BLACKHAWKS OPEN TO TRADING JONES

TORONTO, ON — The Chicago Blackhawks entered the 2024-25 campaign with high hopes. They anticipated taking the next steps in their rebuild after adding veteran pieces in the summer to compliment the young crop of talent spread across the roster.

Safe to say, things have not gone according to plan.

Through the first 45 games of this season, the Blackhawks sit last in the NHL with a 14-28-3 record. They rank 29th in the League in goals-against per game and 30th in goals-for per game. Oddly enough, their penalty kill is fourth in the NHL and their powerplay ranks 12th. Take the little wins, right?

Rising superstar and 2023 first-overall pick Connor Bedard has voiced his frustrations with losing on a regular basis. Unfortunately, for him and the fan base, that comes with the territory.

Blackhawks GM Kyle Davidson is not interested in speeding up his club’s rebuild and youngsters like Frank Nazar, Colton Dach and Louis Crevier are starting to gain NHL experience.

With the NHL trade deadline exactly seven weeks away, Davidson is going to be active and has several players on expiring contracts he can move between now and March 7 – forwards Taylor Hall, Ryan Donato, Pat Maroon and Craig Smith, and defenceman Alec Martinez are all candidates to be dealt in the coming weeks.

Hall, 33, acknowledged the likelihood of being dealt when talking to local reporters this week and it seems like he preparing for the inevitable.

With two salary retention slots still available, the Blackhawks will almost certainly retain a good chunk of Hall’s $6 million cap hit as part of a trade.

But would they consider eating a portion of another player’s contract if the right opportunity presented itself?

Soon after the calendar flipped to 2025, we started to hear defenceman Seth Jones’ name floating around the league. Teams are calling, and Chicago’s listening. Kudos to TSN’s Darren Dreger for first reporting on Thursday that teams are poking around on Jones’ availability.

According to separate sources, the Blackhawks are willing to move Jones – under the right circumstances, of course – and would also be open to retaining some of his contract, which comes with a $9.5 million salary cap hit.

Jones, 30, owns a full no-movement clause for the entirety of his contract and would have to sign off on any deal the team tries to complete. While formal talks between the Blackhawks and Jones and his agent Pat Brisson about waiving his NMC and/or providing a list of teams he would accept a deal to have not yet occurred, sources suggest the player would also be open to a change of scenery for the right environment.

For the balance of his contract, Jones will receive a $5 million bonus payment each year through 2029-30, while his actual salary goes from $5.5 million in 2025-26 to $3 million in 2026-27 to $2.5 million in each of the final three years of his deal.

Trade discussions, to this point, are only considered to be exploratory, and it is unclear what type of return the Hawks would be looking for. And it should be noted the Blackhawks have no interest in simply giving him away in order to shed his contract – they have plenty of cap space, and dollars to spend, so any move would require talent coming back the other way. To what extent, we will have to wait and see.

Such a move may be better suited for the summer, if talks progress, but with a fair bit of time before the deadline, it wouldn’t shock anyone if a move is made this season.

HERE AND THERE

• There’s chatter out there that New Jersey and Vancouver have discussed a trade involving J.T. Miller. Devils GM Tom Fitzgerald was on SN The Fan 590 on Thursday and poured cold water on the rumours. “Patrik (Allvin, Canucks GM) and I are really good friends. Quite honestly, we haven’t talked,” he said.

• No, Colorado has no interest in exploring a trade involving Mikko Rantanen. But it is going to cost the Avalanche a higher AAV than Nathan MacKinnon’s to get him signed.

• Tristian Jarry’s out. Who’s next in Pittsburgh? Many wonder how long it will be before the Penguins pull the trigger on a Marcus Pettersson trade. Vancouver and Dallas continue to be linked.

• The Edmonton Oilers remain in the market for a veteran defenceman. Free agent John Klingberg is still a top target.

• Dennis Bernstein suggested Kyle Palmieri as a potential target for Los Angeles on yesterday’s edition of “The Latest.” He has a $5M cap hit, so it would take both retention from the Islanders and possibly another club to make his contract fit for the Kings, but that would be an interesting play for Rob Blake.

• Utah is currently in limbo. They want to see if they can gain any traction ahead of the deadline before deciding if they are buyers or sellers, in the traditional sense. But whether it’s between now and the deadline or this summer, expect Utah to go big-game hunting outside of the rental market in preparation for next season. They’ve got money to burn and an ownership group that wants to spend.

• Seattle may soon accept its fate this season, which could make things interesting ahead of the deadline. Word is Kraken GM Ron Francis, who likes to keep things close to the vest, is willing to take calls on players with term, not just pending UFAs Brandon Tanev and Yanni Gourde.