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"Most of the team" is not signed to long-term deals. We have some big contracts coming off in the next while and I don't foresee any problems. As prospects and young players we have most of them on cheaper RFA deals or entry level for a while. first "biggish" player to get UFA status is Nyquist in 3 years from now. -Next year without Ott, Miller, Vanek, Kindl's penalty there's 3,905 - some goes Tatar,+Smith?(RFAs) then free agents, -Green's 6 mill is gone in 2 years - some goes to Larkin's+Mrazek's RFA deals, maybe small chance that we don't fit Sheahan in (but cap will go up so I"m sure we'll have space) -Howard's 5.2 and Kronwall's 4.7 is gone in 3 years - re-sign Nyquist, roll in the extra cash. -Ericsson's 4.25 is gone in 4 years

The Helm deal is not as bad as your little tantrum is making it out to be. If we were paying him to be a goal scorer then yes I would agree with you, but the guy brings much more to this team then just scoring goals which is evident by the fact that other teams were willing to pay him as much or more then we did. The Glendening deal is a bit high in salary, but you are making i sound like he is being paid 5 mil/year. These deals are not going to break us. I dont think we will have an issue with paying guys like Larkin and co. as by the time they are due for major increases in pay not only will the cap be up, but guys like Miller, Ott, Green, Kronwall, Smith etc. will be gone and I would be shocked if Zetterberg is not on LTIR as I cant see his back holding up until 2021. I'm not questioning your fandom and you can tell me to "bite your shiny ass" all you want, to me you just sound like a petulant child.

I agree with the Vanek part to a certain extent, but we could trade him at the deadline and get something for him and then he would be a good move long term. Anyway, when you add a potential 50 pt. guy for a 1 year deal without giving anything up, I think you have to do it - you either gain a tradeable asset or he doesn't perform and nothing lost. Or you extend him a year or 2 (not long term) so that Larkin or AA have high level linemates to develop with and let Mantha, and other propects work their way up from the 3rd line competition. The idea that Helm, Glendening are blocking youth is false, though, when you have Miller, Ott taking roster spots and you don't even say which prospects you want on the team. Frank, I think you hit an important point, when you mentioned semantics. I think you guys are talking about a Tanking rebuild. And, no, we're not doing that. It's the often mentioned rebuild on the fly. For those uninterested when we're just making the playoffs, I doubt you would be more interested in 5 years at the bottom of the league.

Don't you know that the definition of MOST is 6 of 23... 26%. That's 5 of 13 forwards, 1 of 7 defensemen, and zero goalies signed long-term. Of course, that's going by MY definition of long-term. (6 years left 'till expiration) Dickie's might be different. That's looking at things probably the most realistically, however If you really consider things based on moves Holland should make... One or more of Tatar, Nyquist, and/or Smith could be used in a trade for that defenseman we all dream of making their extensions null. Either one or both of Howard and Ericsson's contracts will be gone via trade, buyout, or Expansion Draft -- well before their contract expiration dates. Finally, it wouldn't surprise me, and I think kliq mentioned this before, if both Kronner and Z are LITR'd before their contracts are up due to injury.

Kopitar wasn't a top 5 pick, you are just making that up to try to prove a point. He was picked 11th overall in 2005. You make it sound like having a top 5 pick is a requirement/guarantee in winning a cup. Obviously drafting a franchise player will help those odds, but it by no means assures anything. You list a couple teams that have won a cup with 2 top 5 picks in Chicago and Pittsburgh, but that is telling a story by using a small sample size. It can be done the other way as well. The easiest go to is Edmonton, since 2006 they have had 6 top 5 picks, 9 top 10 picks and they have not made the playoffs one time in that span. How many top 5 or top 10 picks have Carolina, Columbus, Buffalo, Winnipeg/Atlanta, Florida, NJ, Colorado etc. had and done absolutely nothing. Tanking is the right thing to do in certain situations (ie. I am not against Toronto tanking), we are not in that situation. We are a couple stars away from being contenders, and a couple of injuries away from being awful as we are in an age of parity. I love how you say you are "NOT" going to argue semantics, only to then argue semantics in the same sentence (I think you did that twice on this page lol). We get it Frank, in your mind the only way to move a team in the right direction is to trade every player over the age of 25, get last place in the league, get a first overall pick who becomes a superstar, then win a cup. Great on paper, but in the real world it works only a small handful of times and more often then not it sinks a team. Guys like Kane, Crosby, McDavid etc. are not a guarantee to land by taking that approach. I'm not even going to address the false narrative of UFA's refusing to come here, that has been proven wrong many times. Nobody is saying that Larkin is going to win the Hart Frank, but the kid has talent and is the kind of player you build around. Add in Mrazek and the rest of the kids and we are building towards something. Maybe not this year, but in a couple years I can see us being legit contenders. Lets just all cross our fingers and hope we get that d-man. We all want the same thing here, nobody is cheering for mediocrity, we just disagree with how to get to our end goal.

Good point Euro Twins, I'd also like to know what defines the streak as being "meaningless". Maybe Frank Grimes from Letsgowings.com doesn't give a crap about it, but ownership, management, coaches, players etc. take great pride in that streak and its disrespectful to people like Mike Ilitich, Scotty Bowman, Mike Babcock, Ken Holland etc. when its called "meaningless".....its not. With that being said, I am not satisfied with making the playoffs and being eliminated in the first round every year. If we were a team of all older vets and doing this, I would be pissed. However with a core moving forward of Larkin, Mrazek, DD, AA, Mantha, Marchenko, Svechnikov etc. Good secondary and still very young players like Tatar and Nyquist and young guys that still could surprise (ie. XO, Sproul, Jurco, Pulkkinen) I am excited of where this team is going. Now if we traded our young players for a bunch of 29-33 year olds that would make us slightly better this year, I would not be happy, but we are not doing that as like I have said a million times, we are re-building.

Still not sure why you're using Vancouver and Toronto as examples. Also not sure what learning "it" the hard way means. If you mean you have to tank to success - your examples work against you. Both those teams were bad for extended periods Van (96-00), Leafs (06-) and weren't been able to put together championship teams from time in the tank. Vancouver ruined an elite team with the goalie debacle of losing 2 elite goalies in Schneider and Luongo - 2 assets they should have got more for. Then they alienated Kesler with this debacle and by hiring Tortorella. If you want to learn from this example, keep your future goalie (Mrazek is Schneider in this parallel) and treat your Stars well and show them you're a competent GM. I think our strategy is to keep our picks and try to draft well. I think we've gotten our future #1 center that way, and a goalie I think I think will be great and some other very good players. Looking at our recent 1st round picks (Larkin, Mantha, Svech) I don't think it out of the question that we pull a top defender in the next few years. Next year there seems to be a number of good Dmen in the draft that I've been checking out that we might get a chance at: Timothy Liljegren, Callan Foote (Adam foote's son), Nicolas Hagues (6'6") In a few years, I really think we could put together a contender with our prospects and young players except for the big hole of #1D, so I don't get the sour outlook and desire to tear it down. There was some head-scratching moves this offseason, though, so makes a little more sense why people are frustrated.

Agreed. If anything I would compare what Holland is doing to what a team like SJ did last year, not Toronto. Very well said. "rebuild" and "tanking" are definitely confused by some on here. What people fail to realize is that for every Chicago and LA that tank and rebuild successfully, there are multiple teams that try the same thing and can't stay out of the bottom of the standings for a decade.

Save Larkin for real season.

Lmfao. You were convincing for a second there. But then you basically argued against yourself by bringing Boston up and came up with a pretty bad excuse. "They did it without a top 5 pick but had performance for the ages". Last I checked you don't win a Stanley cup over 29 other teams unless someone is having a great performance. No team wins the cup if everyone is playing average on their roster lol.

What will you say if larkin becomes a legit 1c and in 2-3 years were a legit contender while still holding on to the "meaningless" streak? I'd be happy with 5 more years of sub-par hockey just to take away Boston's record TBH

A team that was tanking, yes you are right. No one is arguing that the Wings are trying to stay good while re-building.

I would disagree with this. If they were not re-building they would be trading guys like AA, Mantha etc. for vets in their prime. The Wings are re-building while trying not to tank (ie. on the fly), and personally this is something I am a fan of as I dont want to be a Columbus, Winnipeg, Buffalo etc. who are absolutely dreadful for 10+ years and are still not contenders. I 100% agree with e-prime, do I agree with every decision that Holland makes? No. But, overall I like what they are doing as they have a lot of young prospects that I believe are going to be legit stars in this league. Hopefully we trade for that d-man, or a guy like Sproul, XO, Russo etc. surprise us and break out to be a top pairing D-man.

Jimmy Howard To Miss Start Of Season Due To Severe Burn

I remember a few articles praising Howard's masks as some of the best in the league, I guess Mrazek took that away from him as well

I highly doubt that.

Damn Straight! Speak of which, I wonder what Howie is doing with his mask for the season? Oh that's right. Nobody cares.

Hey guys. Almost 1 year away from completion now. This update here ( http://wingsarena.tumblr.com ) is probably the last one I will be able to have where you can actually see into the arena. I shall keep providing updates though. Crazy that 1 year ago, the place looked like this: