{"id":117841,"date":"2021-08-31T11:19:05","date_gmt":"2021-08-31T15:19:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=117841"},"modified":"2021-08-31T11:19:05","modified_gmt":"2021-08-31T15:19:05","slug":"connor-murphy-extended-by-blackhawks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/08\/31\/connor-murphy-extended-by-blackhawks\/","title":{"rendered":"Connor Murphy Extended By Chicago Blackhawks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/08\/25\/2021-chicago-blackhawks-prospects\/\" target=\"_self\">Chicago Blackhawks<\/a> have extended defenseman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/m\/murphco02.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Connor Murphy<\/a> for four years, paying him an average of $4.4 million a year. This extension will carry him through the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">MORE\u203c\ufe0f MURPH\u203c\ufe0f<\/p>\n<p>Connor Murphy inked an extension and is staying put in Chicago. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Blackhawks?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Blackhawks<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/0LtqLBfqI1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/0LtqLBfqI1<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NHLBlackhawks\/status\/1432719837357387786?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">August 31, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Connor Murphy Extended By Blackhawks<\/h2>\n<p>Murphy is an extremely important piece to the Blackhawks&#8217; defensive success. Out of defensemen, he only played fewer minutes per game than <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/keithdu01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Duncan Keith<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/07\/12\/duncan-keith-traded-blackhawks-oilers\/\" target=\"_self\">With Keith now an Oiler<\/a>, Murphy will have some serious shoes to fill in the shutdown role. Luckily for the Blackhawks, he is just that type of defender. He led the 2020-21 team in blocked shots with 123 (32 more than Keith, the next highest). While his advanced numbers don&#8217;t look great, it&#8217;s important to remember the type of season the Blackhawks had as a whole. The most important statistic to look at is his defensive zone start percentage. Nearly 70% of all his faceoffs were in the defensive zone. Coach <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/c\/collije01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jeremy Colliton<\/a> obviously trusts him to take care of the puck and get it out of harm&#8217;s way.<\/p>\n<h3>Moving Forward For the Blackhawks<\/h3>\n<p>Having Connor Murphy extended is a fantastic offseason move made by Stan Bowman. The top pairing will likely be made up of Murphy and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/j\/jonesse01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Seth Jones<\/a>, the recently acquired defenseman from the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2021\/08\/18\/columbus-blue-jackets-sign-cole-sillinger\/\" target=\"_self\">Columbus Blue Jackets<\/a>. Jones is much more offensively minded, so those two will pair together nicely. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/d\/dehaaca01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Calvin de Haan<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/m\/mccabja01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jake McCabe<\/a> will likely take up the second pairing role. These two are solid defensemen in their own right and will slot in nicely behind the Jones &#8211; Murphy pairing. The last pairing is anyone&#8217;s guess. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/m\/mitchia01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ian Mitchell<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/kalynwy01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Wyatt Kalynuk<\/a> are the two that come to mind immediately. However, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/s\/stillri01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Riley Stillman<\/a> is a growing player that could steal some ice time for a few games. The overarching theme for this Blackhawks blue line is they are young and relatively inexperienced, so there will be some growing pains.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"zxFb73y0TFxoUG0EKto-AQ\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1232454745\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'zxFb73y0TFxoUG0EKto-AQ',sig:'WgcYTs5DyDHniZOJNYZ4Yu4bsjnQln4DTsd6FWzYpcg=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1232454745',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Chicago Blackhawks have extended defenseman Connor Murphy for four years, paying him an average of $4.4 million a year. This extension will carry him through the 2025-26 season. MORE\u203c\ufe0f MURPH\u203c\ufe0f Connor Murphy inked an extension and is staying put in Chicago. #Blackhawks https:\/\/t.co\/0LtqLBfqI1 &mdash; Chicago Blackhawks (@NHLBlackhawks) August 31, 2021 Connor Murphy Extended By [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3605,"featured_media":117842,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[27,4547,34,4548],"tags":[6842,1833],"class_list":["post-117841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blackhawks","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-2021-nhl-offseason","tag-connor-murphy"],"modified_by":"Noah Foster, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3605"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}