As expected, The Blackhawks announced today that Nick Leddy will be joining the team for tonight's game in Ottawa. As I mentioned the other day, I'm not sure I really agree with this, for a number of reasons. First of all, who will he play with? Quenneville is not breaking up Keith and Seabrook, or Soupie and Hammer. So, your remaining choices to flank Leddy are Dick Boynton, Jordan Hendry and Big Show Scott. I can't say I trust ANY of those three clowns to tutor the young Jedi. Boynton is brainless, Hendry is still green himself, and Big Show isn't anything more than a hired pair of fists. At least when Cullisnore was out there, you had one guy you could rely on to play solid positionally. I would have been semi-comfortable with Leddy taking his cues from Cullisnore. They are really hanging a lot of responsibility on Leddy's head because if he screws up, like most 19 year olds do, there is no one to really cover his butt. As much as I like Jordan Hendry, he isn't an established NHL defenseman, and won't be able to consistently watch #8's back.
Lets be realistic now, anyone that thinks Nick Leddy will show up and magically change the flim/flam attitude of this team, they have been huffing too many exhaust fumes. The only thing this will bring on is disarray on the back end. For roughly 35 games, this team has played with the same 7 1/2 defensemen, and now one that has played 36 out of 42 games is vacationing in Rock-beria and the new one has a total of 5 NHL games experience under his belt. If Leddy was moistening the boxers of the team management, he wouldn't have been playing for Rock-beria or the World Juniors in the first place, and remember, he was a -7 with the Ice Hogs before he shipped off to the WJC's.
The last concern is his contract. Once he plays his tenth NHL game, he's considered a rookie and his contract goes into effect. If they don't plan on sticking with him, is this worth burning up his rookie year to play on with 3 average-to-bad players, and get his lumps handed to him? I guess that's why we're not NHL GM's. I hope he lights the world on fire and never looks back, but common sense has a strange way of showing up in times like these.