On the New York Rangers …
Chris Nichols: Darren Dreger on the Rangers: “I know the #NYR have interest in either Thornton or Marleau. They have interest in Nick Bonino.” … “They’re not giving Marleau or Joe Thornton a three-year term.”
On the KHL and the St. Louis Blues …
Aivis Kalnins: Hearing that the KHL is leaning towards releasing all of Dynamo Moscow players and making them free agents. This would give them a few days to sign new players and get ready for training camp.
Aivis Kalnins: If this were to happen Blues 2017 1st round pick Klim Kostin would be a free agent and eligible to sign in North America.
On the St. Louis Blues …
Lou Korac: GM Doug Armstrong on the chance of going the free agent route for replace David Perron: “I would say right now it’s more internally.”
Jeremy Rutherford: The Blues have some cap space they could work with and touching base with free agent Joe Thornton makes sense.
Chris Pinkert of NHL.com: Berglund has surgery to repair a dislocated shoulder and is expected to be out until December. Options for the Blues include…
“It certainly will move someone else in the middle,” Blues general manager Doug Armstrong said. “Right now you can go with (Paul) Stastny, (Brayden) Schenn or have the option to go to (Vladimir) Sobotka back in there. (Ivan) Barbashev has played there, the young player we got from Pittsburgh – Oskar Sundqvist – he can play in there. There are some internal options and we’ll explore those.”
GM Doug Armstrong said they could also look at the free agent market.
“We’re always looking to see if we can get creative maybe,” he said. “We’re talking to some potential free agents, but I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up that there will be a lot of change to this roster.”
