Let me start off this post by stating that I am not calling for Antti Niemi to take starts away from Cristobal Huet. I’ve let it be known that I’m not a big fan of Cristo’s, but I know he is the best goalie on the Blackhawks’ depth-chart. Niemi still has a long way to go. Yet, there will be those writers in the media and in the blog-o-sphere that will feed the meatheads their steak and potatoes by saying otherwise. A couple days both parties will forget all about the Fin.

Anyway, a busy off-season awaits Stan Bowman next summer. Contracts will be moved due to the organizations successful attempt to lock up the Big Three. Even a few remaining restricted free agents will have to go in order to create enough cap-space for next season’s payroll. Two players Bowman would be a fool to trade are Niklas Hjalmarsson and Niemi. Hjalmarsson gets enough love being an everyday player, but Niemi’s value to the team is only brought up when he wins a big game or when Huet struggles.

Niemi is 5-1-1 on the season with two shutouts. Granted seven games is a small sample size, but Niemi has the best goals-against average in the league (1.71) and fourth best save percentage (.931). The best part about those numbers is that they are this good when he is sitting on the bench for weeks between starts. In his role, Niemi has been as asset. Quenneville has alluded to idea that Niemi has earned more consistent playing time, but with Huet playing well this season he’ll be hard pressed to do give the Fin more opportunities to start. I still expect him to get around twenty-five starts on the season.

There is a lot that can happen between now and the end of the 2011-12 season when Huet’s contract is up, but in Niemi the Blackhawks found a solid backup going forward and possible goalie of the future – Corey Crawford is pretty much out of the picture these days. Niemi can be compared to some of the better backups around the league – Ty Conklin for example – minus the track record. Bowman could re-sign Niemi this off-season for two or three years with a slight raise to around $1.2M per-year.