Why the Chicago Blackhawks should consider trading for Jeff Skinner this offseason

The Sabres and Blackhawks are two teams in two very different places.

The Sabres are on the rise and they have several young players (most notably Bowen Byram, and Zach Benson) that they will need cap space in order to resign in the next few seasons. It seems like they could really use to move out a big money contract like Jeff Skinner's in order to make room for the young and exciting prospects that they have developed.

It also makes sense for the Blackhawks as the team is looking to do the following...

A) Add veteran players to complement the young core.
B) Add a top 6 scoring threat.
C) Reach the salary cap floor.
D) Take on contracts no more than two to three years in length so as not to hinder the future cap space needed to resign Bedard, Korchinski, Nazar, and the rest of our young prospects.

Skinner does carry a "No Movement Clause" in his contract which could make this deal very tricky.

I think that the Sabres would definitely want to move him, but Skinner might be open to a move as well. This is especially true if Davidson can sell him on the prospect of playing with Connor Bedard in a great city like Chicago, and putting up huge numbers. Those numbers may even earn him another handsome pay day when this current deal is done. Therefore, I think it is certainly worth a phone call to see if he is interested.

The Blackhawks are in a great position to make this move due to the overabundance of cap space that they have available to them next season. According to Capfriendly.com, the Blackhawks will have over $33 million of cap space to work with this offseason, so fitting in a 9-million-dollar cap hit for the next three seasons is actually very manageable.

In fact, taking on Skinner's contract will make Kyle Davidson's job easier, as he will not need to struggle to overpay players just to reach the cap floor as he did last offseason. Rather he can look for good players at fair market value that will benefit the team in both the short, and long term.