St. Louis dealing David Perron to Edmonton for Magnus Paajarvi left a few people wondering just what the Blues see in the 2009 first-round pick.
Coach Ken Hitchcock, who had his ups and downs with Perron, says he’s done enough homework on Paajarvi to know what kind of player he’s getting. Norm Sanders of the News-Democrat shares the story.
“I have a lot of people personally that knew Paajarvi, both in Sweden and in Edmonton,” Hitchcock said. “I watched all of his games against teams similar to us. I knew how well he played in the last 20 games. ... I watched that very closely.
“But I wanted to see how he played against San Jose, LA and ourselves. Those were the games I focused on.”
Over those last 20 games, Paajarvi had four goals and five assists while averaging around 15 minutes per game. Compare that with Perron who had one goal and four assists in his final 20 games with St. Louis and you can see why (via small sample size) the Blues may have made the move.
Related: Evolution and analysis: GMs explain Perron-Paajarvi trade