Orange County Register

_ The Ducks are going to miss the heck out of Todd Marchant if they can’t get him signed. He can center any line, he still skates, and he’s a big-time presence in a room that just lost Chris Pronger.

_ I wouldn’t worry about James Wisniewski. General manager Bob Murray has prepared for the prospect of matching an offer sheet for Wisniewski. If the sheet is excessive? Murray has told people that the “payback is rich,” or something that sounds like that.

_ Without my capology hat, I can’t calculate whether the Ducks can afford  right winger Mikael Samuelsson, but they do like the Detroit sniper _ as they should, after watching him light it up against them the last few years. Samuelsson is a free agent and hasn’t gone anywhere yet.

_ Francois Beauchemin deserves the big contract that the Ducks can’t afford to give him. He plays maximum minutes, he’s spectacularly physical at times, and he can shoot. But he can also suffer the lapses that you don’t see from the other Ducks defensemen.

_ Defenseman Rob Scuderi played his fine Stanley Cup Final performance for all he’s worth, getting $13.6 million over four years from the Kings. Does this allow the Kings to trade Jack Johnson for a Dany Heatley or a Vincent Lecavalier? They still need another scorer.

_ Don’t write Chicago’s names on the Cup just yet. They did sign Marian Hossa but they lost Martin Havlat, and they lost goalie Nikolai Khabibulin to Edmonton.

_ The Blackhawks gave Hossa a 12-year contract. He’ll be 42 in that 12th year.

_ Nothing much seems to be happening in San Jose, although the Sharks did re-sign Ryane Clowe, Kent Huskins and Rob Blake. We always predict the Sharks are going to back up the truck every time they lose, and it never seems to happen.

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