Chicago Trims Their Roster

The Chicago Blackhawks have released their roster and there are a few surprises. The biggest surprises list as Cam Barker being the big player sent down to the minors, while Nikolai Khabibulin remains with the team. Your guess is as good as mine as to how long this lasts for.

Khabibulin was not going to report to Chicago practice until his situation was rectified, so does this mean just that?

In other moves, Aaron Johnson and Antti Niemi were also sent down to the minors, while Kevyn Adams was released from his tryout contract and Joakim Lindstrom has been claimed on waivers by Anaheim.

Forwards	Defense	Goaltenders
Patrick Kane	Brian Campbell	Cristobel Huet
Patrick Sharp	Duncan Keith	Nikolai Khabibulin
Jonathan Toews	Dustin Byfuglien
Andrew Ladd	Brent Seabrook
Martin Havlat	James Wisniewski
David Bolland	Brent Sopel
Craig Adams	Jordan Hendry
Adam Burish	Matt Walker
Jack Skille	Niklas Hjalmarsson
Kris Versteeg
Ben Eager
Colin Fraser

Now, I keep Dustin Byfuglien listed as a defenseman, just because some players like himself or Jassen Cullimore do the flip roles. For all intensive purposes in my pools, Byfuglien is a defenseman.

Amazingly, the moves that were made today has brought the Blackhawks cap hit down below the ceiling at $55.5 million. An impressive feat to say the least, especially since Khabibulin is still in the line-up.

With no Barker in the line-up, the blueline may have some new names to bring to the forefront, but don't jump on them quite yet. You don't want to get burned by a lack of experience with these players.