Recapping Chicago Blackhawks GM Kyle Davidson's media availability ahead of the NHL Draft

Free Agency

When the Blackhawks finalized their trade for Ilya Mikheyev and Sam Lafferty, it addressed a need in the bottom six for more depth throughout the lineup. However, it does not entirely fix their offensive issues.

This free agency looks as though it will have a fair amount of talented forwards who would all help to improve the scoring on the Blackhawks roster. Names like Jake Geuntzel have been thrown around as being linked to Chicago, but it does not look like the team is going to spend that kind of money this early into the rebuild.

It makes sense to not go for the biggest name on the market right now and wait until the team is closer to a contention window, or at least until the young players like Bedard have signed their next contract. But, the team does need top-six talent on the roster to help out those young players.

Davidson alluded to the Blackhawks likely not being big spenders this summer and to not expect a big addition up front. If there are no moves made to upgrade the top-six, it will be a head scratcher for the fans.

The team does need help up front and there will be players available who the Blackhawks could sign to a reasonable contract to be that added scoring presence. Also, given the recent health of Taylor Hall and Andreas Athanasiou, there are reasons to be wary of what could happen if either of them misses time again.

While it is still early in the rebuild, the Blackhawks do need some help around the young players and it will be interesting to see if there are more moves made this summer. The expectations should not be significant, as alluded to by Davidson, but the door is not completely shut on the possibility of adding to the roster in free agency.