The St. Louis Blues had an underwhelming performance from their core in 2025-26, prompting a need for change. This scrutiny has reached the point where there is no return on much of it.
Pavel Buchnevich, Jordan Kyrou, and Robert Thomas are at the forefront of the trade talk, much like they were for most of the season. This offseason could see one or two of those names be moved, with Thomas practically being in the clear due to his end-of-season performance.
Or is Thomas safe?
The youth showed up as much as these veteran, established players, and that is a telling sign of just how awful the 2025-26 season was. How can Alexander Steen step into the General Manager's chair and fix this?
Abolish the no-trade clause
The Blues core is currently really hard to move. As it was seen with Colton Parayko and his potentially done-deal trade with Buffalo, these players have clauses in their contracts to deny trades. Steen has to step in here and either try to get them amended, or at the very least, make sure that contracts moving forward do not have give the players that much power.
It is a nice sentiment to give players to make them feel comfortable for their families and job security. But, if the job cannot get done with this current group, they are handicapped and stuck with a broken system.
The new core has to be better
Jimmy Snuggerud, Dalibor Dvorsky, Philip Broberg and Otto Stenberg. The four pieces of the new core are already starting to blossom and show their potential value. Justin Carbonneau and whomever the Blues decide to select with their three first-round picks in the 2026 NHL Draft will also be joining this group as early as next season.
There is a change in culture, and the youth will start to prevail rather than fail. It is going to take some time for this to come into full effect, but when it does, the Blues will be back to being contenders soon. The current core is about to be nuked, and the fallout could spring new life into this organization.