(Photo credit: Scott Paulus)
Tonight’s game against the Cleveland Lake Erie Monsters is a significant one for Brad Winchester.
Not only is he riding a three game goal scoring streak, and not only has he scored in five of his last six games… but this will be his 25th game with the Milwaukee Admirals.
And thus, the end of the ride on his current PTO contract.
So if we hope to see him again on Friday night in Rockford, something official will need to happen pretty quickly.
His options? Maybe an NHL team would like to sign him. They’ve had the capability to this whole time. But now that he’s playing arguably his best hockey of the year, maybe there’s a team on the playoff bubble that could use his services. He’s not tied to Nashville – they don’t retain his rights. He can go anywhere that wants him.
He could sign a second PTO contract with the Admirals…or any other team in the AHL.
He will be as free of an agent as one can be after the game tonight.
Would it make sense for him to sign a PTO somewhere else if there’s no whiff of an NHL deal? I’m not sure it would. With just 9-14 games left in the AHL regular season, would he want to start completely fresh with a new group? Uproot everything that he’s had here for the last couple months? I don’t see that happening.
We’ll check in with him after the game tonight and see where he’s at with this.
Admirals Roundtable 
I hope he stays. Saturday night he was like the energizer bunny … he kept going and going and going when everyone else had run out of steam.
That line with him and Smith and Cehlin….played very well last weekend.
In chalk talk with the coach before the game, someone asked him this question. Coach said he didn’t know contract details, but he would most likely resign a PTO so he can continue to play but would be free to sign with an NHL team if one comes calling.