St. Louis Blues Invite Defenseman Ryan Whitney to Training Camp

For the second straight season, the St. Louis Blues have invited defenseman Ryan Whitney to participate in training camp with the team on a professional tryout basis. Whitney was in camp with the Blues last fall as a tryout player but was released before the start of the regular season.

At face value, this move does not make much sense. One would think that in addition to getting their primary group of defensemen ready for the regular season, the Blues need to sort things out among their depth players, who now include experienced NHL veterans Chris Butler and Nate Prosser and two rather highly-regarded prospects in Jani Hakanpaa and Joel Edmundson. Whitney will just further contribute to that logjam and will likely eliminate the opportunity for a guy lower down the depth chart such as David Shields to make any sort of impression. Perhaps, though, the Blues want to check out another veteran option with Carl Gunnarsson possibly being out for the start of the regular season while recovering from hip surgery.

The 31-year-old Whitney has played parts of 10 seasons in the NHL, scoring 50 goals with 209 assists and a minus-30 plus-minus rating in 481 games. The former Olympian, who played in the 2009 Stanley Cup Finals with the Pittsburgh Penguins, played in seven games with the Florida Panthers during the 2013-14 regular season while spending the rest of his time with the AHL’s San Antonio Rampage.