And the winner of the Ilya Kovalchuk prize is...

Yep. Home of Jaques Lemaire and the worlds most AWESOME SYSTEM OF HOCKEY EVER, the trap.

Hey, Kovy, call Gaborik and ask him how that worked for him when he was in Minny. Sad to see him go, but you know what? I find this absolutely hysterical and pretty damn ironic. Kovy's been given free reign here. He'll be on a leash up there, and if he doesn't do well on it, it's the doghouse.

Details on our side over on the Blueland Blog.

Also included in the trade was Anssi Salmela, and coming to the Thrashers are Johnny Oduya, Patrice Cormier, Niclas Bergfors, and a first round pick. You might recognize Cormier from such things as this:

Oh, awesome.

Anyway, Oduya is, presumably, insurance if our UFA Kubina requests a trade during the season, which he probably will now. So much for our outstanding D pairing of Enstrom/Kubina, though maybe that'll mean that Bogosian and Enstrom'll be back together. Oduya's contract's good through 2011-2012, so we got a solid 2nd pairing D for a rental who is going to just die in Jersey's system.

That's the only positive spin I can put on this). Actually, no, I lied. Bergfors is 5th in rookie scoring this year and is Jersey's top prospect. We now have the 5th and 9th leading rookie scorers on the squad. Factor in Bogosian, Little, and the prospects we have in Chicago, and it looks really good. Kovy's frankly silly for not wanting to be part of this.

I'm not really upset at Waddell, though, because it was Kovalchuk who held out for this long when he obviously didn't want to be here. He stretched the truth to the fans, and may have damaged the short term prospects of the Thrashers. Don't let the door hit you in the butt on your way out.

Here's the 411 from the Don himself:

Oh, and I'll be posting a link tomorrow after I write my article for Crash the Crease - John Davidson admitted that he was sniffing around Kovy. I'm kind of proud of the Blues for being a mystery team. Well done!