The Predators put winger Zac Rinaldo, who had been listed as a healthy scratch for the past few games, on injured reserve yesterday. The injury was not specified, and the IR is not retroactive, so it’s not clear whether he was injured during a game or in practice.
This morning they recalled forward Colin Blackwell from the Milwaukee Admirals. Blackwell recently returned from a long injury; he has only played in fourteen of the Admirals’ 41 games so far.
Since his return, Blackwell has, as noted in this week’s Milwaukee Musings, provided a much-needed offensive boost for the Admirals. In those games he’s scored seven goals and added zero assists, for a half-point per game pace. His shooting percentage has been a little high and will probably come back to earth, but that zero-assists stat isn’t likely to stick around forever. Blackwell was a prolific scorer with the Rochester Americans last year, but he took a little more of a playmaking role there, finishing with a statline of 17-28–45 in 61 games.
For an AHL team that needs offense, Blackwell—who has scored 52 points in his last 75 games—is a great player to have around. Let’s hope that he can help the Predators’ fourth line contribute as well. Rob Vollman’s latest NHL Translation Factors show that an AHL point is a little more than twice as easy to score as a NHL point; if that holds for Blackwell, he might be expected to be a solid bottom-six contributor with the Predators if necessary.
Blackwell is in his third AHL season and has yet to play in a NHL game.
All statistics are courtesy of theAHL.com and eliteprospects.com.