Do you just know this shit off the top of your head?  If so — props. If not — props for looking it up for me.

Ok.  Thanks to both of you for clearing that up.

Yes and no… and uvgt2bkdnme summed it up pretty well.

In order for Jurco to play for the Red Wings AT ALL, he’ll first need to be signed to a contract, which he is not. The signing deadline for him is June 2013, but the Wings are welcome to sign him whenever they like.

If he plays half of the season with the Red Wings and they decide that he’s not quite ready yet, they CANNOT send him down to the AHL — he would have to be returned to Juniors. The problem, as uvgt says, is that once an entry-level player has played ten games, the first year is burned off of their contract. If they play nine or fewer, the first year of their deal slides to the next season (or, depending on their age, the season after that).

It happened with Marc-Andre Fleury a few years back. He was CLEARLY the best goaltender the then-lowly Penguins had, but they didn’t want to burn a year of his contract on what was sure to be a sub-par season as a team, and sent him back to the Q after nine games. The following season, it was as if he had just been signed.

Conditioning stints are almost always exempt from the wacky rules, but you really can’t send Jurco or anyone else down for a conditioning stint unless there’s a good reason why (meaning injury or prolonged scratching). In the case of the latter, Jurco would have been sent back to his Junior team instead of toiling in the press box for Detroit, anyway. 

To the best of my knowledge following Los Angeles’ Brayden Schenn mini-saga at the start of last season, technically, the team can send down a junior player anytime they want. The self-imposed deadline would be before said player plays in his tenth game if teams want to avoid eating out the first year of his entry-level contract, but if, for whatever reason, the team decides to send a junior-eligible player back to juniors after 10 games, that’s all within the rules. IIRC, a few seasons ago, the Ducks sent down Luca Sbisa mid-season, and he was in junior for the rest of the season. Junior players can’t be called back up once sent down unless it’s an “emergency” situation. There are a few technicalities the Kings pulled in getting Brayden Schenn in one midseason NHL game before last season and in sending Schenn to the AHL instead of junior (“conditioning assignment”), but those were also all within the rules.

Of course, take all this information with a grain of salt because I’m going from memory, not by hard facts or the CBA’s language.

From my vast knowledge and experience playing the NHL video game series, can’t a junior-eligible player hold a spot on the NHL roster and be sent back to junior as long as he hasn’t played more than 5(?) games?  Also, what if he made the Wings roster out of camp, and then halfway through the year we decided to send him to GR?  Piggybacking on that rule I touched on in the first sentence, if he makes the NHL squad, his junior eligibility should be voided.  So what’s to stop them from sending him to GR after ~30 games?  If I’m completely wrong on this, please correct me.

I’m thinking this would work better….just from :25 – :35

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUGyAHSQhpo&ob=av3n

This needs a thumbs down option, not because of you, but because of the rule. Lameness.

Yeah, that’s exactly what it’s about. To allow the Canadian junior kids to mature in THEIR league, as opposed to YOURS. 

You nailed it. Even if the Wings wanted him in the AHL — he can’t until 2013. The only way he WON’T be playing in the Q is if he’s playing with Detroit. 

Necessary goal song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYOyO9F5LfQ