COLUMN: Rest of NHL should follow in the St. Louis Blues’ footsteps and execute offer sheets more often

So what was supposed to be another dull, August day in the NHL as clubs, media and fans await for respective prospect tournaments in mid-September followed by the start of training camps a week later, was galvanized when the St. Louis Blues poked the bear.

A quiet Tuesday morning drew the attention around the league when the Blues announced that they had tendered not one but two offer sheets to Edmonton Oilers restricted free agents, defenseman Philip Broberg and forward Dylan Holloway.

Each was tendered two-year contracts, Broberg for $9,161, 834 ($4,580,917 average annual value) and Holloway for $4,580,914 ($2,290,457 AAV).

These are the players that fall into the age group the Blues are looking for when it comes to retooling their roster while trying to stay competitive. So it made perfect sense to forge ahead with a daring move, even if it rubbed another organization the wrong way.

But the consensus of opinions that followed were plenty of ooh’s and aah’s. ‘How dare they do that?’ There’s the old unwritten role, or gentlemen’s agreement between general managers that, ‘You don’t mess with my restricted free agents, I won’t mess with yours. How dare Doug Armstrong cross such a sacred line?’

This is the second of its kind that offer sheets were submitted to the same team at one time (the Blues were also involved in the first with the Boston Bruins in 1991) and first offer sheet since the Carolina Hurricanes to Jesperi Kotkaniemi of the Montreal Canadiens in 2019, one in which the Canadiens did not match.

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There have been some doozies. Remember the Philadelphia Flyers tendering Shea Weber of the Nashville Predators to the tune of 14 years, $110 million in 2012? Yowza!

The Blues have been, whether tendering or another team tendering their players, involved in 12 previous ones.

These things don’t happen often. In fact, there have been just 44 of them since 1986,

Listen, I’m an old-school person about a lot of things, but this isn’t one of them.

Quote frankly, I would love to see this become a regular occurrence. They’re challenging, they’re gutsy, it shows your fan base you truly are looking to improve your roster boldly by making your team better and not so much caring about how another GM handles his roster.

So what if it ruffles another team’s feathers? So what if it rattles another team’s fan base? The clear objective is to make your team better, and in this case, the Blues would be banking on two young players (Broberg is 23; Holloway 23 in September) to help the process in retooling, and make them better.

Does this back the Oilers and newly-hired GM Stan Bowman into a corner? Yeah, it does, and you know what, so be it.

It’s part of the rules, so why not implement it whenever a team feels like it can help them? I like the fact that players are free game in an otherwise, unwritten rule, situation.

The one thing it does, in my opinion, is it will force teams to be more careful in the way they construct their rosters moving forward. With more susceptibility to have RFA’s plucked off your roster, perhaps GM’s won’t spend so lavishly — sometimes foolishly– with outrageous contracts. Instead of spending so freely, maybe it would force GM’s to allocate funds more carefully knowing they have to pay their own should someone else come calling in the future.

In this case, the Oilers, defending Western Conference champions, have a decision to make why it makes sense to keep one or both of Broberg and Holloway or why it makes more sense to accept the compensation, which would be a second- and third-round pick in 2025. And talk about cleverness, the way Armstrong set up the contracts $1 less on each to lower the compensation from a first- and second-round pick in 2025.

With Evander Kane reportedly needing surgery and heading to long-term injured-reserve, that will offer some cap relief, but not until the season opens. Edmonton also has to consider contract extentions in the not-too-distant future for Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Evan Bouchard.

The Oilers, should they decide to keep both, would be $7,225,541 over the cap ceiling, according to puckpedia.com. Do they move other pieces to in order to try and keep their two first-round picks? Do they move a veteran or two that they normally wouldn’t move to keep the players and become cap-compliant? Or do they feel they have internal options that can replace what they would lose?

You see, I like offer sheets to become more commonplace since it forces you to think even more in a salary cap era. It’s mind-boggling as much as it’s brilliant for teams. They’re fun for fans and media that cover these things. There’s plenty of talking pieces that come with it.

From a Blues perspective, they have the cap room to initiate such moves. And should the Oilers, who have until Tuesday to make a decision, decide to keep the players, even at numbers they’re uncomfortable with, then the Blues at least made an effort, and now would have that cap space back to use later in the season should they be in the hunt.

I see Broberg as a top four defenseman in the foreseeable future for the Blues, perhaps a partner in the long with Colton Parayko, and Holloway projects out as a speedy third-line winger that if he taps potential nobody saw, perhaps he could be dangled as a second-line winger.

Yes, the Oilers internally are upset with this, and rightfully so, the Blues would be upset with a team should they come after one of their RFA’s. That’s not going to change. The Blues should expect Edmonton, perhaps as early as next summer, play the eye for an eye game. Maybe they come after Jake Neighbours, or perhaps Joel Hofer, two players who could be RFA’s in 2025.

Probably most important in all this is that good, young players will get their payday sooner rather than later. Some are very deserving of it, some maybe not as much. Nevertheless, teams have control over these players until a certain age, but at least they’ll get their proper compensation much sooner than later.

Opposing GM’s would hate me as a counterpart because if I was Doug Armstrong, I couldn’t care less if it ruffles your feathers and/or makes you upset. If I have a chance to better my team and weaken yours, so be it. It’s called business.

The Blues are trying to conduct business at the Oilers’ expense in this case. Did Armstrong poke the hornet’s nest? Yeah, and I’m here for it. Bring it on. Bring it all on.

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