Stastny vs. Lehterä

[Robb_K]

I think it will be wise to experiment with Backes on RW and Stastny with Farasenko in pre-season and for the first several weeks of the season, while Lehterä recovers his conditioning and shakes off the rus. THEN, with ose new combos tested, IF successful, they can be used later, if a change is needed. Or, if they start off the season hot, they can be ridden out, until they cool off, and can also be returned to later, if needed.

I, too, think that the Steen, Stastny, Tarasenko line, or Schwartz, Stastny Tarasenko lines make the team too "top heavy". I fully expect Lehterä to be significantly more effective this season, and The Blues should take advantage of his chemistry with Tarasenko, to form TWO very solid scoring lines, rather than having just one.

 

[Vladys Gumption]

There's a couple different train of thoughts, and I can understand both of them. One could make an argument Stastny should play with Tarasenko, but it would leave the lines unbalanced. The other approach is to go with balanced lines, which would likely put Lehtera back with Tarasenko. I flip flop on them. The lines could go a couple ways I think:

Steen-Stastny-Tarasenko
Schwartz-Lehtera-Jaskin
Fabbri-Backes-Brouwer
Ott-Brodziak-Reaves

or

Schwartz-Lehtera-Tarasenko
Steen-Stastny-Jaskin/Fabbri
Jaskin/Fabbri-Backes-Brouwer
Ott-Brodziak-Reaves

My dark horse candidate for possible lines would look something like this:
Jaskin-Lehtera-Tarasenko
Schwartz-Stastny-Fabbri
Steen-Backes-Brouwer
Ott-Brodziak-Reaves

 

[Linkens Mastery]

I feel like Tarasenko Steen and Statsny should be together. And (hear me out) Lehtera centering Schwartz and Backes. I feel the best way for Lehtera to form chemistry with players not beginning with the letter T is to have 2 highly skilled wingers on his sides. He is already familiar with Schwartz. Backes would be a big power forward who can clear the ice for Lehtera and use Schwartz as the sniper of the line. Then also if we want to keep Backes as Center then put Fabrri with Schwartz and Lehtera.

Steen-Statsny-Tarasenko
Schwartz-Lehtera-Backes
Jaskin-Fabbri-Brower

OR

Steen-Statsny-Tarasenko
Schwartz-Lehtera-Fabbri
Jaskin-Backes-Brouwer

 

[Ranksu]

changed on correct thread

Stastny has more points than Lehtera in 18 fewer games. He's on a 57 point pace while Lehtera is on a 34 point pace(over 82 games played, which obviously Stastny will not reach). I can't think of a single thing Lehtera does better than Stastny honestly. As underwhelming as Stastny is for 7M, he's a significantly better player than Lehtera. Nothing about Lehtera's game this season is inspiring. Nothing. We gave him a big contract that kicks in next season and he's done nothing to prove that was a wise investment.

Points its always the points.

I have one thing, he makes his linemates better while he is so frigging slow, imagine if he would be better condition.

Second, rarely possession dies in Lehterä's hands, I really likes how he force his linemates involved to creating plays, the puck don't stay long time in Lehterä's stick = game tempo.

Third, Is it coincidence that in backchecking he has always right spot and finds defend with his stick at correct time.

Lehterä is surprisingly underrated player around Blues HFB.

​

* * *

Terrible investment in Lehtera given his conditioning ?'s. Guy was gassed after 20 or so games last year so why invest for 4 years without knowing if his conditioning had improved? Stupid on Armstrong's part.

This is very thrue, if he cannot find away get better condition and improve his skating, his contract will looks like garbage.

In summer I was alone with this feeling about Army that he made highly questionable extension to Lehterä after one 'shaky' year in NHL. Still ppl defend Army's vision etc. Infuriates me.

 

[ManyIdeas]

I think Lehtera has been fine as far as conditioning goes this year. After Staz got back, of course.

 

[Vladys Gumption]

I may be in the minority but I think Lehtera has looked decent since Stastny came back. He can't handle 20 minutes a night, but in a 15 minute a night role he's fine. He looks pretty sharp to me of late.

 

[shpongle falls]

I may be in the minority but I think Lehtera has looked decent since Stastny came back. He can't handle 20 minutes a night, but in a 15 minute a night role he's fine. He looks pretty sharp to me of late.

Agreed.

 

[Vincenzo Arelliti]

Prediction: Next year, and maybe even for the remainder of the season, Lehtera will play with Tarasenko mostly, and will look amazing doing so. He'll be even better next year.

 

[KingBran]

Prediction: Next year, and maybe even for the remainder of the season, Lehtera will play with Tarasenko mostly, and will look amazing doing so. He'll be even better next year.

I hope you are right because he is pretty invisible without Tarasenko.

 

[Dbrownss]

The Lehterasenkshow is completely invisible..... that Sedin like chemistry isn't present this season. Very discouraging to see Vladi hit a wall like he did

 

[Renard]

The Lehterasenkshow is completely invisible..... that Sedin like chemistry isn't present this season. Very discouraging to see Vladi hit a wall like he did

Sorry to see Jori get hurt.

 

[bluesfan3109]

Everytime I see Lehtera pass up a beautiful scoring chance b/c he refuses to shoot the puck on an open shot b/c Tarasenko is somewhere on the ice that he can try and force a stupid pass to get it stolen, I continuously wonder why Hitch keeps putting them together. Shoot the *** puck for Christ's sake!

 

[ManyIdeas]

I thought he had a couple of nice shots in the past few games.

 

[SirPaste]

Everytime I see Lehtera pass up a beautiful scoring chance b/c he refuses to shoot the puck on an open shot b/c Tarasenko is somewhere on the ice that he can try and force a stupid pass to get it stolen, I continuously wonder why Hitch keeps putting them together. Shoot the *** puck for Christ's sake!

Have you seen Lehtera shoot? It's horrifying to watch, there is a reason he passes all the time

 

[Stealth JD]

What a colossal waste of almost $12M these two guys are. I'd rather have one Stamkos than these two...and I am certainly NOT on the "sign-Stamkos" bandwagon.

Maybe Army could trade both of these guys for something...cap-space...and give their money to SS.

 

[bluesfan3109]

Have you seen Lehtera shoot? It's horrifying to watch, there is a reason he passes all the time

Have you seen him force passes through 5 sticks when he's wide open and turn the puck over repeatedly. I'd rather a crappy shot than a turnover everyday of the week.

 

[KirkOut]

Have you seen him force passes through 5 sticks when he's wide open and turn the puck over repeatedly. I'd rather a crappy shot than a turnover everyday of the week.

It's not like he never turns it over. Sometimes he makes a great pass and sometimes he drop passes it to no one on the rush

 

[Vincenzo Arelliti]

Stastny on a 4-year deal costs a fair 7M. Lehtera on a 3-year deal eating UFA years costs a fair 4.7M. If either player improves, it's a good deal.

Neither of these contracts are holding us back in any way (Stastny leaves when Fabbs needs a new contract), and unless the cap decreases and nearly everyone wants max contracts, neither of these cap hits are getting in the way of doing anything (including signing Shatty and Stamkos to max deals).

I wish Stastny would produce more, but he plays best behind the net (something we are just now trying to utilize) and we don't have the players for him in front of the net unless Backes can play RW with him.

Lehtera spent most of the year playing as a 3C and we give Stastny all the credit in the world for having to play with Berglund and Jaskin last year. Lehtera hasn't done poorly at all, and is a huge part of the STL line's success. Given the circumstances (and his off-season injury) it's kind of impressive he hasn't done much worse.

Both players play well defensively and both players are important for life after Backes (Stastny defensively and Lehtera offensively at the very least), and we knew that when we signed Stastny that this would be the writing on the wall for Backes as a UFA.

There's no way we could have gone forward without either of these guys as that would force us to overpay Backes (you complain about Stastny now, just wait until Backes is making .5M less and is wearing down on a long-term deal), and we'd be without any type of replacement or cap room for a declining Backes. By grabbing both of these players, we extended our current window further than the window of our old core (Backes, Oshie, Berglund, Bouwmeester, Steen).

While I would love for Stastny and Lehtera to score more, I would also like the rest of the team to do better (you know, the guys that typically have to bury the chances these two players feed them). If they were on a different team, I see them both putting up 10 more points easily.

In general, I don't really have many complaints for either of them, and next year will be the year that I will expect them to outproduce what they have done over the last two.