The Pressure is on the Blues' Core

Steve Ott is a jackass.

You know this, the Minnesota Wild know it, the media outside of St. Louis knows it (at least most seem to. Brian Engblom on NBC was still talking up Ott as a useful player, but I digress). Just about everyone outside of gritlovers like Doug Armstrong and Ken Hitchcock know his prime is over and he’s just a jackass on skates.

And yet Steve Ott isn’t the problem for the St. Louis Blues.

A lot of digital ink has been spilled Tuesday after the Blues total no-show in Game 3 against the Minnesota Wild. I’ve contributed to it as well pointing out that Hitch skated Ott (with 12 goals in his last 160 games) two minutes more than Dmitrij Jaskin (13 goals in 54 games this year) despite the Blues never having the lead or even scoring a goal at any point in the game. Ott is part of the problem, but not the problem.

David Backes, Patrik Berglund, Alex Pietrangelo, Alexander Steen, T.J. Oshie, Kevin Shattenkirk, Barret Jackman and Ryan Reaves are the only guys who have been with the Blues for the duration of this Ken Hitchcock-led run. All eight players have suited up in the playoffs since 2012.

The Blues record with these players in the playoffs under Ken Hitchcock is ugly — just nine wins against 15 losses (five in 2012, four in ’13, four in ’14 and now two in ’15). They are just 2-9 in road games, including a staggering nine straight road defeats. The Blues last playoff road win came on April 19, 2012 and the goals were scored by B.J. Crombeen and Andy McDonald. Since that win the Blues have lost nine straight by a score of 28-11. For those bad at math, that’s about a 3-1 loss every time they wear the road uniform.

Nine straight games with different lineups, goalies and lines and the Blues have scored just 1.2 goals per contest. That’s not on Steve Ott.

The eight players haven’t played in every playoff under Hitchcock because of injuries and being Ryan Reaves, but they’ve been around. In that group is Captain Backes and four alternates, Jackman, Steen, Oshie and Pietrangelo. They have seen some shit.

For so long they’ve been insulated from criticism. Goaltending, defense, injuries and the lack of a true sniper or No. 1 center has hidden these guys from the spotlight. Let’s look at each player’s performance in the playoffs. Note: Some of these games are before this little run but it’s still worth noting how the names have performed in the career in the playoffs.

Raise your hand if you had Patrik Berglund in the Not That Disappointing list in your head? Didn’t think so. Everyone else, outside of maybe Shattenkirk and Pietrangelo, has been largely unimpressive in the postseason.

In the regular season, Steen averages a hair over 25 goals per year with the Blues. His playoff scoring rate would have him down 17.5. Backes averages 23.4 goals per 82 game in his career, just 11.7 per 82 games in the playoffs. Oshie has a 20.3 per 82 game average in the regular season, just 12.1 per 82 games in the playoffs.

I know the sample size is small and I know it’s not entirely fair to take hundreds of regular season games worth of production and boil it down to less than 30 playoff games. I get that. Backes could go off and score five goals in game 4 and skew all the math, but do you think he’s going to do that? He averages about a goal every 6.5 playoff games and in his last nine has 0 goals and only 3 assists.

The Blues need more from the guys who have been here the longest. Eight players who have worn the Bluenote the longest have combined for two goals against Devan Dubnyk and the Minnesota Wild. Vladimir Tarasenko score three times in one game. Guys like Oshie and Backes have yet to even get on the board. Reaves and Jackman are an entirely different story, although I'd listen to a case that both should maybe be watching from the press box.

If the Blues hope to have chance to salvage this series, everyone needs to step up, but no one more than the longest-tenured Blues.