Rozner: Vermette makes sense for Blackhawks

We've barely flipped the calendar and the NHL trade deadline is still eight weeks away, but the first shot has already been fired as teams reach the midway point of the season and start to look for upgrades.

Pittsburgh was first in with the acquisition of winger David Perron from Edmonton, in exchange for a 2015 first-rounder and winger Rob Klinkhammer.

Said Penguins GM Jim Rutherford, "When you look at deadline deals, there's not many of those deals that impact the playoffs. You don't have a lot of time to get a guy to your team and get accustomed to your team.

"I like to make a deal in January. I think you have a better chance of that player having an impact on your playoffs if you get him sooner than later."

This would apply to any team, including the Blackhawks, who are always shopping for ways to improve, which isn't easy when you're already among the best teams in the NHL, don't have many holes and have precious little cap space.

Still, Coyotes center Antoine Vermette makes a lot of sense as insurance up the middle and as a No. 2 center if Brad Richards falters in the playoffs, as he did a year ago after a good regular season.

Richards, the 2004 Conn Smythe Trophy winner, doesn't compare favorably to the No. 2s on major challengers in the West, including the Stanley Cup champion Kings, who dispatched the Hawks and then made Richards invisible in the Final as he was dropped to the fourth line by the Rangers.

Richards was also scratched for Games 4 and 5 of the Boston series the previous season by pal John Tortorella, so even though Richards is piling up points while playing on a line with Patrick Kane - and scored a huge, game-tying goal Sunday night - it would only be prudent if GM Stan Bowman had thoughts about finding help in the middle before the postseason.

The 32-year-old Vermette will be unrestricted after the season and he will be dealt in the next two months, but the sooner he's moved the more the Coyotes can ask in return. The Hawks have a stockpile of young players who can't crack the lineup, and Arizona would have to be looking at Chicago as a prime trade partner.

The Hawks are hardly alone in their interest in a scoring center who can win faceoffs, kill penalties and play defense, with St. Louis, Boston, Detroit and Montreal just a few of the many teams probably in on the bidding.

And with very little salary room to maneuver, the Hawks might have to send someone off the NHL roster back to Glendale if they acquired Vermette ($3.75 million cap hit), along with a couple of prospects.

Dustin Byfuglien's name has also been floated, and he would look good in a Hawks sweater in any number of roles. But he has another year left with a huge cap hit ($5.2 million), and Winnipeg probably doesn't want to deal him to a team they might face in a divisional playoff series - if they intend to deal him at all, which seems unlikely as of now.

Of course, he also doesn't solve the eternal question of the Hawks' No. 2 center in the postseason.

As always, the good news for the Hawks is they're near the top of the NHL through 39 games and they've had only one really good stretch of hockey to this point.

After getting lit up by Joel Quenneville following an ugly and irresponsible loss in Detroit on Nov. 14, they went 13-2, playing suffocating team defense and getting great goaltending from all three men in the net.

Since then, they've gone 4-2-1 and played some sloppy hockey, with Corey Crawford struggling to find the same game he was playing before his off-ice injury.

Crawford, however, is not a concern, and it's worth remembering that the Hawks were a bounce away from repeating as champs last June, so desperation is never something trade partners can use against the Hawks.

The Hawks also have tremendous chemistry and they're loath to mess with it, so they will tread lightly even when it comes to parting with their supporting cast.

But you have to give up something good to get something good, and the Hawks are starting to ask the tough questions now.

The answer is never simple.

brozner@dailyherald.com

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