1) Martin Brodeur is back in the NHL!. After an amazing run of 21 years in New Jersey, Brodeur signed with the St. Louis Blues last week. He made his first start on Thursday, looking OK in a 4-3 loss to the Predators. Then this past Saturday, he earned his 689th career win, and first in St Louis, in relief against a familiar foe the Islanders. Don't get us wrong, while it was nice to see a legend return in our opinion it won't help, but hinder the Blues season.
2) The whole Brodeur situation is very odd, because the Blues and Brodeur don’t seem like they should be a fit. Why? The Blues already have two pretty good goaltenders in veteran Brian Elliott and youngster Jake Allen. While Allen has struggled a bit, and right now Elliott has a mild injury. While Elliott is listed as 'week-to-week', there have been conflicting reports as to just how long he’ll be out, however few are saying his season is in jeopardy, which means at some point the Blues are going to have a log jam in net with three guys and only two spots.
3) It’s possible that the plan here is to just use Brodeur as a stop-gap until Elliott is back and then go forward with the Elliott-Allen pairing. But the rumor mill now says that the Blues could be looking to move Elliott, which would leave them with Allen and Brodeur to carry their Cup hopes. That would seem to be an insane strategy, especially since Brodeur hasn’t been all that good for going on 2 years now. From a purely Blues’ perspective, it makes little sense. They’re one of the league’s better teams, in a position to make a run at the team’s first Cup.
4) They tried to upgrade the position late last season when they made a blockbuster trade to get Ryan Miller. Most liked that deal at the time, but it didn’t work out, and the Blues ended up spending a few top assets for a few weeks of mediocre goaltending. True, here they’re not spending any assets on Brodeur, so the risk factor is lower. But the odds of success are lower too! The other non discussed is the negative possible impact on the acting #1 goalie Jake Allen. Brodeur has never been a 'mentor' to any of his former backups, and having a guy who is used to being 'the guy' around could fracture the locker room
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