In what could be explained as a "curious move", Dale Tallon sent the Hawks a free conditional 7th round draft pick in either of the next two seasons for the rights to negotiate with Tomas Kopecky for three additional days, because as of 11 cst on the 1st, he is an unrestricted free agent.
In SOMEONE'S mind, he is some kind of hot property. Now, that may be in some alternate universe, and someone may want to explain to Tallon that Hossa is no longer still attached to Kopecky at the hip, because Good Ol Dale is throwing "solids" our way, left and right. Getting the band back together, right Dale?
The curious case of Tomas Kopecky started 2 years ago, and ended much like Troy Brouwer's story did, Friday. One can only speculate that when Hossa met with Tallon to negotiate his contract, he opened up with, "So, I have this annoying sidekick that is like a much more annoying kid brother, but comes cheap." and Tallon was sold. Kopecky never had a "place", other than fluffing Hossa's pillows and signing for his room service. He was shuffled up and down the lineup, but Quenneville finally cried uncle and paired him up with Hossa, just to shut him up. In the end he was relegated to the fourth line, and that pretty much cemented his fate here.
He has that annoying quality that will get under the Hawks skin, when they DO see him, and the Hawks were NOT going to pay $2 million a year to a guy that has no real definite place in the lineup. If this doesn't pan out for Dale, the ownership in Florida is going to catch on to this ruse he's throwing at them. I guess we'll see in the next three days, but it's starting to seem like a fire sale mutiny in South Florida.