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He's worth trading...

Nearly as good as the win; Lapierre trolling Bergeron.

I haven't been watching the game since the officials have botched the last few playoff games (awardind phantom PPs). And with biting now allowed in the NHL, I don't watch hockey when the kids are awake because NHL hockey is now bad for kids. However, the little I did flip through the game to watch 2 minutes here, 3 minutes there, it was all Bruins. Canucks have had the easiest road to the finals that I've personally ever witnessed (and I have been watching hockey for over 20 years). Bottom line, will be a tragedy if those gutless Canucks win the cup. When they can get away with such coward and gutless antics as biting people, it proves that the sport has gone to s*** and has become the official trailer trash sport. The way Canucks play the game is a disgrace to such a great sport. Now it has become trash, and kids should not be allowed to watch the game. I need to go take another shower, I feel dirty after watching half of the period.

...he picked up it from an Eastern European prostitute.

Reminds me of 2009 when Malkin should have been suspended for Game 3. Gonna be interesting sports talk radio on Monday.

Pure stupidity by all Bruins involved in OT. What the f*** was Thomas doing there diving like a mile out of his net. And does it always seem like players who should be suspended have the biggest games? Like the five OSU players who should have been gone during the bowl game.

Complete ******* joke, there is no other way to describe it.. The guy who shouldn't have even played in the game is literally the difference on all three goals.... Vancouver is going to win the Cup i.e. Next season can't come fast enough

What a goal by Burrows! Give that man a hand! Or just clap.

Kindl was effectively guaranteed a roster spot this past season. Same as Mursak next year and Smith the year after. I would take Janik over Salei because Janik is a solid, reliable defender who plays a good physical game. Salei is no longer that. Salei was on the roster this season for his defense, and he often made costly mistakes but rarely made excellent plays. Janik may not be a star defender, but one thing he can be relied on for is relatively mistake-free defense. He won't bring you much offense, and he's not going to shut down the Sedin twins on his own, but he'll do his job and he won't f*** up very often. And that's what I would expect from a #6/7 stay-at-home type. Osgood will probably be re-signed to back Howard up. Based on play last season before Ozzie went out, we'll see how long that arrangement lasts. As I've said before; I think Ozzie sticks around long enough to get close to or pass Sawchuk's Wings and career numbers, but not much beyond if he passes them. He likely retires after 12-13.

If the Wings don't go after two higher-end defensemen, I think Meech is a good fit to take on a lot of Rafalski's duties in the Wings' top six. He's a solid all-around defenseman with good offensive skill and great speed. He'd be a good complement to Lidstrom with other pairings of Kronwall/Stuart and Kindl/Pitkanen. Janik would be the 7th. As for Salei... I would rather have Janik. And as for Janik "earning" it... Meech has "earned" it more than Janik has. Meech has put his time in, played the role of #7, and Kindl being the hot prospect who couldn't get sent down this past year is the only reason Meech wasn't still on the NHL roster.

My tweet was "Well @biznasty2point0, #HatingOnDatsyuk is like telling someone hockey would work in Phoenix."

I think free agency this year will be a lot more like last year than previous years with Bouwmeester and Campbell. I don't think there's a big "prize" like that, where everyone is bidding. Bieksa gets a lot of talk right now, but I think that will settle down. Not necessarily directed at you, but I don't think the Wings are as stingy as some people seem to believe. We've been cap strapped the past couple summers but we're not now. History has shown that we will spend when we can. We don't need to bargain hunt and we don't need to try to dictate the market. I think Holland is too good to get frozen out of all the good free agents because 'we' think players are worth $1-2M less than what the market says they are. With the cap going up as fast as it has been, you have to pay more for good free agents than you did two years ago. You can't give raises to playres who already have contracts, saving too much is a waste, and you can only have 23 players. That means the best way to spend the extra money is by drawing free agents. I think you're pretty close on Wis's value (I'd say $4.5-5). We have a lot of money, more than any other contender and we're maybe the most respected organization in the league, and we really only have one major hole to fill. Shouldn't be any reason to think we aren't the front runner for at least one of the top available defensemen. Since Wis seems like both the best fit and pretty likely to see July 1st, I think there's a very good chance. Not to say that he (or anyone else) is a lock, but a lot of people seem really pessimistic when it comes to all the good FAs this year.

If you are registered on my site, log in. It will be pretty inconsistent coverage for a good while.

According to this thread, some posters here make it out to seem that Ericsson raped their mothers and killed their dogs... and to some others, he's a potential young Bobby Orr is his prime... damn is the Ericsson topic polarizing... As I've stated all along, this Babcock character just MIGHT know something about this crazy game of stick-puck and if he thinks enough of him to play him 20 min a night, MAYBE there's something there... In my mind he should be offered and gladly accept a deal of 3m over 2 years - 1.5 a year, and if he earns it, re-negotiate then... I wouldn't be upset about him getting 2m a year though, nor would I be upset about him being let go if he won't accept it... he doesn't deserve more than 2m, but lets keep things in perspective here people...

Silly knowledgeably-disabled fan. Red Wings Attendances over the last 10 seasons (% full): 10-11: 98.1% 09-10: 97.4 08-09: 99% 07-08: 94% 06-07: 100% 05-06: 100% 03-04: 100% 02-03: 99.8% 01-02: 99.9% 00-01: 97.5% Our attendance is fine. Plus, I never said anything about attendance, I said the fact the city wouldn't build a new NHL arena but would build a new state-of-the-art minor league hockey arena was silly. If you're going to try and make a condescending argument, at least make a good one

If we move Hudler we can sign him for as much as he could get elsewhere. CAPGEEK.COM CAP CALCULATOR FORWARDS Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Johan Franzen ($3.954m) Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Brad Richards ($8.000m) / Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) Jan Mursak ($0.550m) / Kris Draper ($0.850m) / Patrick Eaves ($1.750m) Todd Bertuzzi ($1.937m) / Darren Helm ($0.912m) / Tomas Holmstrom ($1.875m) Justin Abdelkader ($0.787m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.200m) / James Wisniewski ($4.250m) Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) / Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) Brendan Smith ($0.875m) / Brad Stuart ($3.750m) Doug Janik ($0.512m) GOALTENDERS Jimmy Howard ($2.250m) / Chris Osgood ($0.850m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (follow @capgeek on Twitter) (these totals are compiled without the bonus cushion) SALARY CAP: $62,400,000; CAP PAYROLL: $61,771,211; BONUSES: $0 CAP SPACE (22-man roster): $628,789 I would see what that could do, also think we could get him for the seven million range.

Legace is far from terrible...

Well, here's what I'd like Forwards, with Hudler: Zetterberg - Datsyuk - Cleary Bertuzzi - Filppula - Franzen Hudler - Helm - Eaves Mursak - Abdelkader - Holmstrom Emmerton (?) Forwards, without Hudler: Zetterberg - Datsyuk - Cleary ? - Filppula - Franzen Bertuzzi - Helm - Eaves Mursak - Abdelkader - Holmstrom Emmerton ? or Zetterberg - Datsyuk - Cleary Bertuzzi - Filppula - Franzen Mursak - Helm - Eaves Abdelkader - Emmerton - Holmstrom ? (?) D-men, Nick with Nik: Lidstrom - Kronwall Stuart - Righty shot Grit/PK - Kindl ? (?) D-men, Nick/Nik pairs as 1a/1b Lidstrom - Righty shot Kronwall - Gritty righty shot Stuart - Kindl ? (?)

Hudler, Kindl, draft pick, bag of pucks, Babcock's hair --- Lucic

This should be their mural:

Discarded peanut shells under the seats at the Joe have more value than Jonathan Ericsson.

I disagree. If Holland wanted to get rid of Hudler, he'd have been gone at the deadline because he was as hot at that point as any Wing was all season. Babcock wasn't using Hudler in a top-six role, so trading Hudler for a top-pairing shut-down defenseman and simply replacing Hudler internally in the bottom six with a grittier, more defensive forward like Miller or Draper would have happened. Holland, and perhaps even Babcock, think later December through the end of February is what they can expect from Hudler going forward. Not what they saw at the start of the year.

The thing is, and i know its 99.99999% fact that he wont be a Red Wing next year, BUT Holland does have enough cash next year to offer him a $9M contract. If the Cap goes up to the rumored $62.3M (third number I heard BTW) that will give the Wings $21.49M in Cap space before anyone is signed... Given that Lids will get at least $6, Wiz a generous $4.5M, they would then have to trade away Hudler's salary, giving them $4.8M to finish up the roster. Slight raises to Miller/Eaves and then add Mursak. That would leave $2.5M and they would have just enough for another $1M defenseman a 7th league minimum defenseman and a league minimum goalie... I know there has been a lot of talk about Jovo, but he made $6.5M last year, do you think he would sign for under $2M somewhere? Anyhow, I will leave the mopping up to Holland, but so far my pipedream roster looks like this... CAPGEEK.COM CAP CALCULATOR FORWARDS Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Brad Richards ($9.000m) Todd Bertuzzi ($1.937m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Johan Franzen ($3.954m) Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) / Darren Helm ($0.912m) / Patrick Eaves ($0.950m) Drew Miller ($0.850m) / Justin Abdelkader ($0.787m) / Tomas Holmstrom ($1.875m) Jan Mursak ($0.550m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.000m) / James Wisniewski ($4.500m) Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) / Brad Stuart ($3.750m) Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) / ???????? ???????? GOALTENDERS Jimmy Howard ($2.250m) ???????????? CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (follow @capgeek on Twitter) (these totals are compiled without the bonus cushion) SALARY CAP: $62,300,000; CAP PAYROLL: $59,783,711; BONUSES: $0 CAP SPACE (19-man roster): $2,516,289 ...BUT, this all depends on Holland being able to move Hudler before July 1st, if he cannot dump his salary, then even this pipedream goes up in smoke... I sure hope the cap goes up the $5.1M that it has been rumored to (that would be $64.5M and would give Holland $4.7M to mop up,) that would help out alot! But, Richards it is not impossible, just improbable... (unless he does pull a Hossa for one year and then gets a multi-year deal next off season...)

I have that wierd feeling like Kenny is going to put in a decent effort here. If not, I really wouldn't care, but if we can pull a Hossa-esque moves im all for it. If Richards were here, I'd hope that Zetterberg would focus more on scoring 40 goals again and less on playmaking. We need bonafide goal scorers and if Brad and Pavel could be the playmakers to Hank and Johan's finishing abilities, our offense would be scary. With Raffi gone and Nick gone soon, we will probably spend the rest of our free space on defenseman and appropriately so. Here's my ideas and first go around with Capgeek... Note: Cap should be at least $62 mill next year. Richards takes Datsyuk's salary after Holland tells him he can only make more than Pavel if he can take the puck from him. Richards signs before ever trying. We sign a hometown, offensive defenseman. Osgood stays because Holland adopts him as his son. Ericsson stays because he knows his flaws would be exploited elsewhere. We don't sign a tough guy because size is our enemy and strength is weakness. Hudler disappears, like last summer and most of his NHL shifts. CAPGEEK.COM CAP CALCULATOR FORWARDS Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Brad Richards ($6.700m) / Tomas Holmstrom ($1.875m) Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) / Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Johan Franzen ($3.954m) Justin Abdelkader ($0.787m) / Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Todd Bertuzzi ($1.937m) Jan Mursak ($0.550m) / Darren Helm ($0.912m) / Patrick Eaves ($1.500m) Cory Emmerton ($0.533m) / Kris Draper ($0.800m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($5.000m) / Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) Brad Stuart ($3.750m) / James Wisniewski ($4.500m) or Andy Greene ($3.5-$4) Jonathan Ericsson ($1.700m) / Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) Brendan Smith ($0.875m) GOALTENDERS Jimmy Howard ($2.250m) / Chris Osgood ($1.000m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (follow @capgeek on Twitter) (these totals are compiled without the bonus cushion) SALARY CAP: $59,400,000; CAP PAYROLL: $61,092,044; BONUSES: $0 CAP SPACE (23-man roster): -$1,692,044 Disclaimer: This is all under the not so likely assumption that we would actually sign Brad Richards. I highly doubt its going to happen. Most likely (if our needs are 2 defenseman, a backup goalie, and a top 9 forward) we'll end up with a Ruslan Salei clone, Tomas Kaberle (Schnieder was terrible and he played here!), Osgood (duh!), and Dale Hawerchuck (since Modano is probably done).

For forwards: Cody McCormick or Michael Rupp plus Fiddler to upgrade our already stellar bottom two lines. Do not re-sign Miller. These two guys are as good as Miller, plus have no problems throwing down. 2.5mil cap hit for two of these three players total. For defense: Jay Harrison and Hamrlik. Harrison is an upgrade over Ericsson and Salei, plus he is big and physical and likes to punch faces while putting up points. Hamrlik will put up 30+ points and finish +10 and will be a suitable stop gap for Rafalski and will play 75+ games. about 5mil cap hit for both these guys combined. Leaving us with a ton of cap space to use at the trade deadline to pick up Richards from whatever team he hinder with his cap hit.