to use, move up to acquire a higher slot, or use those picks to make a trade(s).

"I would say that the addition two years ago of [Philip] Broberg and [Dylan] Holloway expedited that," Armstrong said. "If we can expedite it again, then we're closer. If we can't acquire players via trade with our draft picks, with our prospects, with our current players, then we'll draft those guys and we'll have them grow together.

"I go back to when I arrived in St. Louis in 2008, there were pieces there and then all of the sudden, you started to move players out and build a team and the team became good and all of the sudden, we went to a Jay Bouwmeester, who was a year away from being an unrestricted free agent. He liked the vision. He liked what he was seeing. He came in and he signed, and the rest is history. That's what we've got to build. We have to build something here that people say, 'You know what, I want to explore that.' I think, and again, self-serving and preaching to the choir, I think St. Louis is a great town, I think it's a great sports town. I think when people want to come here, they never want to leave, but we have to create an environment where they can check all the boxes. Some players, the No. 1 box is winning. Some players, the No. 1 box is money and some players, the No. 1 box is family. I think we have to create an environment where we're checking off all three of those boxes."

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