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Blues send Elliott to AHL for conditioning stint

brianelliottgetty

The St. Louis Blues’ three’s company goaltending routine is getting cut down, at least for a weekend. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that struggling former All-Star Brian Elliott has been sent to the team’s AHL affiliate for conditioning purposes.

Blues GM Doug Armstrong explains why it will be a short but potentially useful stint.

“We don’t play this weekend and he wasn’t going to play tonight,” Armstrong said. “It gives him an opportunity to play two games in two nights. The feeling was he needed to get some games.”

The trip didn’t just happen because Elliott, 27, will be able to squeeze in contests on Friday and Saturday with the Peoria Rivermen. It’s likely that the team kept him around a little longer so that the Matt D’Agostini trade could go through.

Naturally, some might wonder if the Blues are trying to keep Elliott in shape for trade deadline reasons.

They’re carrying three goalies (Elliott, Jake Allen and Jaroslav Halak) on their NHL roster, which is not exactly ideal. It’s also interesting that Elliott and Halak have contracts through 2013-14 while Allen is a restricted free agent this summer.

One might see that as a formula for a trade, yet Elliott’s value is low and Armstrong shot down Halak rumors.

Either way, the Blues’ netminding situation looks set to be an interesting scenario to watch, especially in the next week.