If you're still looking for things to be thankful for this week, you can be thankful you're not as dumb as Ken Campbell.  For those of you who don't know, Ken Campbell is a senior writer for The Hockey News and THN.com.  So the idiotic ideas he pitches below aren't the ramblings of some bored local writer who's tired of analyzing Jay Cutler's body language.  This guy has the entire NHL to write about, and yet he saw fit to express this opinion on the Blackhawk's goaltending/salary cap situation anyway.  From the November 24th edition of Campbell's Cuts:

Antti Niemi has played six games for the Chicago Blackhawks this season and has two shutouts in four wins, including stopping 30 Vancouver Canucks shots Sunday night for a 1-0 victory.

This is all true.

If the Blackhawks are looking to free up cap space, they should be considering a very, very difficult move. As well as Cristobal Huet has played lately, they could bury his $5.625 million cap hit in the minors and replace him with either Joe Fallon or Corey Crawford, who are putting up very respectable numbers for a weak Rockford IceHogs team in the American League.

WHAT?!?  Did the senior writer for the Hockey News just suggest that it would be a good idea to send the goaltender with the 4th best GAA in the NHL to the MINORS?  And calling up Fallon or Crawford as the backup?  Fallon's only playing because high draft pick Crawford has been terrible.  I don't even know how you'd decide between which to bring up.  I guess Crawford, because if he's not playing in the AHL, he might as well soak up some valuable experience by sitting on an NHL bench.

It would leave the Blackhawks with an inexperienced No. 1 goalie and an unproven backup, but they don’t have the luxury of being selective here, either in the long or short term. Huet’s career pattern is that he runs hot and cold and there’s no guarantee he won’t implode in the playoffs the way he has before.

They don't have the luxury of being selective?  What the hell?  The Hawks are hotter than shit right now.  At the time this was written the Hawks had won 7 in row, with 6 of the wins going to Huet.  3 of the wins were against Calgary, Colorado and San Jose, who were all in the top 5 in the Western Conference.  As for Huet's "career pattern", that sounds like the career pattern of just about every NHL goaltender, ever.  Most have good runs and bad runs.  The guys who are consistently awesome every night are Hall of Famers, the guys who are consistently cold are run out of the league or acquired by the Toronto Maple Leafs. 

And the Hawks DO have the luxury of being selective.  The only reason I can see to send Huet down is if you're going to trade for a player who is an upgrade (because the suggestion that Niemi/Crawford/Fallon are going to backstop a team to the Cup is fucking ridiculous) and you can't move Huet in the deal.  Right now, there aren't a lot of guys who would provide an upgrade over Huet, and even fewer of them are available.  If you think you can pull off a deal for a better goalie, that's one thing.  But Huet is playing so well right now that he'd be a good trading chip.  And if the Hawks send Huet to the minors, he's never coming back to the team.  I believe the guys at the Fifth Feather have pointed out previously that any attempt to recall Huet from the AHL would require him to be put through re-entry waivers.  This would mean that any other NHL team could claim Huet and the Hawks would be responsible for paying half of Cristobal's contract.

As for playoff implosions, Huet's played in two entire playoff series in his career and had pretty good numbers in both.  Last season he played in 2 full playoff games and was terrible in the first (after an extremely long layoff) and outstanding in the second.

It would be an awful thing to do to a veteran you signed to a long-term deal and it might turn off other unrestricted free agents from coming to Chicago, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

What exactly makes these "desperate times" for the Blackhawks?  They are in first place in their division, and second overall in the West and have beaten 5 of the top teams in the Conference in the last 3 weeks.  The only reason the Hawks would need to clear cap space is to finalize the extensions with Toews, Kane and Keith.  Is that really such a desperate situation at this point?  And even if it was, there are plenty of other guys on the roster with big cap hits who are better candidates for salary dump trades or being sent to the minors simply to clear cap space.  I'd imagine the Hawks would want to make moves with Byfuglien, Sopel or Barker before they'd consider sending the only viable starting goaltender in the entire organization to the minor leagues to clear cap space.

Except for a couple of notable exceptions, teams have not used that loophole in the collective bargaining agreement to their advantage and they should do it while they have the opportunity because there’s a good chance it will be closed next time around.

Good call.  The Blackhawks should send Huet to the AHL, because they may never get the chance to do it again!  There's a very good reason that teams don't use this "loophole" to their advantage very often - it's the fucking nuclear option.  A team doesn't send a big money guy to the minors unless every possible option has been exhausted.  I can't imagine a GM who wants to do it.  A move like that basically destroys a player for the organization.  The player isn't going to go down and get his head right, as it's unlikely the team can ever recall him.  And what General Manager wants to walk into the owners office and say: "remember that guy we gave $5+million to a couple of years ago?  Well, we fucked up and we'd like you to pay him that money to play in the minor leagues."

Anyway, on this Black Friday, I'd like to wish everyone a belated Thanksgiving, and give a special thanks to Ken Campbell for providing me with one of the easiest pieces I've ever written.