I watched the 2nd period yesterday. Complete waste of time. I spent the 3rd catching up on Yellowstone and that new Star Wars show.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Some assistant GM reading the bored.

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Elections have consequences.

Just need Billy Donovan to get launched so all the head coaches and managers in Chicago will have one year or less of tenure.

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the rationale is there for the move...no idea if things got real bumpy between GM kyle and coach luke in regards to certain issues (bedard, lines, good progress with young D-men, veteran D-men playing way below expectations). all involved, including danny wirtz, need to take a longer look in the mirror. seems to be doing well with blackhawk alumni, getting rick ball...but, i believe this t.v. nonsense doesn't do him and his club any favors.

no one here was really excited about kyle's FA signings. he found himself in an enviable situation of having to spend wirtz money just to get to the cap floor. was hoping for reinhart and pesce as the top 2 OFF/DEF signings and not sure if bertuzzi or teuvo was the #1 OFF signing and not sure if martinez or brodie was the #1 DEF signing. as it turned out so far, roster-fillers in smith and maroon have been the most positive in terms of production and play. i did like the broissoit signing, he hasn't played a single minute.

kyle's draft: was also hoping for demidov. willing to give levshunov a chance. no demidov, ok...eiserman was available...hmmm, no eiserman. eiserman at BU, currently leading goal scorer amongst all NCAA rookies with 9 goals. hoping for bosivert (5 goals for north dakota) to come through.

teuvo does most things relatively well, just not working out, so far. bertuzzi...has been a flop. lot$ of money for really nothing. no role for him on any line - maybe the 4th line and PP duty. getting paid too much for 4th line status. supposedly a PP ace, hasn't shown us anything. can see why the wings, then boston, then toronto all gave up on him. the positive is that he's been on his best behavior and not taking dumb penalties, which had plagued him.

all in all, not much there. coach luke was getting paid to make it work.

the good news is that kyle will be right back at it next FA season, as he might get close to $20 million to play with - UFAs leaving and an increase in the cap. if he brings the same lack of quality, that would probably be too much to recover from in the short term - would push back the rebuild and he could be joining coach luke filling out forms and standing in line.

Kyle gives off Rick Hahn vibes.

We all knew Maroon is a boat anchor...

not sure about the interim coach and if this club is capable of the new coach bounce, the positive bounce the bruins and the blues have exhibited.

not going to spend time on how coach luke and crew set up their preferred systems and if they were optimal for all the players' skill-sets. one thing noticed and shown on recent video analysis about bedard, is that the club often 'attempted' to play man to man (bedard as Forward 1, seemed to dangle/pressure the puck at the points/quick double-team on the wall for a potential rush), all others man to man) as it's main d-zone coverage system. the one take-away here is that you need quick-fast D-men to pressure the puck/cover space to deny return passes. on that analysis, bedard as a C, wouldn't get enough rush opportunities as he would as a winger.

we just saw evidence that the blackhawks possess 3 of the slowest D-men (murphy - top pairing right now??, brodie, martinez) in all of hockey - out of nearly 190 other nhl defensemen. these slow players will burn you almost every time - regardless of system. zone defense that could mask the lack of speed doesn't appeal to anyone because it's very low pressure and very structured. a player chases the puck -no rotation, the system breaks down.

my feeling is that bedard's struggles had more to do with letting coach luke go than any tactical faults.

vlasic, good. kaiser, good. allen, unproven..fairly good skater. jones? athletic, low hockey iq. murphy isn't worth half his salary and brodie and martinez, shackled by age and lack of speed. i never thought much of del mastro's skating ability, speedy korchinski will play here again and i wouldn't mind seeing phillips. levshunov is 2 years away. the D corps will be good in 2 years.

right now, did he take a peek at his roster? he's got some prime 3rd pair d-men. 3 are 3rd pair guys. right now, allen is a 2nd pair, on a good day.

I'm not taking handedness into account here, but I want to see Vlasic paired with the fastest young defenseman they have. And Soderblom is going to have to play enough now to be exposed to waivers if they send him down, so play him every other game between now and the trade deadline and see what you really have and which goalie of the three you want to move.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

right now vlasic is paired with murphy....who is the slowest D-man in all of the nhl. from a forward-looking view - doesn't make sense to me, you're trying to decouple from players like murphy. murphy gets a promotion because the other under-performer D got injured?

some of the blackhawks FWD 'closest' prospects are on the smallish (nazar, lardis, oliver moore) side. other FWD prospects, production-wise: so far, hayes (2 goals, 4 points in 19 games) and ludwinski (zero goals in 14 games, 1 assist as a FWD) have disappointed. can't say i'm all in on the FWD prospects. slaggert will be 23 next summer...do or die for him the next year of his professional career.

the D prospects (rinzel and levshunov, maybe del mastro) are better and the depth (add crevier and phillips - both contracts expire after this season) is really good.

Would think the thinking is pair a youngster with a veteran who can cover when the youngster is out of position, etc. Vlasic does seem to make, in my opinion, some ill-advised pinches and sometimes gets lost watching the puck instead of picking up his guy.

That being said, Murphy completely sucks. So does Jones. Martinez. Brodie.

I'd rather let the two young players get the experience together until Jones comes back. At that point, ok move Kaiser to the second pairing.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

yeah, i don't argue. we both agree that murphy is bad and won't be around when the club will be a legit playoff team. so, why play murphy with vlasic? why increase murphy's minutes? too complicated to increase vlasic's, kaiser's and allen's minutes? they are the future, not murphy.

i wonder how the club categorizes each defender, what their strengths & weaknesses are and go from there. can see vlasic being many things: rushing d-man, mobile d-man? gets stronger and improves positional playing and reads, a shut-down (may take away from his offensive abilities) d-man. definitely see kaiser as mobile d-man. each has good top speed and/or good acceleration. maybe some improvement on puck handling and passing and each of them could easily be paired with a more defensive minded d-man. a crevier or a del mastro?

at this time, i see murphy as a stay at home d-man. that category is probably the most generic and demands the least amount of skill at D. at $4.4 million per year for a stay at home defenseman, not a bargain at all. i'd say that the club appears to have an abundance of 2-way D types, which is the best of all worlds. no quinn hughes types, no QB-type for 5x5/PP.

bleacher nation's bamford was just on nhl network radio, didn't tell us much....can't really bedazzle neutrals with optimism about this prospect getting an assist in college or that prospect ringing the post in the ohl. did mention that the club has been up or down by 1 goal in the 3rd period of most games - which is totally on point about coach luke's firing. heard GM kyle lament all the icings. yeah. you cringe. hurts even more when you know we'll probably lose the ensuing face-off in our own zone. right. why did that guy ice the puck? the d-zone system gave him no move the puck options? maybe he has zero composure? why can't we do better at the face-off dot to mitigate the icing?

line-ups out for the game this afternoon vs. winnipeg. we get hellebuyck. crevier out for the 2nd consecutive game after the hideous columbus goal. i don't want him banished into exile, but unless the hawks can pull a trouba-like trade and get rid of murphy and/or jones, i guess we'll see d-men like crevier/phillips less often. when jones comes back, does that mean allen will sit out? this line-up has bedard at wing with kurashev (c) and teuvo. we'll see.

They need to make 2 big splashes in the off season and make a solid pick in the 1st round.

We are at a point with Bedard where we can not wait 10 years for this plan to develop.

Mrazek out with a lower body injury... Are they going to have to expose another young goalie to waivers?

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

Only Soberblom is subject to waivers, they’ll probably call up Commeso who’s not.

I liked the pace of play today. D was involved in the play and the forwards seemed to press better. They are a horrible passing team. Murphy, Brodie and not sure who else it was, couldn’t complete a 5 foot pass. Brutal for guys who have been in the league that long.

that's the scary part. some of the top FA talent will be resigned by their clubs (marner & tavares both UFAs with toronto. i believe the leafs will let tavares walk and use that money for marner). whatever is left? do you trust the GM to make quality signings? he'll have lots of money again for a 2nd bite of the apple. one more miss and i do believe it will hurt the club...backslide on this rebuild.

I don't know the hockey waiver rules, how many games can Commeso play before he becomes subject to waivers?

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

Not sure, either.

I would assume after his 1st contract is up and it is spelled out in his next one?

goalies under age 25 when signed get 60 nhl games for waiver exemption - at 0 career nhl games, commesso has 60 nhl games to play before he'll have to clear waivers - if he'll ever get waived in the future. soderblom also had the 60 games - he's had 58 career games, 2 left.

if a player signs a two-way contract, believe that player is waiver exempt.

skaters (non-goalies) signed before the age of 21, get 160 nhl games, before losing waiver exemption. examples: bedard/korchinski/kaiser. skaters signed after the age of 21 get less games, age 22, less games. etc. examples: guttman (60 games), slaggert (80 games).

i think i have a good understanding of it, i'm not at nhl GM level. makes sense, otherwise clubs could stockpile and bury talent.

I honestly think we are at capacity with talent in the minors. Maybe 1 more draft and you are at the brim, but I feel like there are there.

Kyle's clock started ticking when he fired Richardson.

yeah, down on the farms, some players contracts are expiring (some will be RFAs and others UFAs) and others need a new contract or club will lose their rights and they can sign with anyone.

luypen (rockford) and sarela (finnish club) could be RFAs, while AA, seney, guttman and sanford will be UFAs. D-men phillips and crevier will both be RFAs. there will be some spots opening up at rockford.

other players in junior/foreign clubs/college and will have blackhawks rights expire on jun 1 of 2025. D harding, FWDs: oscarson, marcel, pharand, james and stjernborg.

commesso and korchinski called up. korchinski with 84 nhl games remaining before he ever has to clear waivers.

listened to a hawk podcast this am and they each thought phillips would get the call up - due to martinez injury. how so? he'd have to clear waivers, if sent down again. next time he's brought up, it's likely for good or he'll be gone..

surprised that the rockford club WASN'T playing the same system(s) that coach luke was. sorenson's forecheck is a 2-1-2, coach luke played a 1-2-2. didn't matter much...when you don't control the puck and can't dump it in to forecheck..

geez, just heard the carolina club's affiliate in rosemont, purposely plays the same systems the parent club plays.

the other news is that joey anderson and his $800k (this year and next) was sent down and we'll see if he's claimed. tried hard, just not good enough. poor attacking player. the video i watched on bedard's struggles showed anderson's shortcomings in his last ever game, vs. the flyers. anderson, under no pressure and on his forehand, couldn't corral a loose puck outside the hawk zone and failed to get the puck to a streaking bedard on the RW. bedard had to circle back and when anderson was able to control the puck, he gave the puck away to philly. the video people made anderson look pretty bad. we already knew.

He's not the only one who can't pass on that team...

....yeah, and we're going with all of them until the bitter end. no one wanted anderson and the club will not call up nazar. ok.

some stuff that will light embers of excitement. need to see more to grow the fire. thought much of the D had a fairly good game. sloppy goal against on the PP.

i have nothing personal against hall, but, i'd rather see guys like bertuzzi/teuvo/mikheyev play well and get points. hall will be gone after this season, the others will be with us for awhile. still not out of the realm of possibility that hall will get enough points to interest someone at the trade deadline. hawks can easily pick up half his salary until the end of the season. make it happen, hall. did it all night, great passes from hall and deservedly got a goal after going fearlessly to the net.

was worried that soderblom would fold up in this game. not the case, solid. what a turn around from last year. mrazek ($4,250,000 per), brossoit ($3,300,000 per) and commesso ($925,000 per) under contract until 2026. commesso's is an entry level deal, will we good to see him play here and there and gauge if he has an nhl future. no way the hawks pay 3 goalies on an nhl roster, with soderblom's ($962,500) waiver status. mrazek may be dangled and they may take anything for him. soderblom playing himself into a $2,500,000-$3,000,000 range as a RFA.