Blues GM Doug Armstrong is using a farming analogy to let everyone know he has full intentions of keeping St. Louis captain Alex Pietrangelo after the signing Thursday of Brayden Schenn to an eight-year, $52 million extension.
"I go back to a saying that someone told me: 'How do you get the horses back in the barn? You get them in one at a time.' We got one in and now we've got to go corral another one and get him in the barn," Armstrong told Jeremy Rutherford of The Athletic.
He admits he won't be easy. The Blues only have just under $150,000 in cap space now, with a $1.25 million raise for Schenn kicking in next season. Pietrangelo, who currently makes $6.5 million per season, will become an unrestricted free agent on July 1st, 2020. The defending Cup champs will also have four restricted free agents to deal with, and one of them has arbitration rights. Armstrong also admits that the back end of Schenn's eight year contract is going to be difficult to deal with in the latter part, but insists it was worth it to get the 28-year-old locked down.
"You want to get that extended term to try to get that cap number down. I know the term is something we're going to have to deal with in 6-7 years, but we'd rather put a 12-13-14 year run together in a salary cap system and worry about that then."
Defenseman Jay Bouwmeester will become an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season, and it's unlikely the Blues will want or be able to bring the 36-year-old back. Bouwmeester currently makes $3.25 million per season. Outside of that, the team will have to look at trades or sending contracts to the minors to save money. While bringing in Justin Faulk definitely strengthened an already strong team, he was instantly signed to a six-year extension worth $6.5 million per season, further complicating the Blues' cap situation in the spring of 2020.
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