MARYLAND HEIGHTS, Mo. -- Doug Armstrong has never been one to attack need over best player available when it comes to the NHL Draft.
In his final one as general manager before Alexander Steen takes over the GM duties in 2026, that mantra won't change.
When the St. Louis Blues make their first-round pick at No. 19 in the 2025 NHL Draft in Los Angeles on Friday, they will go with the best player available at the position.
The Blues, who were 44-30-8 a season ago and made the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time in three seasons but were eliminated by the Winnipeg Jets in seven games in the Western Conference First Round, have had plenty of practice picking from a spot similar to this, most recently taking Zack Bolduc at No. 17 in 2021, Jimmy Snuggerud at No. 23 in 2022, and Robert Thomas at No. 20 in 2017.
"The guys feel we’ll get a good player at 19," Armstrong said. "There’s probably, in our group, two or three different tranches of if you go an elite player or players, where’s that, and then you go down. At 19, we think there’s a good tier of players there that we can get."
And there's a philosophy to why they go the route they do.
It's been rare, if at all, that a Blues top-tiered pick gets to the NHL quickly, and that's likely to be the case again here.
"We’ve tried the last couple of drafts, we’ve drafted a centerman (Dalibor Dvorsky in 2023), a right-handed shot D (Adam Jiricek in 2024) with our first picks," Armstrong said. "One thing that hasn’t really changed how you build a team is through the middle of the ice, centerman, D, goalie. Wingers are extremely important, but they seem to move around quicker or become more available than centermen or D, but you don’t want to take a half letter, full letter grade lesser player just because of the positional need.
"At 19, you’re hoping that this player can make an impact on your team in four years. He might pop his head into a game in two or three years. That’s just the way picks 19 go. If they’re playing in the second or third year, it usually means your team isn’t performing well or the guy’s just better than advertised and we had that with Robert Thomas. But we don’t count on that getting a player that should play in the second year after the draft. I think since I’ve been here, we’ve had two players play … I don’t think any players played their first year after drafted. We’ve had two players play after their second full time and that was [Robby] Fabbri (21st pick in 2014) and Thomas. We’re looking at three or four years before this year’s draft, guys are going to make a difference."
But there is a caveat to all this: don't discount the Blues using the pick in a trade to improve next year's roster, a switch of the past couple years where, for example in '23 when they had three first rounders, they've used a stockpile of picks to improve from within during a retool period.
"It’s definitely a consideration, yes," Armstrong said of using the pick to try and improve next year's roster. "But it’s always a consideration. What I don’t think we’re going to do is deviate from our course of trying to build within a group of players that, say are 20 or 21 now in ‘25. That’s sort of that window that we’re trying to input players into. I think we could trade (No.) 19 for a player that’s one year away from UFA and then hope you can sign him, but if you can’t sign him, then you have a player one year away from UFA. … We won’t be trading for a guy with one year left unless we know 100 percent that we can get him signed, or two years quite honestly."
The Blues only have three picks currently in this year's draft (first-, fifth- and sixth-round picks), which can make for a longer than usual Saturday, or enough time to chat with other GMs to consummate or lay the framework for a trade(s).
The Blues used their second- and third-round picks to acquire Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway as compensation to the Edmonton Oilers via last year's offer sheets. Their fourth-round pick was used to acquire Alexandre Texier from the Columbus Blue Jackets, and their seventh-round pick was used in 2023 to acquire Jakub Vrana from the Detroit Red Wings.
"Yeah. It is," Armstrong said of the long time between picks. "Maybe that’s why I’m glad it’s here. Maybe we can sneak out for a quick 18 on Saturday morning. It is different, but the second and third, obviously we believe the value in Broberg and Holloway was worth the second and third. That’s just the price of doing business."