Hudler reportedly got, what $5 million (tax free) per year in Russia? Can’t see him coming close to touching that in an NHL courtroom.

I’m sure the NHL doesn’t want to back down and risk a precedent for players/the KHL to use with restricted free agnets, but you’d think all parties could work out some something for this specfic case like Detoit maintains his NHL rights but loans Hudler to the KHL.

Detroit could bring him back in 2 years (under this summer’s arbitration salary) when maybe they’re better positioned and some of their forwards (Holmstrom, Draper, etc) could be gone to allow for more playing time and salary space.

1) Regardless there seems to be a significant change in the way the KHL and NHL are handling each other’s assets. Is the ‘Cold War’ we saw quite a bit last spring/summer defrosting a tad? First the NHL refused to allow a player with a valid KHL contract to play here(Kwiatkowski ). Now the KHL might defer to the NHL arbiter whether Hudler can play over there.
2) Last year Medvedev was blustering that the KHL would take any player who wanted to come over there regardless of their contract status and the NHL rarely cared whether or not a player was under contract with a non signer of a transfer agreement.

I’ve had to amend this post slightly as there’s a provision in arbitration that forbids teams from dealing players immediately after accepting a ruling.

Is that a new provision? My memory’s a bit shaky, but I thought Brian Burke traded Vitaly Vishnevski immediately after arbitration.

Remember all the Danny Markov hype two years ago?

I wonder what kind of interest he’s getting now. Didn’t he sign a two-year contract the year he left, with the second-year having an out/option if he signed in the NHL?

Wings beat writer Ansar Khan says that they CAN trade Huds after arbitration:

Contrary to what I wrote earlier, if the Red Wings accept the arbitrator’s decision regarding Jiri Hudler’s salary, they still have the option of trading him. The NHL said there are "no restrictions.’’

In that case, it makes no sense for the Wings to walk away from the decision and lose his rights and get nothing for him. They surely would accept the decision and, if it’s more than they want to pay, they can move him for a player and/or draft picks, assuming there’s a taker.

So it appears Hudler will remain in the NHL, one way or another, and will not get that two-year, $10 million mega deal from Dynamo. His curious decision to file for arbitration could end up costing him millions.

But all of this still remains to be seen. Who knows if there will be another unexpected twist in the situation.

Hudler’s North American agent, Petr Svoboda, hasn’t been returning calls the last few weeks.

It should be said that the Wings are allowed to trade Hudler, not that they CAN trade Hudler. He’s said that he wants to either play for the Wings or in the KHL, so he’s pretty much made himself untradeable.

Hudler shorted playing time.
Hudler was shorted playing time Evidently Babcock thinks Hudler is too small. I think if he was treated fairly, the money Detroit offered would have been enough.

Except that…he has been treated fairly, but maybe not in his own eyes. He hasn’t produced with second-line minutes. He’s not physical or good enough defensively to be on a third line. So what’s the best spot? On the fourth line where he doesn’t have to worry much about defensive responsibilities while getting prime PP time to maximize his skill set.

I don’t want the Wings to invest long-term dollars in Jiri. I want that money to be available because there may be better options available and more flexibility down the line, rather than have $3 per year tied up in a PP specialist.

I’m pretty sure I saw it in a couple of places where he said that he only wanted to play for Detroit.

http://blog.mlive.com/snapshots/2009/07/red_wings_gm_ken_holland_confi_1.html

From Malik’s post, he notes:

He also provided a translation of part of the iDnes report:

“In Detroit … I didn’t want to go to another club. So I didn’t ask for a trade,” Hudler was quoted as saying. "Then came Dynamo with their offer. I started thinking about it and decided to go to Russia.

Unfortunately, the article that Malik references isn’t online anymore.

i was really hoping that the wings will sign hudler, i think he is good two way player, sure he has some size issues but he can really shoot the puck good…I really thought that hudler would be moving up a line this coming year, i thought he would play him with zetterberg… hudler put up carreer numbers last year and I believe he would have topped that playing with hank on the second line in detroit….but like someone said up the page, hudler is in it for the money at this point…we should let him go to russia, use his money to sign Mike Grier, more size, more grit, and he can score too