Philly Seeking Nabokov's Rights, Chicago Gets Ladd's Qualifying Offer In On Time

 

~ The Philadelphia Flyers do not currently have a No. 1 goaltender and weren't able to draft one over the weekend (not that anybody they would have selected on Friday or Saturday would have filled the spot right away, anyway.) However, after the draft was completed, General Manager Paul Holmgren reportedly struck a tentative deal with San Jose Sharks GM Doug Wilson for the negotiation rights to goaltender Evgeni Nabokov. The deal hinges on the Flyers' ability to reach an agreement with Nabokov before free agency on July 1. If that is done, then Philly will fork over a seventh round draft pick to San Jose in 2011.

The likelihood of this trade actually going through are slim, however. TSN has reported that Nabokov informed the Flyers that he would like to test the market. And according to CSNPhilly, Wilson even mentioned that complications do exist for the Flyers to actually complete a deal with Nabokov, which the site speculated could include the 35-year old's entire career having been spent on the West Coast. But neither genral manager involved here elaborated on the issue all that much.

The Flyers are familiar with the process of trading for negotiation rights and sometimes it works out for them, i.e., Kimmo Timonen and Scott Hartnell. But other times it does not, such as what just went down with Dan Hamhuis. And while the team does stand a strong chance at getting Nabokov, the fact that he only needs to wait four days to find out his value over the entire market (and maybe even the KHL) doesn't make it look good on the Flyers' end to get this thing done before noon on Thursday.

~ Former Chicago Blackhawks and current Florida Panthers general manager Dale Tallon is not so great with tendering qualifying offers in time to restricted free agents. Stan Bowman isn't so bad, though. On Sunday, he beat the Monday deadline for Andrew Ladd's qualifying offer at a price of $1.65 million.

Ladd will likely want more in a new contract that than and he should have no problem doing so if he chooses to seek salary arbitration. The 24-year old former Carolina Hurricanes first round pick scored a career-high 17 goals last season and added 21 assists for 38 points. He added three goals and three assists in 19 playoff games en route to a Stanley Cup Championship with Chicago.