Blackhawks sign Kopecky

by James Mirtle on Jul 1, 2009 1:32 PM CDT in Free Agency Comment 5 comments

Chicago's raided another Red Wings forward in signing away Slovak depth player Tomas Kopecky on a two-year contract.

Kopecky, 27, didn't play many minutes in Detroit, but will likely get a chance to contribute more with the Blackhawks. I'm guessing Scotty Bowman played a role in this signing as he'd be very familiar with this player.

	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	GTG	SOG	PCT
2008 - Tomas Kopecky	79	6	13	19	-7	46	1	1	2	0	110	5.5

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If you can’t beat ’em….Sign ’em!

Pensburgh.com -- it's like the Max Talbot of blogs*

*not just because we only work for 12 minutes a night

by Hooks Orpik on Jul 1, 2009 1:38 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Divide and conquer?

by Habs on Jul 1, 2009 1:40 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Kopecky and Hossa are good friends. I wonder if Hossa was even more reluctant to sign with Detroit once it was clear that Holland wasn’t going to offer Kopecky a contract?

It wouldn’t be the first time that players chose where they were going based on friendships.

"A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with." -- Tennessee Williams

by Baroque on Jul 1, 2009 2:09 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Good point Baroque…I remember Hossa talking about training in Slovakia with Kopecky who was already urging him to join Detroit last summer. He had his other reasons, but there’s a lot of factors and that was probably one factor in both decisions.

Pensburgh.com -- it's like the Max Talbot of blogs*

*not just because we only work for 12 minutes a night

by Hooks Orpik on Jul 1, 2009 2:38 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

For a while at least, when he first came to Detroit, Hossa was even staying in Kopecky’s house.

If that was the case, and he wasn’t going to sign in Detroit unless his friend did too, then Holland would have been crazy to take up two roster spots to make one player happy. I wish him luck (except against Detroit). :-)

I hope the lifetime contract is all he wanted it to be.

"A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with." -- Tennessee Williams

by Baroque on Jul 1, 2009 4:13 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs