This whole Kovalchuk thing is getting ugly. A few weeks ago I reported on here that Kovalchuk had signed with New Jersey only for that report that I had taken to be close to fact, to turn out to be nonsense. Kovalchuk was still pimping himself out to Los Angeles as well as New Jersey to see which city on either side of the country would give him the best deal. Either that or he was just taking his time to see whether the water was warmer in the Atlantic or over in the Pacific.

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So after live blogging throughout the 1 July on the NHL free agency in what turned out to be a very busy day but also in the hope of breaking live where one of the biggest names in NHL free-agency history, Ilya Kovalchuk ended up we had to wait five full days for the Russian to make up his mind. Lucky I wasn’t patient enough to live blog until then for I’d be out of a job by now if I did sit waiting. According to reports yesterday the Russian sniper second only to Alexander Ovechkin in goals since the lockout signed a seven-year, $60 million contract with the New Jersey Devils were he finished last season after a trade deadline deal from Atlanta on 4 February 2010.

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The NHL free agency window opens today – 1 July 2010 – and everyone out of contract is not eligible to sign wherever they like. For that reason it’s likely to be one of the busiest days in the NHL calendar. Follow live updates from myself and various other NHL big hitting analysts and jouros on Twitter, right here.

With new ownership on board, a new coach hired and a new prospect drafted, there was only one more thing for the Montreal Canadiens to do this off season: Change the entire shape of the team. With ten players as Unrestricted Free-Agents on Wednesday afternoon they decided to ignore the chance to re-sign any of them and went in a completely different direction. Gone are the likes of Kovalev, Tanguay and captain Saku Koivu and in are the small, speedy scoring types of Brian Gionta, Mike Cammelleri and Scott Gomez. Throw in defencemen Jaroslav Spacek and big Hal Gill and you can see a huge change in the team over just one summer. Read More»

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Here we go, tons of hockey news to be coming forth today and boy do the hockey fans need it after quite an uneventful draft day last week. Today is one of them big days in the NHL calendar that doesn’t include any hockey actually being played — other such days include the Trade Deadline and the Draft. It’s 1 July and that means Free Agency Opens.

The players out of contract officially became eligible to sign for whatever team offers them a contract at 12 p.m. today so we are about 39 minutes into free agency as we speak and already a few moves are being made. There is also some steep rumors of trades of players under contract being made as team try to free up cap room to sign the potential free agent that attracts them.

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