The St. Louis Blues made it publicly known that they were looking into adding an enforcer after losing Ryan Reaves in a trade with the Pittsburgh Penguins. They wasted little time filling that hole, signing Chris Thorburn to a two-year, $1.8 million deal shortly after the free agency period officially opened.
Thorburn spent the last six seasons skating with the Winnipeg Jets and had three goals and one assist to go along with 95 penalty minutes in 64 games. He had no issue dropping his gloves last year, picking up a total of 13 fighting major penalties in the regular season.
GM Doug Armstrong previously mentioned that he’s aware teams are moving away from the enforcer role, but he wasn’t ready to go “cold turkey” after trading Reaves. It’s worth noting Reaves had far more offensive upside versus Thorburn, but it’s clear the Blues are looking for Thorburn to focus more on the physical side of the game.
For fun, here’s a look back to 2014 when Reaves and Thorburn had a pretty memorable fight.
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