Quite frankly, it shouldn't be a surprise this Blues roster gives its fans hope, then bursts their bubble with a performance like this against another bottom-of-the-barrel opponent
ST. LOUIS -- I seem to be running around in circles when it comes to this St. Louis Blues roster.
In December when I voiced my opinion on Craig Berube's ouster, I specifically pointed out that it wasn't the coach, it was a flawed roster.
And going into the trade deadline, I thought I had buried them once and for all after a string of play that showed no willingness to management they deserved an opportunity to go for it.
And rightfully so, I praised this group just last week for scratching and clawing in a recent stretch of weeks to make themselves relevant in the Western Conference wild card race, surprisingly to me anyway, coming up with results against opponents I felt quite frankly were better than the Blues.
Management wanted to see which side of the 50-yard line, something pointed out by general manager Doug Armstrong at the start of the season, the Blues could get to.
Well, that all was squashed in a three-hour period with a disgraceful, embarrassing, disparaging performance in a 4-0 loss against the lowly San Jose Sharks on Saturday in front of another loyal full house of 18,096 at Enterprise Center voicing their opinion of what they thought of that performance that was worthy of basically a whole lot of nothing.
I'll go through the game here in a bit, but I feel like I'm going to have to take this full circle: it's not the coaching. It. Is. The. Roster.
Period.
No ifs, no ands, no buts about it.
That performance tonight, particularly the second period, really was gutless.
When the flaws appear, they rear their ugly heads. Which begs the question of how can this happen? How does one play down to the competition, something interim coach Drew Bannister specifically said following the morning skate can't happen.
And in the first period, it appeared that the Blues (39-31-4) wouldn't stoop down to the record of where the Sharks (17-48-8) are. San Jose was 0-8-1 in its last nine games and outscored 44-20. The Blues had multiple Grade A scoring chances they didn't bury past Mackenzie Blackwood.
OK, it was 0-0, but they're allowing a lesser opponent to hang around. However, sticking to the same formula would eventually break the dam. Instead, they revert to a cast of skaters not worthy to compete at the former Ron's Roller Rink, let alone an NHL game.
It was a comedy of errors.
The Blues came into the game trailing the Los Angeles Kings by five points for the second wild card. It could have been trimmed to three. Something very doable, after the Kings fell 4-2 to the Calgary Flames. But they couldn't beat a team outscored 288-153 against the rest of the NHL outside of the Blues.
So, with so much on the line, basically their season with so few games and every one mattering that much more and more, how can this happen? Brayden Schenn paused, fluttered his words a bit and was initially speechless.
"I don't have words for that. Trying to come up with something for you," he said. "But reality of it, I don't have an answer. It can't this time of year with the position we're in, with our team and where we are and how hard we fought to get to this position to let one slip against a team like that."
The captain was also asked if this was more telling that one game.
"I'm not sure how to answer that one either," he said. "I've got to talk about tonight. I don't know how to answer that."
He should, because this isn't the first time this has happened.
Remember that godawful display in San Jose on Nov. 16, a 5-1 loss then? But that's not all. Against three of the worst teams points-wise (San Jose, Chicago Blackhawks and Columbus Blue Jackets), who are a combined 63-133-25, the Blues are 2-5-0 and have been outscored 25-15, including 0-4-0 against the Sharks and Blue Jackets, outscored 15-3 in those games. Yikes.
Oh by the way, the Blues became the first team to lose to the Sharks this season -- twice.
Congratulations.
"That's twice against them, Columbus and Chicago and the good teams don't do that," Schenn said. "That's how you get into the playoffs is by beating those teams. We've just been shooting ourselves in the foot with tough losses like that."
The Blues went from outshooting the Sharks 11-3 in the first period, with a huge advantage on offensive zone time (San Jose had a measly 39 seconds of it in the period) to being completely dominated and outshot 12-3 in the second period and being down 3-0.
Again ... how? With your season on the line.
"No question, in the first period, I thought we started well and we had our opportunities," Bannister said. "Then you go into the second period and we fell asleep. We weren't doing the same things that we were in the first, whether it was us getting frustrated early on in the game, where we weren't having a lot of success but we were doing things the right way. We just had to stick with it. Then we find ourselves in a hole. We turn the puck over. We get beat on a track and then we get a bad bounce, but we weren't working for those opportunities on our end, especially in the second period and then we're chasing the game from then. We have a team that's just defending in the third period. Now we have some chances, but we put ourselves in a deep hole there to climb out of."
I feel bad for Zack Bolduc because he's just getting his feet wet and learning on the fly, but he had a gaffe that led to the first goal. Colton Parayko's poorly-timed pinch led to a 2-on-1, and Robert Thomas showed absolutely no effort in casually putting his stick into space defending in the zone that could have broken a play up. Instead, it ultimately led to the second goal, and on the third, it was a fortuitous bounce for Chesterfield's own Luke Kunin, but the Sharks were making their breaks at that point.
Speaking of Thomas, where has be been the last half dozen games (one assist)? Truthfully, I couldn't tell if Pavel Buchnevich and Jordan Kyrou were wearing Blues or Sharks jerseys tonight with the blunders they had. Speaking of Kyrou, I'm not sure if he even understands what a one-timer from the circle on the power play is. I get the guy came into the game with eight points in the past four games but these are games the top players should dominate, and his disappearing act when games matter most seems to happen far too often.
These are three of the most important players on the roster that you didn't notice on the ice tonight unless it was for something they did wrong.
What would be so Blues is come in here on Monday and rip the Edmonton Oilers with Connor McDavid and Co. They've been doing it all season, beating the Dallas Stars (twice), Colorado Avalanche, Vancouver Canucks (twice), Oilers, Vegas Golden Knights, Kings (twice), Boston Bruins, Florida Panthers, Tampa Bay Lightning, New York Rangers, Carolina Hurricanes ... all these playoff-bound teams. But they can't scrounge up enough effort to brush the Sharks aside, a team that had a whole seven wins coming in this calendar year.
I guess the Blues could somehow still pull this off. But really, do they deserve to with performances like this against the league's bottom feeders? Remember the listless effort losing to Columbus 1-0 right before the All-Star break?
I get it's sports and everyone can beat anyone on any given day, but when this happens multiple times, fans rightfully have no faith on who you are and the product you bring with you.
And they certainly let the Blues know how they felt as they skated off the ice Saturday.
"It's a good city. We have passionate fans," Parayko said. "The fans show up for us every game and we appreciate that. We've got to make sure that we put our best out for them every game. Not saying that we're not trying but they want to see wins. It's frustrating for them and obviously it's frustrating for us. At the end of the day, they want wins and so do we."
The Blues feel like they can dip their toes in the water when it's convenient for them. But reality is, those are teams that aren't worthy to be part of the group competing for a Stanley Cup, and once and for all, the 2023-24 Blues have made themselves invisible far too often.
In all honesty, that 2-1 overtime loss against the Golden Knights last Monday may have been the final death knell for the Blues. Saturday likely was their burial.
