I assume by KK you mean Korchinski? Is there actually a chance he starts in the AHL after spending all of last season in the NHL?
Hawk fans are divided on his development (I personally thought he was overall fine as rookie and showed alot of poise) and Davidson talked about how team rushed kids into roles they weren't ready for and thus why we signed so many vets this offseason
Hawks only have two spots potentially open now because of signings on D with one being #7 D
So, for that top 6 spot we will have some variation of this most likely
Vlasic-Jones
Martinez-Murphy
?-Brodie
(?)
Korchinski, Kaiser and Del Mastro all in camp fighting to win that spot open spot. I think Allan and Levshunov go to Rockford and one or both gets looks whenever Murphy gets injured (As he always does at some point)
The 2nd ? = 7th dman is probably between Phillips/Crevier as neither really has any more development left and are type of kids who won't be hurt sitting in press box eating popcorn for large chunks of year getting paid NHL salary
I liked what I saw for Korchinski overall but if Hawks feel he is better served starting in Rockford with bigger role for Hogs (Potential top pairing and top PP time or at least shared PP time with Levshunov) they will go ahead and do it and give one of the other kids first dibs this coming year
Hawks have a glut of young Dman now all who will be needing to establish roles in coming years
And Rinzel (2022 1st) is potential to join Hawks system as well late next season or during next offseason
Hawks D pipeline hasn't been this deep since early/mid 00's when we had Keith/Seabrook/Byfuglien/Hjalmarsson/Babchuk/Wisniewski/Barker/etc in pipeline