{"id":645142,"date":"2026-03-07T10:41:22","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T10:41:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/645142\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T10:41:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T10:41:22","slug":"st-louis-blues-2026-trade-deadline-report-card-grading-doug-armstrongs-moves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/645142\/","title":{"rendered":"St. Louis Blues 2026 trade deadline report card: Grading Doug Armstrong\u2019s moves"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Athletic has live coverage<\/a> of the NHL trade deadline.<\/p>\n

Movement since Dec. 12<\/p>\n

In: Justin Holl, Dmitri Buchelnikov, Jonathan Drouin, Marcus Gidlof, Thomas Bordeleau, Detroit Red Wings\u2019 2026 first-round pick, Colorado Avalanche\u2019s 2026 first-round pick, San Jose Sharks\u2019 2026 third-round pick, New Jersey Devils\u2019 2026 third-round pick, New Jersey Devils\u2019 conditional 2026 fourth-round pick (latest of three owned by the Devils)
Out: Brayden Schenn, Justin Faulk, Nick Bjugstad
Grade: B-<\/p>\n

If grades were given out before the last hour of deadline day, the Blues might\u2019ve received an F. They struck out trying to trade Robert Thomas and Colton Parayko to the Buffalo Sabres, and they were still holding onto aging veterans with term, Brayden Schenn and Justin Faulk. But in the final 60 minutes, general manager Doug Armstrong\u2019s report card got a lot better.<\/p>\n

In separate deals, Armstrong moved Schenn to the Islanders and Faulk to the Wings for a collection of high draft picks and players. Each player fetched a first- and third-round pick, which means the Blues will have three first-rounders (including their own) in 2026. It will be the second time in three seasons that the team has three first-rounders. In 2023, they drafted Dalibor Dvorsky, Otto Stenberg and Theo Lindstein in the opening round.<\/p>\n

Some might scoff at the B- because the Blues only moved two players from their roster, and that\u2019s understandable. But they attempted to move Parayko in a package that would\u2019ve yielded a significant package. He just turned it down, which is his right with a no-trade clause. Also, in regard to Thomas, Jordan Kyrou and other tradable assets, if the returns weren\u2019t enough, it was perhaps a good decision to wait until the offseason to resume those talks. \u2014 Rutherford<\/p>\n

What they\u2019re saying<\/p>\n

Brayden Schenn, televised on TSN: \u201cWhen you look at the (New York Islanders), they\u2019re built with a solid goalie and a lot of good pieces with (Matthew Schaefer), (Mathew Barzal) and (Bo Horvat). The list goes on and on, and it\u2019s a great place to play. At the end of the day, St. Louis, they wanted to go a different direction. Obviously, we\u2019re sitting in 30th place in the league, and they want to go younger and rebuild a different way. You\u2019re one of the guys that gets called to ask to waive and that\u2019s kind of how it all shook out.\u201d<\/p>\n

What it means for the team\u2019s lineup<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s deadline won\u2019t help the current lineup. In fact, it will create holes with the absence of Schenn and Faulk. But it could provide more playing time for Jonatan Berggren and Matthew Kessel, and, again, the moves were more about the draft picks.<\/p>\n

Holloway-Thomas-Snuggerud
Neighbours-Buchnevich-Kyrou
Suter-Dvorsky-Berggren
Toropchenko-Finley-Sundqvist<\/p>\n

Broberg-Parayko
Fowler-Mailloux
Tucker-Kessel<\/p>\n

Binnington
Hofer<\/p>\n

Trade gradesThe trade: Islanders get forward Brayden Schenn. Blues get first-round pick, third-round pick, forward Jonathan Drouin, goalie Marcus Gidlof.<\/p>\n

James Mirtle\u2019s Blues grade<\/a>: B+
Dom Luszczyszyn\u2019s Blues grade<\/a>: A-<\/p>\n

The trade: Detroit Red Wings get defenseman Justin Faulk. St. Louis Blues get first-round pick, third-round pick (via San Jose), defenseman Justin Holl and forward Dmitri Buchelnikov.<\/p>\n

Dom Luszczyszyn\u2019s Blues grade<\/a>: B+
Shayna Goldman\u2019s Blues grade<\/a>: B<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Athletic has live coverage of the NHL trade deadline. Movement since Dec. 12 In: Justin Holl, Dmitri…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":645143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,6,12,33955],"class_list":["post-645142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba-draft","tag-basketball","tag-nba","tag-nba-draft","tag-st-louis-blues"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116187475958339973","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=645142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/645143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=645142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=645142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=645142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}