Not many readers need to be convinced that the performance of a team’s best players goes much of the way to determining that team’s success or failure. For anyone wondering, last season’s Blues are instructive.



The dramatic midseason turnaround of the Blues’ top line, the worst in the NHL in mid-December, is a fascinating element in their fantastic 2018-19 redemption arc. A lot changed along the way, including the head coach and starting goalie. Against that backdrop, the shifting performance of the stable first line was as big a factor.



When The Athletic’s Tyler Dellow, now an executive with New Jersey, wrote about NHL top lines in December 2018, he found that Pittsburgh’s first line was the class of the league, outscoring the opposition by two goals per hour. At the other end, St. Louis’s top line was the only top unit getting blown out of the water by more than a full goal per hour.



From the moment Dellow wrote...