NASHVILLE, Tenn. — For new Blues center Kevin Hayes, maybe it was a stroke of luck.
Hayes had already planned a golf trip to Nashville for this week, unknowingly coinciding with the NHL draft and lining up for him to meet the Blues brass on Wednesday, one day after St. Louis acquired him. On Tuesday, the Blues traded a 2024 sixth-round pick to the Flyers for Hayes, and Philadelphia is retaining half of his $7,142,857 cap hit.
“I didn’t realize it was the same weekend when we planned this weekend,” said Hayes, who has one round scheduled Wednesday and two for Thursday. “You get traded the day before, you get to meet the people that are part of the team. So it’s a win-win.”
When Hayes arrived at the Blues team hotel on Wednesday morning, he was greeted by the Blues contingent that included team president Chris Zimmerman, general manager Doug Armstrong, Keith Tkachuk, and then had a meeting with coach Craig Berube.
Hayes fills a role with the Blues as a middle-six center, an acquisition that deepens a shallow group of centers in St. Louis and sets up a 1-2-3 set of Robert Thomas, Brayden Schenn and Hayes down the middle.
Armstrong said “we think we’ve rounded out our forward group” and re-iterated that landing a center was important for St. Louis.
“This is a natural centerman so it kind of balances out the world,” Armstrong said. “It’s always easier to move centermen to the wing, a lot of teams do that. We were trying to move players that played more on the wing to the center. I think it alleviates some of the pressure on Alexandrov. We really liked the way Dean played last year. It gives him a more natural growth pattern.”
Last year in Philadelphia, Hayes was named an All-Star as he had 18 goals and 36 assists in 81 games. The Blues will be Hayes’ fourth team of his career after playing for the Rangers, Jets and Flyers.
“You never want to get traded out of any job that you’re doing, whether it’s sports or you’re at a desk job,” Hayes said. “You feel like you’re letting someone down. I looked at it as a situation where the Blues wanted me and they see something I can bring to them. You feel like a, failure is probably the wrong word, a little dramatic, but you feel like you let some people down.
“Now I can use that to go to St. Louis and show everyone that I can still play in this league at a high level.”
Hayes’ name first was connected to the Blues on Saturday, when multiple reports linked St. Louis and Philadelphia. Over the weekend, the hold up was Torey Krug exercising his no-trade clause. So the deal was downsized for Tuesday, and the Blues only gave up next year’s sixth-rounder to acquire Hayes.
On the Krug situation, Armstrong was brief, saying only “I don’t respond to rumors.”
Hayes said he expected to get traded: “It’s not hard to figure it out with the way that the Flyers were going.”
“I just feel like we started to go our separate ways throughout the middle of the season,” Hayes said. “They were going in a different direction halfway through the year. Now that I’m on to a new team, I think it’s a new start. Motivated to, I guess you could say, prove those people wrong. I think anyone that gets traded would use that as motivation.”
Hayes said by Wednesday morning, he’d already heard from many of his new teammates, including Krug, Thomas, Schenn, Nick Leddy, Justin Faulk and Pavel Buchnevich, who he played with in New York.
Hayes is also related to Tkachuk and said he’s been in touch with Keith about the city of St. Louis.
“I used to look up to Keith and then Matthew and Brady were looking up to my brother and I when we were first in the NHL,” Hayes said. “Now, I’m kind of finding myself looking up to Matthew and Brady.”
Hayes, 31, will bring size to the Blues lineup, but has also been praised in the past for being a veteran presence in the dressing room. On Wednesday, he touched on the importance of bonding with his teammates, something that the Blues pointed to as a detriment during last year’s subpar season.
“Hockey is very important to me, but (so is) making sure I’m a good teammate and making sure all my teammates feel comfortable within themselves,” Hayes said. “I’m a believer of if you’re happy, you’re going to play better. You don’t see any sad guys on the ice scoring a bunch of goals.”
— Hayes said he works well with shoot-first wingers, which could line up with playing alongside Jordan Kyrou (18.07 shot attempts per 60 minutes at 5 on 5), Jakub Vrana (15.97) or Kasperi Kapanen (12.39).
“I think my whole career, coaches have been telling me to shoot more,” Hayes said. “I’m trying to do it. I think I look to pass, so if I have a shoot-first winger, I think that’s going to help my game.”
— Hayes has worn No. 13 in New York and in Philadelphia. During his brief stint with the Jets, he wore No. 12. Alexey Toropchenko currently wears No. 13 for the Blues, while No. 12 is open.
“I think someone wears 13, but he’s Russian, so maybe I’ll have my (Russian) fiancée talk to him,” Hayes said.
