Blackhawks Submit Qualifying Offers
According to Scott Powers at The Athletic – Chicago, the Blackhawks have tendered qualifying offers to restricted free agents defensemen Erik Gustafsson and Ville Pokka and forward Tomas Jurco.
Which means Michael Latta and Kenton Helgesen and defenseman Nolan Valleau will be cut loose.
UPDATE: the Blackhawks will reportedly let Dennis Rasmussen walk as well.
Jurco was protected in the expansion draft, so the qualifying offer there should come as no surprise.
Glad they decide to make offer to Gustafsson and Rasmussen ..and i think Pokka will be in a trade soon
Hope the Hawks give a chance to play to Gust …
Agreed 2010.
Gus is my player to watch this season, assuming he sees the ice.
Agreed very excited to see Gus hopefully at some point this year.
Pokka trade chip or ahl body.
I like moose and hopefully Jurco is healthy.
The other 3 no surprise there.
Anton Forsberg is also a RFA. Why the Blackhawks haven’t tendered him a qualifying offer?
Forsberg received a QO from Columbus, which is how they exposed him in the expansion draft.
re: Gustafsson – an intriguing player. But the Hawks have depth for him to work through during camp if he’s going to get on the NHL roster. Keith, Seabrook, Murphy, Kempny, Rutta, Forsling, Rozsival all ahead of him on the depth chart.
Thanks TAB !
Good point Tab only thing might help him is waiver exempt again.
Tab,
Seabs, Murphy, Rutta and Rosy are all righties. I know players play their off-side from time to time but in these cases (save Rutta b/c I haven’t seen him play) I think it’s safe to say the depth that Gus is up against is: Kempny and Forsling. Forsling is waiver eligible where Gus now wouldn’t be (correct me if wrong). Likely is we carry 8 for a while if we can afford it (cap wise). Another reality is that we somehow manage acquiring another LHD but for now the competition isn’t so stiff that he wouldn’t see at least a handful of games.
Tab….i cant beleive Rozival is still ahead of Gust …probably the slowest dman on the planet ….i really think he can play this year for the Hawks …and what about Pokka ??
Somobody knows about Rutta ??
Think Gustafson has a lot of potential. But you gotta let him play, make mistakes, and progress instead of a couple games here or there.
I still can’t fathom how you get on the Q good list when you are old, slow, dumb, undisciplined and or make a lot of mistakes…see replays of rosival versteeg etc
or on the Q bad list when you have world class skills: leddy can’t play for Q but has some of the best wheels in the nhl and is worth 30M$ on the open market. boy could we have used leddy the last two years.
TT has great skills but was completely mind screwed by Q’s yo yo games with him.
vermette was a seasoned veteran with awesome face off abilities, but Q treated him like an AHL rookie when he DIDN’T DRESS HIM AND TT for game 3 in chicago after they won the first game in TB in ’15 cup final for him.
we were totally outplayed in game 1 for 54 minutes, but V and TT pulled a rabbit win out of their hats in the last 6 minutes. some thanks they got from Q when he wouldn’t dress TT and his best face off man vermette in game 3 at home. of course we lost that game. once Q got them both back in the lineup, we went on to win the cup….
for all the good Q has done the hawks, I am forever grateful but facts are facts: he has squandered some incredible talent that the bowmans have provided and his manner is not great for bringing along rookies and new players to the team. I well remember when toews, kane, keith and seabs were rookies and Q had to let them play and didn’t guillotine them for every error (and there were plenty of errors early on).
Q needs to return to tolerating some errors in order to let these young players mature: forsling is a great example. he has every tool except size and in the current nhl that isn’t as important as it used to be. let him develop. encourage him and let’s see if we don’t have the next variation of duncan keith or hammer coming into his own for the blackhawks. confidence is critical in every vocation and Q isn’t exactly great at developing that in his newer younger players.
I would rather try that than play as we did this season, a good regular season team that is absolutely not built or coached properly for the playoffs.
no one has gone into the paint consistently for the last two cup series: anisimov did it once for kane this year for one of our 3 goals in 4 games. that is not only on the players. it is on the coaches: how did we forget what won in ’10 buff, ’13 bicks and ’15 shaw and committee all in the paint all the time, getting blo0dy dirty and scoring the hard goals that win cups?
that is probably why Q had his staff shaken up for him against his wishes. I hope it works but if things don’t go smoothly soon, look for DG to take the reins and hopefully get back to what won cups.
Does the Jurco signing mean the other 3 are officially gone now or how does that work?
James no it doesn’t actually giving them a qualifying offer usually means they will be atttempted to be signed.