With Cuts Coming for St. Louis Blues, Who Figures to Go?

Now over a week into training camp, the St. Louis Blues are planning on cutting their training camp roster down to 30 players this weekend, likely when they get back from Saturday night’s preseason exhibition in Kansas City against the Dallas Stars. Head coach Ken Hitchcock has spoken recently about the difficulty he and the staff have had evaluating their potential depth players because not too many of them have been separating themselves from each other, so having a week to evaluate a thinner roster in a more intimate setting should be beneficial as the Blues try to make their final cuts.

The Blues’ AHL affiliate, the Chicago Wolves, open their training camp on Monday, so any players who will obviously be with the Wolves to begin the season figure to be sent out this weekend. As things stand now, here’s a rough guess at who will be part of the cutdown.

Goaltenders (3): Matt Climie, Jordan Binnington, Niklas Lundstrom

Climie surely will be returned to the Wolves, as he’s actually under contract to them and not the Blues. It’s possible that the Blues could keep Binnington around a bit longer to get him some more NHL work, as he’s their projected third-stringer this year, but it’s more likely that they’re going to want to get Brian Elliott and Jake Allen all the work they can before the regular season kicks off.

Defensemen (5): Joel Edmundson, Jani Hakanpaa, Petteri Lindbohm, Brent Regner, David Shields

Lindbohm has really gotten some quality exposure this preseason, and the Blues could keep him around until the end of the preseason. However, he’s already missing time with the Finnish team he’s scheduled to play for this year, Sport Vaasa, and the coaching staff probably would like more time to evaluate their realistic eighth defenseman candidates, Chris Butler and Nate Prosser. The other four in this group are ticketed for Chicago; Edmundson and Hakanpaa are considered to be legitimate prospects, but both have been held back by injuries during camp, meaning they haven’t been able to showcase themselves as much as the Blues probably would have liked them to.

Forwards (14): Cody Beach, Rob Bordson, Terry Broadhurst, Pat Cannone, Jacob Doty, John McCarthy, Phillip McRae, Zach Pochiro, Ty Rattie, Ryan Tesink, Yannick Veilleux, Sebastian Wannstrom, Jeremy Welsh

All of these guys figure to begin the season with the Wolves, or the Blues’ AHL affiliate, the Alaska Aces, if there’s not enough playing time available in Chicago. Obviously the most intriguing guy to be left off this list is 2014 first-rounder Robby Fabbri, who’s stuck around in camp longer than most people expected. It should be exciting to see if he’s given himself a legitimate chance to compete with guys like Colin Fraser, Magnus Paajarvi, and Peter Mueller for one of the final available forward spots on the roster.