Some bad news for the Preds, as defenseman Ryan Suter left tonight’s game against Calgary with what looked like a knee injury of some kind.  He didn’t return to the game.

Check out the video at On The Forecheck.

The Predators play next on Thursday night, hosting the Penguins.  And the question now — do they call up a defenseman?

Alexander Sulzer has been scratched in all of the Preds games so far this season, so one line of thinking is that he’ll slide into the starting lineup, and the Preds may or may not elect to call someone up to be the 7th defender. They have gone both routes when presented with this scenerio in previous seasons.

But if they aren’t sold on Sulzer playing, or if they’d like the security of a 7th defender, who do they call up?

Aaron Johnson — The last defenseman sent down during training camp, who reportedly had a better camp than Sulzer.  I think we’ve made it pretty clear how he has played since he has been in Milwaukee so far, but he’s got 225 games of NHL experience, which may trump the last four games here.

Teemu Laakso — Seven games of NHL experience, and kicked a 50 yard field goal the other day.  So he’s got that going for him, which is nice.

Brett Palin — Training camp critiques gave him decent marks.  Would be his NHL debut if he skated Thursday.

Jon Blum — After watching Nashville bring in new defenseman after new defenseman….could this be his time to get his first cup of coffee?

Josh Cooper from the Tennessean is tweeting that it’s a minor injury for Suter, with the following quote from Barry Trotz: “No, not too serious, he may miss a little bit of time here, but nothing major.”  So it sounds like it would be just a cup of coffee if someone would get called up.

If there IS a promotion, who do you think it’ll be?