Confirmed with Link: Berube out, Bannister in

[AyeBah]

I'm sorry but this is an F'ing joke. Berube wins the only cup in 50 years, Army lets the #1 dman walk and this team is in no mans land. Right now we are the Philladelphia Flyers of the last 7-8 years= mid. We are in no mans land right now. Not competing and not tanking. How do we as fans even invest in this team? They have no heart, structure, or skill. We can talk about this "retool" as much as we want but its going nowhere. The D cuppoard is barren and the forward prospect pool is nothing special. What do we even have to look forward to at this point?

The character guys of the 2010s are all gone, the guys who fought teeth and nail for the note: Backes,Steen, Petro, ETC. This team had no identity at all, it isn't even Blues hockey. I don't even know whether to root for us to win or lose on any given night for the better of the future of this team, and honestly does anybody know?

Had to vent but like what even is the point anymore? This team is just floating right now from the forwards all the way back to the guy in charge in the front office.

 

[mk80]

I'm guessing there are two reasons they fired him now. First, they need to send a message to the players that their crappy play has consequences. Secondly, this tells me that the front office still thinks this season is salvageable. Not a fan of this move but at least Berube gets a well needed vacation before being hired by another team in the not so distant future. Thanks for your service Chief, you'll always be a legend in St Louis.

One thing is for sure, if Bannister can't improve things, Army is going to have to embrace a more in depth retool/rebuild, instead of delaying the inevitable and trying to salvage a brief playoff appearance.

 

[Reality Czech]

I'm sorry but this is an F'ing joke. Berube wins the only cup in 50 years, Army lets the #1 dman walk and this team is in no mans land. Right now we are the Philladelphia Flyers of the last 7-8 years= mid. We are in no mans land right now. Not competing and not tanking. How do we as fans even invest in this team? They have no heart, structure, or skill. We can talk about this "retool" as much as we want but its going nowhere. The D cuppoard is barren and the forward prospect pool is nothing special. What do we even have to look forward to at this point?

The character guys of the 2010s are all gone, the guys who fought teeth and nail for the note: Backes,Steen, Petro, ETC. This team had no identity at all, it isn't even Blues hockey. I don't even know whether to root for us to win or lose on any given night for the better of the future of this team, and honestly does anybody know?

Had to vent but like what even is the point anymore? This team is just floating right now from the forwards all the way back to the guy in charge in the front office.

Stop the ridiculous Petro narrative as if he didn't have any say in the matter. So frigging annoying at this point.

 

[Reality Czech]

One thing is for sure, if Bannister can't improve things, Army is going to have to embrace a more in depth retool/rebuild, instead of delaying the inevitable and trying to salvage a brief playoff appearance.

That's a good point. But fans need to realize that remaking a roster takes time. I don't really see anything Army could have realistically done last season to make a big difference. This year was always gonna be a write off. Just disappointing that our team seems to have no guts or pride.

 

[AyeBah]

That's a good point. But fans need to realize that remaking a roster takes time. I don't really see anything Army could have realistically done last season to make a big difference. This year was always gonna be a write off. Just disappointing that our team seems to have no guts or pride.

 

[AyeBah]

Stop the ridiculous Petro narrative as if he didn't have any say in the matter. So frigging annoying at this point.

Yeah it's pretty ridiculous not like the guy was the #1 dman on the cup champs last season. Thank god we didn't give him that NMC. So great that the money went to Leddy and Krug instead. You're living in denial if you say otherwise, we lost Dunn, Schwartz, and Pedro for 0 value, and that tanked this team

 

[Novacain]

That's a good point. But fans need to realize that remaking a roster takes time. I don't really see anything Army could have realistically done last season to make a big difference. This year was always gonna be a write off. Just disappointing that our team seems to have no guts or pride.

I think you are misconstruing the problem. The problem most of us have with Armstrong is we are locked into a shitty top 4 of old defensemen for a combined 23 and a half million dollars a season for the 2 seasons AFTER this, locked into Krug and Faulk a year after that,

This isn't a "retool". It was never a retool. Anyone who looked at this roster without fan goggles on knows it's not a matter of this being a quick fix. The problem is we are stuck in purgatory right now of being a team that cannot actually rebuild even though it's obviously the only real option for us. It's going to be a long, bitter road for the next few years, and it was pretty obvious we are doing the slow slow descent to the absolute bottom just like the Sharks and Blackhawks did before us. The frustrating part is that Armstrong just refused to pick a lane. He needed to go all in or all out long ago. But he's been riding the middle for years now. And were we are now is arguably being the most directionless team in the NHL.

 

[Reality Czech]

Yeah it's pretty ridiculous not like the guy was the #1 dman on the cup champs last season. Thank god we didn't give him that NMC. So great that the money went to Leddy and Krug instead. You're living in denial if you say otherwise, we lost Dunn, Schwartz, and Pedro for 0 value, and that tanked this team

I'm guessing you were in the room when the contract was being negotiated since you seem to know exactly what happened and what was said. You're in denial if you think Petro would basically turn this team into was contender by himself.

 

[Ranksu]

 

[542365]

Might as well have just given him until the end of the season. This is a bad team. Maybe the new coach will spark a dead cat bounce for a bit, but it just isn’t very good top to bottom.

I’ll always appreciate Chief for helping bring the Cup to St. Louis. Seems a repeat of that is probably a long ways away, but I look forward to watching guys like Dvorsky, Snuggerud, Stenberg etc. start to make their mark on the team. Couple of big draft hits can turn things around pretty quickly and the Blues have drafted pretty well over the years.

 

[Bobby Orrtuzzo]

While it wasn’t totally his fault…unfortunately I think we all saw this coming at some point (maybe not this soon).

Chief will always be a legend in this town. Thanks for the awesome memories coach.

 

[Ranksu]

Won't help one bit. Fix the problem, Army.

He doesnt admit he has made mistakes with trades and player moves.

 

[Bobby Orrtuzzo]

He doesnt admit he has made mistakes with trades and player moves.

Has any GM ever come and actually said “I screwed up” while they’re still employed?

 

[Ranksu]

Has any GM ever come and actually said “I screwed up” while they’re still employed?

Well Stilman should just fire Army.

He is the reason where we are at now.

 

[Spektre]

Not surprised

 

[Vladys Gumption]

Oh what a surprise, someone else takes the fall because of Armstrong’s terrible roster decisions. At what point does ownership look at him and place the blame where it rightly belongs?

 

[The Note]

Surprised that it happened midseason. Figured he’d at least get to the end of the year, if for no other reason than they wouldn’t be paying him for a year and a half not to coach. Not really sure what anyone’s expecting out of this roster beyond what we’ve seen so far. They’ve looked a deeply flawed roster with just enough talent to surprise teams some nights and I don’t really know what Bannister (or anyone else for that matter) should be expected to squeeze out of them. Everything should be geared towards the future at this point so if Bannister can be a positive impact on the young guys on the team the next couple years then that’s a win in my book.

 

[AjaxManifesto]

I figured he would be gone by Xmas.

DA needs to go. He is the root of this mess.

 

[BlueOil]

surprised to see this move, good luck bannister, maybe you can fix the powerplay

 

[LogosBlue]

Anyone else get the feeling that this could be a mercy firing. Berube might not have wanted to stick around for this type of effort. Players tuning you out and giving you crap effort every night. Don't know that I'd want to get hung out to dry like that either. Time to move on.

This is the beginning of the hard reset though. I don't think a new head coach will make much of a difference this time around. I expect a lot of players (I still like) to get traded or shipped out throughout the year.

 

[BleedBlue14]

I feel like the criticism with Berube's firing is that both the compete from the players was lost and the system Berube put in place just doesn't work. Aside from their 0-10-1 start to the season, the Sharks have gone 8-7-2 with a hilariously mediocre team when compared to the Blues. I don't think the Blues should be a playoff team, but I expect better compete out of these guys and if Armstrong thinks the message has gotten stale/the system has shown not to work, then you fire him

You can cherry pick timing as well for the Blues having some moderate success this season.

You can’t really disregard theSharks god awful start when outside of the last 4 games the Blues were in a playoff position

 

[TheDizee]

Anyone else get the feeling that this could be a mercy firing. Berube might not have wanted to stick around for this type of effort. Players tuning you out and giving you crap effort every night. Don't know that I'd want to get hung out to dry like that either. Time to move on.

This is the beginning of the hard reset though. I don't think a new head coach will make much of a difference this time around. I expect a lot of players (I still like) to get traded or shipped out throughout the year.

Hopefully that happens

 

[Celtic Note]

Anyone else get the feeling that this could be a mercy firing. Berube might not have wanted to stick around for this type of effort. Players tuning you out and giving you crap effort every night. Don't know that I'd want to get hung out to dry like that either. Time to move on.

This is the beginning of the hard reset though. I don't think a new head coach will make much of a difference this time around. I expect a lot of players (I still like) to get traded or shipped out throughout the year.

Berube and Army have too much pride for me to believe that would be or would need to be a thing.

 

[Eldon Reid]

Only thing that makes me happy about the move is they didn't bring in washed up coach back in. Put someone that hasn't done it in NHL yet.

 

[PelagicJoe]

Wings fan (in STL mind you) coming in peace. This move is a mistake IMO. Last night was a hard fought game by both teams. I'm more surprised that Army wasn't canned first. He deserves more of the blame than Berube for handcuffing the roster with all those bad contracts, especially on defense.