The Blues may already have one line penciled in for opening night, but the real battle is going to come behind it.
Jimmy Snuggerud, Dylan Holloway, and Robert Thomas look locked in as St. Louis’ first line.
After that, though, the forward group gets a lot less certain, and the biggest question sits right in the middle of the second line. That 2C job is shaping up as a straight-up fight among Pius Suter, Dalibor Dvorsky, Mason McTavish, and Connor McMichael.
Dvorsky is the name that jumps off the page. He’s the youngest of the bunch, and he has a real shot to jump past the more established NHL veterans if training camp breaks his way. For Jim Montgomery, that would be a welcome problem to have.
One reason is the direction the roster is already heading. The Blues’ core has tilted younger, with McTavish, Dvorsky, and McMichael all under 25.
Suter is the outlier at 30, and Dvorsky is the only one of the three younger centers who was drafted by St. Louis.
That gives Alexander Steen a few different ways to sort out the lineup. He could simply play the best center and move the others to the wings on the second line.
He could also push one of them down to the third line and keep Jack Finley as the fourth-line center. Either way, Suter’s role for 2026-27 is far from settled.
Dvorsky’s case got a boost from what he showed last season, especially on the power play. The next step is clear: he has to turn that into a stronger 5-on-5 game.
If he does, the Blues could easily decide he’s the best fit over the newcomers. His Olympics performance was a big positive, even if it didn’t really carry over into the Blues’ season.
Money matters here too. McTavish and McMichael are both going to cost a lot more than Dvorsky. McTavish is not going to be parked on the third line if he’s making north of $7 million AAV, and McMichael is still in arbitration, with a new deal that could land over $4 million AAV.
So at least to open the season, Dvorsky should get a real shot in that second-line center spot, with McTavish and McMichael on either side of him. That setup would also bump Pavel Buchnevich down to the third line, which may actually suit him given his downward spiral in recent years.
Dvorsky still has to win the job. Nothing is handed out here.
But the path is there, and it’s very much within reach. No. 54 could be a real factor next season.
In Other News...
Blues Fans Can Finally Judge The Jordan Kyrou Decision
The Blues spent the offseason making one of the bigger roster calls of their rebuild, moving Jordan Kyrou and using the return to add another piece to the organizations long-term plan. It was the kind of decision that immediately changed the conversation around how the roster would look for 2026-27, especially with the front office clearly leaning into a younger core.
For now, the move feels like the sort of bet St. Louis can live with, even if the final grade still has to wait. The Blues have added flexibility and a different kind of ceiling to the lineup, but the real judgment will come only after the new group is tested over time and the trade is weighed against what Kyrou might have continued to provide. [Read more 🡒]
Beloved Rangers Figure John Davidson Lands Front Office Role With Sabres
The Sabres added another familiar name to their front office this week, hiring John Davidson as a senior advisor in a move that brings one of hockeys more experienced executives back into the mix. Davidson has spent years in NHL management, with stops that included the St. Louis Blues, Columbus Blue Jackets and New York Rangers, giving Buffalo a seasoned voice in a room already built around front-office experience.
For Blues fans, Davidsons name still carries plenty of weight from his time in St. Louis, where he helped guide the organization through a significant stretch of its rise. His arrival in Buffalo also reconnects him with general manager Jarmo Kekalainen, a relationship that has long been part of Davidsons professional path and now adds another layer to a front office that continues to lean on proven NHL decision-makers. [Read more 🡒]
That Jets Collapse May Have Changed Everything For The Blues
A first-round loss to Winnipeg in the 2024-25 playoffs did more than end the Blues spring early. It also left behind the kind of what-if that can linger around a franchise, because a series win might have changed how the next year looked from top to bottom, from the urgency of the offseason to the way the front office judged where the roster stood in its competitive cycle.
Instead, St. Louis entered the 2025-26 season dealing with the reality of a team still in transition, even as the organization continued trying to thread the needle between staying competitive and getting younger. The bigger question now is whether a deeper run would have nudged the Blues toward a more aggressive path this summer, or whether the move toward a younger core was inevitable no matter how that first-round matchup ended. [Read more 🡒]