It looks like the move that has been rumored over the past few months could be made official as early as today....the Senators AHL affiliate will be moving to Belleville from Binghamton, likely for next season.
The Senators website, as of this morning, has a page on its rotating newsfeed about the move, but had not posted the accompanying article as of 9:15 this morning. (EDIT: the page has since been taken down when I went back to look and see if an accompanying article had been posted).
There is also a Belleville Senators landing page on Ticketmaster's website, with Yardman Arena as the venue, with no games yet available.
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As training camp approaches, there are still question marks on the blue line, especially in terms of depth should one of the top 4 go down to injury. And given past history that is certainly more likely to happen than not. Among the depth blueliners of Mark Borowiecki, Chris Wideman and Freddie Claesson, not one of them is ready or capable of filling a top 4 void for any significant time without having a major dropoff.
Whether Thomas Chabot can step in and fill that void right away will be answered in training camp, but I think the chances of that being a long-term, season-long option is far less than 50%, while the likes if Andreas Englund have a lot of questions as to when and if they will be ready.
The Senators invited Matt Bartowski to camp on a PTO last week, but there are rumours that former Bruins buyout and current Team Europe defenseman Dennis Seidenberg might be joining the Senators after the World Cup ends, either on a PTO or a signed contract.
The 35 year old defenseman doesn't bring much offensively any more, and isn't as quick as he once was, but the veteran could anchor the third pair and be a fill-in on the top 4 when and if necessary. He isn't the top line blueliner he was 3 or 4 years ago, and health is a concern, but if the Sens can bring him in on a cheap contract (he is getting more than $5.5M over the next 4 years from his Bruins buyout) it might be worth the gamble.
You can see how Seidenberg matches up against elite players tonight as Team Europe faces Team Canada where the winner gets the first seed in their pool, with the loser getting the second seed, as both have already clinched a semi-final berth with 2-0 records.
Ottawa Senators Blogger • 
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