The St. Louis Blues are returning a bottom-six forward much earlier than expected. Earlier this afternoon, the Blues announced that forward Nathan Walker will rejoin the lineup for St. Louis’ contest tonight against the Chicago Blackhawks.
Walker sustained an upper-body injury against the Anaheim Ducks on December 1st. The team quickly placed him on injured reserve and shared that they expected Walker to miss eight weeks. Returning tonight, Walker will have only missed five weeks.
Much like he has been the last several years, Walker was a cog in the bottom-six of the Blues’ forward core before succumbing to the upper-body ailment. Outside of being a healthy scratch on a few occasions, he was a fairly consistent piece of St. Louis’ forward core, scoring three goals and nine points in 25 games while averaging 12:38 of ice time per game.
Despite the tepid offensive output at first glance, Walker was actually trending toward the highest production of his nine-year career. Had he continued his current pace across 82 games this year, Walker would have finished with approximately 10 goals and 30 points. That’s much more than last season, at least in the assist department, when he scored eight goals and 16 points in 73 games while managing a 12:01 ATOI.
Regardless, the Blues have never counted upon Walker for his offensive prowess. He’s been one of the most physical forwards on the team for the past three years, giving out 471 hits in his previous 143 contests, averaging out to 3.29 hits per game.