Player Notes in the Draft (Oct 6)

Lots of players on waivers and being demoted on Monday, as we approach the Tuesday afternoon deadline for rosters, but it is an illness strike for Calgary's John Gaudreau, which gets a note in the blog this morning.  Gaudreau has been granted the day off from practice on Monday, with the full expectation that he'll be ready to go for Wednesday night's opener, home to the Canucks.

This shouldn't be a concern for Wilton, as it appears that Gaudreau has done more than enough to make the Flames roster and it would have to take a pretty poor showing in the first few games for him to be sent down, by my estimation.

It took until the Noon hour in Calgary for the pool's second cut down to the minors, as Teemu Pulkkinen was sent down to the AHL by the Detroit Red Wings, in a series of cuts that needed to be made.  The 22-year old is a 4th round pick of the Wings back in 2010 and he appeared in three games for the Wings last season, while they were in the middle of their injury-plagued year.  Pulkkinen was well behind in the depth chart to start camp and obviously didn't push enough to move anyone out ahead of him.

Of the two Red Wings that Benson has picked in the draft this year, neither of them will be starting the season with the big club, as he owns both Pulkkinen and Pavel Datsyuk, who starts the year on the IR.  Benson now has the least amount of games projected for Week One, now sitting at 25.

An updated list of injuries can be found here.