from Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet,

Check out Chicago’s 23-skater salary structure. Two players above $10M. Six above $5M. Twelve — more than half the team — underneath $1M. (Barring a miscount, that’s the most active guys below seven figures in the league right now.) Is that where we’re going, especially as the NHL gets younger?

“Very possible,” one GM said. Marko Dano and Ville Pokka, both close to ready, are under $1M for next season, too. In addition to drafting and developing well, what’s really helped the Blackhawks is how they’ve won or kept the rights to highly-recruited college (Kyle Baun, Michael Paliotta) and European (Artemi Panarin) free agents, despite their success. Other teams try to “negative recruit,” telling these players they won’t get into the lineup. The Blackhawks convince them it will be no problem. Weeks after deciding not to test free agency and signing with Chicago, Paliotta went to Columbus in the trade that brought Patrick Kane and Panarin’s centreman, Artem Anisimov.

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