When watching your favorite team’s broadcast, the last thing you expect to see is the team’s GM announce a trade in the first intermission.

That is exactly what happened Monday night in the St. Louis Blues’ road game with the Minnesota Wild.  GM Doug Armstrong, in an interview with Color Analyst Darren Pang, announced that the club had acquired 29-year old defenseman Jay Bouwmeester from the Calgary Flames in exchange for St. Louis’ 2013 first-round pick, Peoria Rivermen defenseman Marc Cundari and Swiss goaltender Reto Barra.

The Blues’ first-round pick will become a fourth-round pick if the Blues fail to make the playoffs.  The Flames would also receive the Blues’ first-round pick in 2014 in that scenario.

"We've been looking to acquire a top left-handed defenseman and Jay represents that and is an elite player in our game," said Armstrong.

Bouwmeester has six goals and nine assists in 33 games this season.  He has accumulated 71 goals and 229 assists in 750 career NHL games.  He is a career minus-65 in 10 NHL seasons with the Florida Panthers and Calgary Flames.

Bouwmeester completes the Blues’ quest for a left-handed, offensive defenseman. On Saturday,  Armstrong acquired defenseman Jordan Leopold, who is also a left-handed defenseman.

With Bouwmeester and Leopold, the Blues are now carrying nine defensemen.  The NHL roster does expand Tuesday at midnight, but it is believed that the Blues are not finished with roster moves.  All nine defensemen would have to clear waivers before being sent to the AHL, unless it was on a conditioning stint.

A while back, I wrote about the Blues not being able to handle adversity. The team fell apart after a bad call against the team in Detroit. It brought back thoughts of the implosion against the Kings in the playoffs last year. I closed that article by stating that if the team couldn't right the ship, fans had better hope that Hitchcock and Armstrong didn't use up everything in their award winning arsenals last year.

Here we are starting the final third of this shortened season and the team is lamenting a couple of missed calls after they played the same kind of game against the Kings they've been playing for the better part of the second third of the season. That is to say: mediocre, inconsistent yet frustratingly predictable hockey where they aren't making their own luck.  

So let us explore the questions of coaching and management.  Does Hitchcock have anything left to teach or new ways to teach his message? Or has the message gone stale?  Has the time come for Armstrong to try his hand to change this team's chemistry?

This week we discuss Oshie's return, the D'Agostini trade, game recaps, some trade deadline talk and a radio rant.  Lets Go Blues Radio is powered by Fanzlive, the official app of the fan!

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On this episode of Lets Go Blues Radio, hosts Jeff Ponder and Curt Price discuss the injuries news involving the team, as well as tell you about the past three games that the Blues have played and debate who should be sent to Peoria when T.J. Oshie returns.  Lets Go Blues Radio is powered by Fanzlive, the official app of the fan!

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