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The Chicago Blackhawks helped shake the hockey world on Friday night. The Blackhawks traded Taylor Hall to the Carolina Hurricanes as part of the three-team Mikko Rantanen trade. Reactions are still coming in even days following the blockbuster trade. One consistent reaction is bewilderment at Chicago's role in this move. In fact, the Blackhawks received rather low grades for their involvement.
The Blackhawks received a third-round pick originally owned by them on Friday. They did not retain any of Hall's $6 million salary for the 2024-25 campaign. But they did retain half of Rantanen's $9.25 million salary. It's a head-scratching return for Chicago. As a matter of fact, the Colorado Avalanche's announcement of the move simply mentions that Chicago facilitated the deal and nothing else.
General manager Kyle Davidson has heard all of the criticism. However, he is not upset with his team's involvement in one of the biggest midseason trades in NHL history. He took time on Monday to clear up what he perceived to be confusion about Chicago's aims when trading Hall.
“I think there’s a little bit of confusion on what our role was in it. For us we were happy to get the asset that we got back. In moving Taylor, I think it was something that was probably going to happen at some point. We were not going to use our two retained salary transactions on being involved in this one and then maybe another one with Taylor later on. And so, it was one or the other. We either going to be involved in this or we weren’t,” the Blackhawks general manager said, via team reporter Charlie Roumeliotis.
Blackhawks' Kyle Davidson reveals evaluation of Taylor Hall trade market
The Blackhawks' general manager continued discussing the Taylor Hall trade on Monday. He acknowledged that his team could have waited closer to the deadline in order to potentially maximize their return. However, Davidson believes he may not have received more than the third-round pick he got on Friday. In the end, it wasn't worth the potential risks that come with waiting the market out.
“In waiting you run the risk of things like injury, the role was diminishing almost by the game, and it just wasn’t heading towards a way that was going to maximize or enhance value, and so in moving then, we moved at full price and held on the other player involved. It just didn’t make sense to wait and not really get a better return later on,” the Blackhawks general manager said, via Roumeliotis.
As mentioned, the Blackhawks still have a retention slot available. This allows them to retain salary once more this season. Perhaps we see them make another major move before the March 7th NHL Trade Deadline. In any event, Chicago is a team to keep an eye on as trade activity begins to pick up.
