The St. Louis Blues have reportedly placed defenseman Nick Leddy (4) on waivers Wednesday. (Jeff Curry-Imagn Images)
MARYLAND HEIGHTS, Mo. — In light of trading for a young defenseman on Tuesday when the St. Louis Blues acquired 22-year-old Logan Mailloux from the Montreal Canadiens for forward Zack Bolduc, the team has begun the process of reshaping what has been a veteran group on the blue line.
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Reports have surfaced that the Blues have placed veteran defenseman Nick Leddy on waivers.
The 34-year-old has one year remaining on a four-year, $16 million contract ($4 million average annual value).
With Mailloux’s addition, it gave the Blues eight ready defensemen in their lineup, and when asked on Tuesday about the makeup of it with the addition of Mailloux, Blues general manager Doug Armstrong said, “We’ll look at it.”
There’s the potential at some point this becomes a Brandon Saad situation, where the Blues put the forward on waivers last season, he wasn’t claimed, the team was prepared to send him to Springfield of the American Hockey League but instead terminated the remaining year and a half of his four-year, $22.5 million contract and became a free agent and signed with the Vegas Golden Knights.
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It’s tough to envision Leddy willing to go to the AHL at this point in his career and is less than likely to get claimed on waivers, but that would be the perfect case scenario, and there are teams that need to get to the cap floor that may be willing to take a flier on him.
But Leddy has a 16-team no-trade list and a team needing to get to the cap floor may be on his list of teams he’d be unwilling to go to. And Leddy, who has spent the past three-plus seasons in St. Louis after being acquired from the Detroit Red Wings, has $3 million in actual salary left on his contract.