After an injury against the Toronto Maple Leafs that looked pretty ugly on the broadcast, the Blues announced today that Philip Broberg will miss 4-6 weeks with a lower body injury.

Good news: The Blues avoided disaster here, as the injury looked much worse initially -- potentially requiring surgery and ending his season. Broberg will not need surgery and will resume his season in December with still 4 months of the season left to go. Bad news: the Blues are getting bit by the injury bug early in the season. They've now lost their best offensive player, Robert Thomas, for at least 6 weeks to a broken ankle, and now are losing their best defensive (and top offensive) player in Philip Broberg to what is more than likely a knee sprain of some sort. Tough break.

Broberg exits second (to Jordan Kyrou) on the Blues in total points with 2 goals, 7 assists, and a +6. It's a huge loss for the Blues from a production standpoint, and will be challenging to weather the storm missing your top two weapons for nearly 2 months. The ultimate goal is to win hockey games, but the secondary goal at play here is the experience and development of the young players like Broberg. This season can still be a success without winning a bunch of games: by watching the young players take a step forward and become key pieces of the future.

Broberg is still only 23 years old and has played a little over one full season's worth of games (93 games) over 4 regular seasons in the NHL. As good as he's been this year, he's barely begun to scratch the surface of his potential. The Blues need him on the ice night after night making plays, making mistakes, and growing as a player.

Fortunately there's still a lot of season left to go, and the Blues just dodged a bullet with Broberg's prognosis. There's a ton of young talent on this team, they just need to stay healthy and continue to play every night and develop. Once Thomas and Broberg return, the Blues can start to turn into the team we all hope they can be.