{"id":442779,"date":"2024-07-01T11:49:37","date_gmt":"2024-07-01T15:49:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=442779"},"modified":"2024-07-01T11:49:37","modified_gmt":"2024-07-01T15:49:37","slug":"blues-kasperi-kapanen-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2024\/07\/01\/blues-kasperi-kapanen-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"Former First-Round Pick Rejoins Midwest Team"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The St. Louis Blues have re-signed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/kapanka01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-07-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kasperi Kapanen<\/a> to a new contract. The former first-round pick returns to the Blues on a deal for one year and $1 million.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Kasperi Kapanen&#39;s new deal in STL is one year, $1M<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FriedgeHNIC\/status\/1807798746635211258?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 1, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3>Kasperi Kapanen Contract Signed by Blues<\/h3>\n<p>Kapenan was drafted by the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2024\/06\/29\/kevin-hayes-trade-to-pittsburgh-penguins\/\" target=\"_self\">Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a> in the first-round of the 2012 NHL Entry Draft. Kapenan was traded to the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2024\/07\/01\/toronto-maple-leafs-re-sign-young-goaltender\/\" target=\"_self\">Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> in a 2015 blockbuster trade. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/kesseph01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-07-01_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Phil Kessel<\/a> went to Pittsburgh in the trade.<\/p>\n<p>Aside from a 20-goal season in 2018-19 that earned him a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2019\/06\/28\/toronto-maple-leafs-re-sign-kasperi-kapanen\/\" target=\"_self\">new contract<\/a>, The Finnish forward failed to play up to his first-round status with five seasons with the Maple Leafs.<\/p>\n<p>Kapenan was <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2020\/08\/25\/toronto-maple-leafs-trade-kasperi-kapanen\/\" target=\"_self\">traded back to Pittsburgh<\/a> in August of 2020. Kapenan&#8217;s failure to produce continued. The most Kapenan scored in a season with the Penguins was 11 goals. However, accomplished this feat twice in 2021 and in 2021-22.<\/p>\n<p>The Penguins would place Kapenan on waivers in February of 2023. The <a  href=\"https:\/\/thehockeynews.com\/news\/blues-claim-kasperi-kapanen-off-waivers-from-penguins\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">St. Louis Blues<\/a>, a team in the middle of a retool would claim Kapenan.<\/p>\n<p>Eight goals in 23 games with the Blues was a step in the right direction for Kapenan. However, he would only score six goals in seventy-three games the following season before free agency.<\/p>\n<h3>What the Kasperi Kapanen Contract Means<\/h3>\n<p>Kapenan has not played to the level of a first-round pick. While he may not reach that level, he has shown flashes of being a productive player. He can be an asset to the Blues once again. The team that could use some depth scoring.<\/p>\n<p>St Louis seems to be in a no-man&#8217;s land between contender and a rebuilding team. Kapanen is a low-risk and low-cost option for Blues General Manager Doug Armstrong. Kapanen can still provide some use to this club. However, more scoring is needed out of him to make this deal a true bargain.<\/p>\n<p><em>Main photo by: Jeff Le-USA TODAY Sports<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The St. Louis Blues have re-signed Kasperi Kapanen to a new contract. The former first-round pick returns to the Blues on a deal for one year and $1 million. Kasperi Kapanen&#39;s new deal in STL is one year, $1M &mdash; Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) July 1, 2024 Kasperi Kapanen Contract Signed by Blues Kapenan was drafted [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3464,"featured_media":444372,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[34,4547,4548,32],"tags":[2220,662,5801],"class_list":["post-442779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-hockey","category-nhl","category-blues","tag-kasperi-kapanen","tag-nhl-free-agency","tag-st-louis-blues-news"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3464"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442779\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}