Archive for July, 2010

Three Blackhawks at US World Juniors developement camp

July 30th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Three Blackhawks’ prospects – Jeremy Morin, Kevin Hayes and Stephen Johns – were invited to Team USA’s development camp that began today in Lake Placid, New York. The camp will encompass practice sessions, inter-squad scrimmages and scrimmages against the Swedish and Finnish squads. There were a total of 42 players invited to the development camp, and the roster will be cut down prior to the first international scrimmage against Sweden on August 3rd. USA Hockey also has a World Juniors blog up so fans can follow the happenings from home. The camp runs through August 7th.

Morin was on the USA Junior national team last year. This is the first time for Hayes and Johns at the Team USA development camp. Nick Leddy was supposed to attend the camp as well, but was pulled after he signed a professional deal with the Hawks earlier this week. Not too sure why, but he is at the Blackhawks Convention this weekend.

Meanwhile, north of the boarder…

Dylan Olsen in the Blackhawks lone prospect invited to Team Canada’s development camp next week. Competition for a roster spot will be stiff this year. Three defensemen from the 2010 squad are returning – Jared Cowen, Calvin de Haan and Ryan Ellis. Olsen – along with Shawn Lalonde – was one of the last players cut from last year’s silver medal squad.

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Blackhawks on hold as they wait for Niemi’s number

July 29th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Antti Niemi and his agent Bill Zito met with the Blackhawks in Toronto to plead their respective cases in front of an arbitrator because they were unable to come to an agreement before yesterday’s hearing. A ruling is expected to be made on Saturday. From what I’ve been reading Niemi’s camp has their hearts set on a number above a $3 million cap hit. Knowing the Blackhawks’ cap situation, it becomes hard to believe all the rhetoric that Zito fed the media regarding his client’s desire to play for Chicago next season.

In Stan Bowman’s conference call earlier in the evening, he said:

“Depending on where it comes in, it’s going to dictate what we have to do. We’re going to try to make it work, but it’s hard – we’re kind of playing a guessing game and I don’t want to speculate because I don’t know where it’s going to be.

“There are numbers that we have in mind which would make it more easy to fit him in versus really difficult to fit him in. We’re just going to have to wait and see.”

The impartial arbitrator will have to either pick the number the Blackhawks submitted, the number Niemi’s camp submitted or choose a salary somewhere in between. If the arbitrator sides in favor of the 26-year-old goaltender, it will likely force Bowman and company to move on. The Blackhawks will have 48 hours to sign Niemi, trade him or walk, thus making him an unrestricted free agent.

Anything above a $2.5 million cap hit could be detrimental to the Blackhawks ability to field a roster of twenty skaters and two goaltenders. It wouldn’t surprise me if Bowman had deals already in place if Niemi’s price tag is too high. There have been rumors floating around that Bowman has already talked to Jose Theodore and Marty Turco, and that suitors have called regarding Niemi’s availability. In one last-ditch-effort to keep their goaltender around, the Blackhawks could move Tomas Kopecky and his $1.2 million cap hit.

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Leddy leaves Golden Gophers, and signs entry-level deal

July 27th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Leddy as a Golden Gopher

Nick Leddy, former defenseman of the Minnesota Golden Gophers, signed a three-year deal worth $2,700,000 $4,200,000 with the Blackhawks this afternoon. The exact details of the contract have yet to be released, but Leddy will be on the books with a cap hit of $900,000 $1,400,000 each year. Once he signed the dotted line his collegiate career over, but he still has junior level (CHL) eligibility. Leddy is leaving the University of Minnesota after one year in the program. He had 3 goals and 8 assists in 30 matches in 2009-10. Leddy did suffer a broken jaw that kept him sidelined for nine games.

There were murmurs that Leddy was in talks with Stan Bowman and company regarding an entry-level deal. I chalked it up to nothing more than message board gossip, and quickly forget about the rumor. It made little sense to me then. He wasn’t all that impressive in his freshman year as a Golden Gopher. The Minnesota Wild’s opinion of their 2009 first round (16 overall) draft pick soured as a result, and the Blackhawks were able to acquire Leddy in the Cam Barker for Kim Johnsson deal.

The Blackhawks came to a different conclusion then the Wild. The problem wasn’t Leddy. It was the Gophers’ hockey program. According to Gopher Puck Live, the reason for Leddy’s lack of production last season was because the 2009-10 squad was “one of the worst goal-scoring Gopher teams in history.” Under Don Lucia the once rich hockey program regressed. They haven’t been to the post-season in two seasons.

It sounds as though the Blackhawks are saving the top prospect from a bad situation by signing Nick Leddy to an entry-level deal, and Bowman can justify because of his performance at prospect camp. I liked what I saw from Leddy at the camp, but don’t think he needs to be rushed to the AHL at this point. The 19-year-old Leddy could use more seasoning elsewhere, and add more bulk to his 5’11” 179lbs. frame.

A few things that must be said about the signing of Nick Leddy is that 1) this doesn’t mean Brian Campbell will be traded, 2) he won’t be in competition for a roster spot out of training camp, and 3) he’s still eligible to play in the CHL. So get those dirty little thoughts out of your mind.

IceHogs ink Palmer and Leblanc

The Rockford IceHogs signed Joe Palmer and Peter Lablanc to AHL/ECHL contracts. Palmer and Leblanc were in attendance at the Blackhawks’ prospect camp earlier in this month, but were rather unimpressive. Because they signed deals with the IceHogs they’re technically not in the Blackhawks’ system any longer, thus they are stricken from the ‘In the Organization’ page.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Silvertips trade Byron Froese to the Rebels

July 26th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Byron Froese, the Blackhawks fourth round (119 overall) selection of the 2009 draft, was traded by the Everett Silvertips (WHL) to the Red Deer Rebels (WHL). He was traded with a third round pick in 2012 for center/right winger Landon Ferraro – a prospect in the Red Wings system. In 70 games with the Silvertips, Froese scored 29 goals with 32 assists in his second season with the club. He was at the Blackhawks’ prospect camp earlier this month, and he looked good out there on the ice – good skater, big body and a hard shot.

Toronto Rookie Tournament

The Blackhawks will send a full squad of prospects to London, Ontario to participate in this season Maple Leafs Rookie Tournament in September. The Senators, Penguins and Maple Leafs, of course, will also field teams. Top prospects Kyle Beach, Shawn Lalonde and Jeremy Morin are already slated to play, but a complete roster is expected to be announced sometime down the road.

Good thing I have a ton of family in the London area, and one of them will have the hono(u)r of hosting me for the weekend of the tournament. If that doesn’t happen, hopefully it will be televised on the NHL Network.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Bryan Bickell inks three-year deal

July 23rd, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Stan Bowman can cross another item off his to-do list by re-signing forward Bryan Bickell to a three-year deal worth $1,625,000. He is slated to make $500,000 in 2010-11, $525,000 in 2011-12 and $600,000 in 2012-13, which is a cap hit of $541,666. It’s a small raise compared to the $500,000 Bickell earned last season, but he’s guaranteed a spot on the Blackhawks’ roster because of his price tag. I thought he was going to get $550,000 per year. Every penny counts.

Bickell could have a Ladd-like role down the road, but should begin the season on the fourth line. In fourteen regular season games Hawks last year, Bickell had three goals with one assist. He also skated in four post-season matches.

Next, Bowman and company have Jordan Hendry and Antti Niemi to take care of. Hendry will get a deal done with the same cap hit he had last season ($625,000), which should be possible because the Hawks didn’t tender him a qualifying offer making him an unrestricted free agent on July 1.

With Niemi, on the other hand, it’s difficult to foresee what will happen. Bowman is making the extra effort to re-sign his goaltender by signing guys like Bickell to minimum deals, and trading away inexpensive pieces such as Marty Reasoner. Anything over a cap hit of $2,500,000 could force the Blackhawks to walk, or trade Tomas Kopecky ($1,200,000).

Two more signed

The Hawks signed restricted free agent Nathan Davis and free agent forward Hugh Jessiman to one-year deals worth $500,000. Both will spend the 2010-11 season with Rockford where they are to earn significantly less (Davis – $75,000; Jessiman – $105,000) in the AHL as they have two-way deals. Jessiman was selected 12th overall in the 2003 entry draft, and has yet to play a game in the NHL.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Bowman clears more cap space by trading Marty Reasoner

July 22nd, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

In an effort to free up enough cap space to re-sign restricted free agent Antti Niemi, Stan Bowman traded Marty Reasoner and his $1,150,000 cap hit to the Panthers. In return, the Hawks received 29-year-old journeyman, Jeff Taffe ($550,000 cap hit). Bowman’s latest move is nothing more than a salary dump. Taffe should play most of the season with Rockford, and he may make a rare appearance with the Blackhawks on a bottom line if needed.

Today’s trade is a tell-tale sign that Bowman is going to re-sign Niemi. Hopefully they can come to terms before the scheduled arbitration hearing on July 29. As it stands right now, the Blackhawks have sixteen players locked-up with $138,410 cap space.

Cristobal Huet’s ($5,625,000) cap hit will come off the books before the season starts, but the organization will have his contract count against them till they can send it to Rockford. The collective bargaining agreement allows any team to go over the cap ceiling by 10%, and the Hawks will use that space to re-sign Jordan Hendry and Bryan Bickell on top of Niemi.

The 2010-11 Blackhawks’ cap ceiling ($59,400,000) plus the 10% summer cushion ($5,940,000) equals to a summer ceiling of $65,340,000. So the Blackhawks have $6,013,410 cap space with the summer cushion. As I mentioned above, Bowman will use this space until he needs to have his roster legal by opening night. When you take out Huet’s cap hit from the equation, the Blackhawks actually have $5,763,410 to work with.

Hawks re-sign Evan Brophey

The Blackhawks re-signed 23-year-old center Evan Brophey to a one-year deal worth $500,000. He played 79 games in Rockford last season with 14 goals and 17 assists. Going into the off-season there is no way I would have thought Brophey would crack the Blackhawks roster out of training camp, but a cap friendly hit might have an effect on where he plays come fall.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Blackhawk roster taking shape: Forwards

July 20th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

Last week the Hawks made a few minor moves that will have some affect their roster this fall. Jack Skille, a restricted free agent and former first round draft pick (7th overall in 2006), re-signed to a one-year deal worth $600,000. I feel like a broken record writing this, but Skille should have every chance in the world to leave training camp with the Blackhawks. His cheap price tag guarantees that. Skille will have a Versteeg-like role on the third line, but is bigger (6’1” 215).

The other transaction was the signing of Russian forward Igor Makarov to a two-year entry-level contract worth $1,105,000 (a $552,000 cap hit). Makarov made an impression at prospect camp two years ago, but hasn’t backed that performance up in two seasons in the KHL. He split the 2009-10 season between St. Petersburg SKA and Moscow Dynamo, and in 51 games between the two clubs, Makarov had five goals and four assists with 61 penalty-minutes. The 22-year-old Russian will compete for a spot on the Blackhawks’ roster as a bottom-six forward at training camp, but he’ll likely land in Rockford come October.

If Skille and Makarov don’t get you excited, maybe Bryan Bickell will. There have been whispers that Bickell (RFA) is close to signing a multi-year contract with the Hawks. It’s a matter of when. The Blackhawks will re-sign him to a cap-friendly deal at $550,000 – a slight raise from last year. Once Bickell is inked, the Hawks will have twelve starting forwards locked-up.

Brouwer – Toews – Kane
Sharp – Bolland – Hossa
Stalberg – Reasoner – Skille
Bickell – Dowell – Kopecky

Update: Recently acquired Marty Reasoner was traded to Florida for Jeff Taffe.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Doug Wilson is a very very bad man!

July 13th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

The decision was made yesterday to match San Jose’s four-year $14 million offer sheet to Niklas Hjalmarsson. That will be a $3.5 million cap hit. I still think it’s a little much for the 23-year old Swede, but the Blackhawks do have a couple over valued contracts on the books that overshadow this one. If you do compare it to other deals signed by free agent defensemen this summer, Hjalmarsson’s contract doesn’t look so bad.

As expected, the Hawks are in a tough spot (again) in regards to the salary cap. With fifteen players under contract next season, the organization has only $113,410 (source: cap geek) to spend on five to seven more players to fill out the roster. Teams do have the luxury to go up to 10% over the cap ceiling in the off-season. Antti Niemi’s arbitration hearing is July 29, and it appears as though the Hawks will need to use the extra space this summer until Cristobal Huet’s contract is removed from the mix. If that were done today, the Blackhawks would have $5,738,410 salary-cap space to work with.

Signing Hjalmarsson to an offer sheet, and forcing Bowman’s hand was a tactic that is Machiavellian in nature. The Blackhawks’ cap issues are well known around the league, and San Jose general manager Doug Wilson did all he could to screw the reigning Stanley Cup Champions the best he could within the parameters of the collective bargaining agreement. It’s an evil, yet brilliant strategy. Wilson was able to set Hjalmarsson’s price tag, and now Bowman and company will find it hard to keep Niemi around as a result.

If the Blackhawks opted not to match San Jose’s offer, the Sharks would have added a solid, smart and young defenseman to their roster for relatively little. It was a win-win situation for Wilson.

Coaching staff set

The void left by John Torchetti was filled yesterday by Mike Kitchen, and Mike Haviland signed a contract extension to remain with the Blackhawks as an assistant coach. Kitchen was on Joel Quenneville’s coaching staff when he was in St. Louis years ago.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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Notes from the final day of prospect camp

July 13th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

I’ll start off with just a couple general observations from the final day of prospect camp. The overall level of play was better on Monday compared to the first day of camp. Every player from the 2010 draft class was in attendance. One day one they looked at little green as a whole (minus Kevin Hayes), and three days later that wasn’t the case. There were no drills to start each session this time around, just two 60-minute scrimmages. Now for a few notes from prospect

- Story of the day from prospect camp was the absence of Norwegian forward Mathis Olimb, and early reports are stating that he’ll be out four months with an injured shoulder. He (5’10” 176) and Kyle Beach (6’3” 202) went at it twice over the weekend. This really is nothing new when it comes to Beach. I don’t think I’ll ever understand why two players would square off at prospect camp. It wasn’t Beach’s only scuffle at camp either, which should raise a few eyebrows. Anyways, he was nearly invisible on the ice surface Monday, and I doubt Olimb will wear a Blackhawks jersey in 2010-11.

- Justin Holl and Nick Mattson were paired together again on the final day of camp, and both were more aggressive on both ends of the ice compared to the day one. Holl was beat a few times on the back check. He could use some work on the whole skating backwards thing, and it wouldn’t hurt if he increased his cheeseburger intake (6’2” 170).

- On both days of camp I never really noticed much of Jeremy Morin, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. On day one he did pick Marcus Kruger’s pocket in the neutral zone and scored off of it, but aside from that he doesn’t appear to have much flash to his game.

- There were quite a few prospects within the Blackhawks system whose play improved from day one of camp, and the guy I want to single out is Joakim Nordstrom. He was barely noticeable on Friday, but on Monday he was all over the place. Nordstrom would go in hard to battle of the puck against the boards, move the puck up ice well, can back check and appears to have all the tools.

- Of the two prospects that came to Chicago in the Versteeg trade with the Leafs, Philippe Paradis was the better of the two at the camp. Paradis is bigger, more athletic and a better skater than Chris DiDomenico. There was nothing about DiDomenico that impressed me in either session I went to. He looked lost out there.

- It seemed unfair to have Shawn Lalonde, Nick Leddy, Ryan Stanton and Joe Lavin on the same team in scrimmage. As a group they were tight defensively. Goaltender and non-roster invite Calvin Heeter barely saw any action with these guys in front of him all afternoon. Kevin Hayes managed to score a goal in the last minute of scrimmage.

On day one, Leddy couldn’t have impressed me less, but on the last day of camp he stood out as the best defender on the ice. He scored his team’s first goal top-shelf from just above the key. The chemistry between him and Lalonde was undeniable. Still, Leddy is a few years away from making a realistic run at a NHL roster spot.

- Second round pick (58th overall) in 2010, Kent Simpson let in five goals in 30 minutes of action in his team’s scrimmage. Mac Carruth came in for the second half of scrimmage, which would have happened no matter how well Simpson played in net. Carruth let in one goal in his half against the same opposing team on Monday. I was disappointed with Simpson’s performance in either camp session I was at.

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Clock ticking on Hjalmarsson

July 12th, 2010 by Leigh Michael Dengis

This pic always cracks me up

Doug Wilson, Sharks general manager and Blackhawks legend, made an already difficult situation harder for Stan Bowman when he signed Niklas Hjalmarsson to an offer sheet. They signed the 23-year old Sweded a four-year deal worth $14 million – a cap hit of $3.5 million per season. If Bowman’s balls weren’t already in a vice, they are now. As of today, the Hawks have four more days to match the offer sheet before Hjalmarsson becomes Sharks’ property.

If the Blackhawks decide not to match they will be compensated with San Jose’s first and third round draft picks in 2011. Since the lockout five years ago, there were only a total of five offer sheets signed before Friday. Only the Oilers offer to Dustin Penner in 2007 wasn’t matched.

No matter how you look at it, the situation Doug Wilson put the Blackhawks in isn’t good. With roughly $3.6 million cap space to work with and 14 players singed, the organization might be forced to choose between Antti Niemi and Niklas Hjalmarsson as to which restricted free agent to re-sign. (Semi-random note: Niemi’s arbitration hearing is scheduled for July 29.)

It’s hard to say what direction the Hawks will go, as they are currently at a crossroads. Personally, I think what the Sharks are offering is a little steep for Hjalmarsson. But if he’s gone by the end of the week, the Blackhawks blue line is going to look mighty thin. There isn’t much out there in the way of desirable free agent defensemen, and the Blackhawks won’t want to tap into their system to fill out three spots on defense. Hjalmarsson was a great complament to Brian Campbell, and was important on the penalty kill.

I went down to Johnny’s Icehouse on Friday for the first day of prospect camp, and was lucky enough have a seat in the section next to management and scouting. By the time I learned of the offer sheet, the section cleared out. Instead of watching the second group’s scrimmage, the Blackhawks’ brass must have entered the war-room as their focus was on the Hjalmarsson situation. Bowman is expected to address the offer sheet today at prospect camp.

Hawks bring back veteran defenseman

Jassen Cullimore, who was an unrestricted free agent, was brought back into the fold when he signed a one-year deal worth $500,000. The deal was struck before the news of Hjalmarsson’s offer sheet from the Sharks, so I’m a little surprised the Blackhawks re-signed the 37-year old defenseman. He won’t make his way off the IceHogs roster next season. Cullimore played 59 games with Rockford last year, and scored two goals with six assists.

Changes have been reflected on our In the Organization page above.

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