Defenseman Bryan Rodney to be called up from the Charlotte Checkers

Jay Harrison still injured; Rodney will join the Hurricanes for two road games

According to the latest blogpost from the Carolina Hurricanes' Paul Branecky, Jay Harrison's injury, which occurred during the game vs the St. Louis Blues Saturday will keep him out of the line up for the pair of games to be played vs the Florida Panthers and the Atlanta Thrashers tomorrow and Thursday. While the paperwork has not been made official, the Canes will be recalling left defenseman Bryan Rodney from the Charlotte Checkers.

Rodney, who has been notable for his confidence and shot as a powerplay quarterback for the AHL team, has played 30 games with the Hurricanes over the previous two seasons. With the conspicuous absence of scoring by the Canes when they had the man-advantage the last six games, this may be the most valuable trait he brings with him from Charlotte.

A little more on what to expect after the jump.

Last week, Cory Lavalette spoke to Checkers' Head Coach Jeff Daniels who had strong praise for the Checkers' captain and the steady play Rodney 's shown this season:

We've survived some injuries and callups. Carson's been up and down a bit, Sanguinetti's been out, Bellemore's been hurt. So we've had to mix and match guys. The one constant through that whole time has been Bryan Rodney. He's the captain of this team, he's been a leader for us. He really sets the tone for us for the way we want to play. The last couple weeks he's really started to produce offensively for us. He's been our go-to guy through callups and through injuries. He's been the one steady guy for us that kind of rights our D when we've had those [players out].

Because Harrison is certainly a bigger and more physical defensive player than Rodney (who is listed at 6-0, 195 pounds), some were speculating Brett Carson (who is also 6-4) would get the call as he did when Joni Pitkanen was sidelined by injury earlier in the season. However, Branecky points out that Rodney plays on the left side as does Harrison making him the coach's choice here.

Another common question here is about the waiver requirements. Rodney is waiver eligible, but because this assignment is to replace an injured player, without whom the Canes would not have the numbers to play a full team, I am fairly confident this will be regarded an "emergency" call up, thus avoiding the need for going through waivers either now or if/when Rodney is reassigned to Charlotte as soon as Harrison can play. However, this will need to be confirmed and we'll have more on this nature of the call up as details are available.