The Blackhawks Have Made Their First Trade Of The Offseason, Getting A Big Russian From The Canucks

Kyle Davidson taking a flier and doing the Canucks a favor with this one. 

This trade checks virtually every single box for what Davidson is reportedly after

--Fast

--Short term deal

--Good size 

--Recoups a 2nd round pick in exchange for paying Mikheyev's $4.75M AAV. 

That's good business in my opinion. 

As far as how he will help on the ice...well...very much tbd. Mikheyev had a very nice '21-22 season. 21 goals in 53 game during the covid truncated year. Goes to Vancouver as a free agent and tears his ACL 

Played virtually a full season in 23-24 where he managed to not to score a goal over his final 61 games. Read that again. 61 straight games without a goal. That is virtually impossible. Seeing that many zeros in a game log is jarring. Sounds like he is hockey's club trillion. Also sounds like he is due for a correction in 2024-25. He only shot 7.5% so there's probably a little puck luck involved there too. If there's no offense to speak of, he can still forecheck and kill penalties with his reach and his feet. 

This trade makes the Blackhawks better than they were last year. Hopefully Davidson gets a player who helps and an asset from Vancouver which is the same playbook he used to get Jason Dickinson. Mikheyev has to waive his no-trade clause to make this happen apparently. It's 7:44AM in Russia right now so he probably just looked at his phone. I have a hard time imagining him turning down an opportunity to get genuine minutes. We'll see though.