It could be likely that the St. Louis Blues would be without one of their top defensemen for next season.
Torey Krug has been diagnosed with pre-arthritic conditions on his left ankle. He will be rehabbing for the next six to eight weeks performing physical therapy, where he will likely get pain relief and range of motion exercises to see if his ankle can be stabilized to where he can resume playing professional hockey.
The injury came from a bone fracture that Krug suffered earlier in his NHL career, and he also sustained a foot injury last offseason, missing several games with various injuries in each of his first three seasons with the Blues. He previously suffered an ankle injury in the second round of the 2018 playoffs against the Tampa Bay Lightning while playing for the Boston Bruins, and re-aggravated that injury in the following preseason right before the 2018-19 regular season.
The Blues have said that Krug will be re-evaluated after physical therapy to see if he would require surgery to address the matter. Should he need such, he would miss the entire 2024-25 regular season, thus allowing St. Louis to place him and his $6.5 million cap hit on the long-term injured reserve (LTIR).
Future Impacts
This could or could not be a blow to the Blues. Krug hasn’t truly panned out with the Blues, and the organization tried to move on from him in the last two seasons due to his lack of production and has missed just over 15% of games due to injury over his four years with the organization. He also blocked a trade with the Philadelphia Flyers last offseason with his no-trade clause, and his current injury speaks to the lack of trade talks around him.
Part of the Blues fanbase wanted to see him go to another team, and they wanted to see what the team would look like without him for an extended period. However, some may believe that the timing of the announcement was delayed, given that they signed Ryan Suter to a one-year deal at a league minimum cap hit, and signed Pierre-Olivier Joseph to a one-year deal at a $950k cap hit. This is not to confirm anything, but it could make sense on why one of the team’s top defensemen would miss the entire season.
There is also the possibility that Krug rehabs and ends up completely okay, and thus there rises the issue of the logjam at the left-shot defenseman position. A full recovery is what Krug and the Blues are hoping for, that he avoids surgery and goes on for a healthy 2025 season. The only thing that will provide the answer is time itself, though the decision to sign both Suter and Joseph may likely be pre-emptive in the case that Krug were to miss the entire season.
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