| | ST. LOUIS -- All of a sudden, the St. Louis Blues are thin on the blueline.
| |  | | | MacInnis |
Al MacInnis, last season's Norris Trophy winner, has a non-displaced fracture of the left fibula -- the outside bone on his ankle. He is expected to miss 4-6 weeks but won't need surgery.
In addition, Ricard Persson is out with a strain of the medial collateral ligament in his left knee. He will be re-evaluated on Monday and is out indefinitely.
"I'm pretty disappointed," MacInnis told The St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "You work hard all summer to get in shape for the season, and now this. For this to happen, it's the worst thing, but I guess it's better that it happened four games into the season than with four games left in the season."
MacInnis sustained the fracture the first period of Saturday's 4-2 win over the Edmonton Oilers.
"It was a shot from the point," MacInnis said. "It was coming in pretty good, but I've gotten hit by a lot harder shots. I lifted my skate off the ice to block it, but it just happened to hit me on the worst spot -- right on the outside of the ankle. It was painful."
The injuries to MacInnis and Persson leave the Blues with six healthy defensemen: Chris Pronger, Marc Bergevin, Jeff Finley, Chris McAlpine, Rudy Poeschek and newcomer Todd Reirden.
Poeschek and Reirden have yet to play this season, but likely will see action when the Blues face Central Division rival Detroit on Wednesday (7 p.m. ET, ESPN).
MacInnis, who has long been known for his 100-mile per hour slap shot, had his best all-around season in '98-99. His 20 goals, 62 points and plus-33 were enough to earn him his first Norris Trophy as the league's top defenseman.
MacInnis has played 1,146 NHL games, scoring 292 goals and 775 assists. | |
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