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Any chance of the wings news section that was above the forum reappearing? It was quite handy.

I have a bad feeling about this season.

As long as Illitch is the owner of this team, this is not going to happen. I'm not sure if you follow baseball Frank, but last year at the trade deadline the Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski wanted to sell as the Tigers were not going to make the playoffs. Long story short, word is that Illitch was so pissed at this, it led to DD's ousting as GM. I believe Holland has 2 mandates from ownership...1) Make the Playoffs, 2) Build a winner. It is very hard to to do both at the same time. With that being said, I am not for tanking. I think many teams try this and fail miserably creating a losing culture for a long long long time. However, I do think there are some moves that we make that do hurt long term. I personally wish we didnt sign Vanek and played Mantha top 6 or top 9, I wish we didnt sign Ott, put Sheahan on 4th line and played AA on the third line, I would bench E for XO, and I would rotate Sproul into the lineup somehow. I didnt love the Nielson signing, but I dont hate it as it gives Larkin some time to mature into the role of 1C. I agree that we do need to find a top caliber d-man. Hopefully other teams balk at Winnipeg's demands and we somehow pull-off a trade for Trouba.

I don't care much about Frk, Pulkinnen or any other of the overrated prospects but to me it's so obvious that Holland doesn't know what a rebuild is and how to do one the right way. Fine Frk, Pulkinnen and whoever gets waived weren't good enough to make that embarrassing roster. Solution get players who are better not just your usual patchwork type of guys but young players who are better and can help the ******* team right now and in the future. Of course this involves not playing golf the whole summer instead of get of your rich ass and work the phones in order to pull of a trade that finally lands this team a sniper and a top 4 defenseman! Can't pull of a trade? Fine, maybe stop kicking the tires and offer some pieces with real value instead of trying to shovel your own average players onto other GMS, they are smart they won't bite! Can't pull of a trade, can't get top guys to sign here? Fine, go with the young guns stop signing all these garbage veterans and finally get better draft picks. Can't do that either? Move up the latter and make place for someone who will...if only someone named Steve Yzerman would have been available a few ago..thanks for blocking him you moron! If Vanek makes the team over AA and/or Mantha that will be quite telling but of course holland has to justify his signing somehow right? Also Nielsen as a number 1 center *lol* a guy who never had to deal with the other teams top defensive pairing or top players, thanks to being the second fiddle behind superstar JT. Can't believe this is last lineup that will ever play in the JLA...not a good way to install confidence in a fanbase that had to deal with way too much crossroads seasons and first round exits lately. I'm sure Mr. I will be thrilled to announce the price-increases for the Gordie Howe Arena when most of these guys will be back next year.

First things first: I have to say, never once did I think that when I started this site back in September of 1996 that it would still be going strong 20 years later. It's truly unbelievable and I'm so thankful that thousands of you have made these forums your home and community of friends over all of these years. 20 Years. Wow... hard to believe that number! Welcome to version 4.0 of the LetsGoWings.com Forums! This is the largest update to the forums since v3.0 was launched back in 2010, and by far the most extensive. The site now features a completely responsive design and should run far faster than the previous rendition and includes many bells and whistles that weren't available on the previous version. Unfortunately it took a bit longer for this upgrade to happen (and, truth be told, the server is still running background processes to update an absolutely massive database), but I hope you feel it was worth the wait! As with any upgrade of this magnitude there's going to be some tinkering going on (some things may look odd or out of place). Don't fret! There'll be some periodic updates as the last wrinkles are ironed out with this release. Feel free to PM me through the forums here if you find a bug, have a problem, etc.. Thank you and LGRW!

Finally got my password correct after locking myself out for 30 minutes twice. Nice work, clean and fresh!

You should look at those drafts again. If anything, we drafted too well and got more than we had room for. We got Sheahan and Mrazek in 2010, plus Jarnkrok and Pulk. Jurco, Ouellet, Sproul, and Marchenko in 2011, AA plus Frk in 2012, Mantha, Bertuzzi, and Janmark in 2013. It's rare to get more than 1-2 NHL players in any given draft. Sure, we can question the roster management, say we should have traded more prospects, but people got pissed when we did that too. It's a no-win situation. People have unrealistic expectations.

Kronwall isn't expected to be out long. Would've saved him a few days at best. Regardless, it's obvious the team didn't see a role for Pulk here, so there's no reason to keep him. Sure, maybe we could have gotten a low pick, but that's hardly worth getting upset over. We have never had a problem getting good players for the middle and bottom of the roster. Even last year when our offense sucked our scoring depth was well above average. I am probably the biggest Pulk supporter here, but I don't think having him in the pressbox or on the 4th-line would have made any difference. It's been said ad nauseam, but our problems are at the top of the roster. It's extremely unlikely that Pulk (or Frk) would have helped that. AA might though, so we should probably be happy that he's on the team (at least until Jurco is healthy).

Well, that just means you haven't been drinking enough. *burp*

Unless...trade? Please? plz?

I think Miller and Ott has more to do with Mantha and AA not being sure if they are ready this year. Next year Miller and Ott will be gone and Helm and Sheahan slide down or Bertuzzi is brought up

I'm sorry , I never wish for someone to get hurt but I'm hoping one of our defensemen get hurt not named ouellet/sproul , especially Ericsson or maybe kronwall gets delayed another 4 weeks just enough time for us to see sproul and ouellet play and hopefully show the management they are worth keeping around, seeing as defense is our biggest concern I don't think we should be giving up on a vlasic type player in ouellet and someone who's as a big as sproul and can potentially be a good powerplay contributer as you mentioned with frk and pulkkinen they both never got a real shot in Detroit especially frk, boggles my mind these washed up veteran signings/trades that happen every year and always fails ... Weiss/legwand/Cole/tootoo/samuelsson etc... Enough is enough, start playing the kids more for Christ sake , but what pisses me off is losing these kids for nothing , there's no way we couldn't of got a 5-7th rounder for each when more than one team are putting in a claim for these guys mrazek was a 5th rounder, we should always be collecting assets back not drafting,developing them for 4 years and giving them away for free to have careers elsewhere ridiculous

Frk's biggest knock was always his skating, but that has improved leaps and bounds since then. He's still not a great skater or fast by any stretch, but he can definitely keep up to the pace of the NHL. I think he will go on to have a better career than Pulkkinen. Frk is very strong on the puck and seems to be a much smarter player. I would have liked to keep him over signing Vanek. Vanek is probably the better player today, but Frk would likely be the better player next year and in the future. Not to mention it would have saved the team $2M in cap space. Holland is terrible at cap management and a big part of that is taking advantage of entry level contracts, something he is incapable of doing...

Appreciate this so much ... thanks a lot. Looks really great

http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2016/10/red_wings_jeff_blashill_on_tee.html#incart_river_index This article says "Blashill confirmed that either Andreas Athanasiou or Anthony Mantha will start the season on the NHL roster," That's good to hear, but I don't see how it makes sense. They say they have to be playing to stay so that forces someone from the lineup that kickazz posted to be an extra forward. Would love if it was Miller or Ott, but comments from Blash seem like that 4th line is set in stone. I'll be mad if Sheahan's a scratch over one of those 2. Waiving Pulkkinen was a big shock and I think is a really bad move. I don't Frk was ever going to make the team - He had a good camp, but he only had the one good year in GR so I expected it to happen. Still would have preferred him to Miller/Ott, but don't think it's a huge loss.

110% chance pulkkinen gets claimed

It was to keep Helm from playing on the 4th line where he belongs, not to keep Miller and Ott. It was also because he's unlikely to be an NHL player for very long.

Good job. I'll check what's under the hood during the season.

Yup, they're both good reads...that make me want to scream into a pillow.

Maybe a trade....?

Welcome to version 4.0 of the LetsGoWings.com Forums! This is the largest update to the forums since v3.0 was launched back in 2010, and by far the most extensive. The site now features a completely responsive design and should run far faster than the previous rendition and includes many bells and whistles that weren't available on the previous version. Unfortunately it took a bit longer for this upgrade to happen, but I hope you feel it was worth the wait! As with any upgrade of this magnitude there's going to be some tinkering going on (some things may look odd or out of place). Don't fret! There'll be some periodic updates as the last wrinkles are ironed out with this release. Feel free to PM me through the forums here if you find a bug, have a problem, etc.. Thank you and LGRW!

Kraft Hockeyville game is tonight from Lakeview Arena in Marquette. Thought we should have a place to discuss the game! Stanley Cup is in town as well1

Well deserved

I didn't think your comments came across this way and to be fair I dont think many on these boards do. The majority of the people who are pretty level headed on this board have the consensus that they are excited for the future with all the young talent we have coming up, but I dont think any are saying things to extreme's (ie. guaranteeing championships, refusing to acknowledge mistakes etc.). Also, when it does come to mistakes, alot of people are experts when they look at things in hindsight. We could all build winners if we had a crystal ball lol.

It probably wouldn't bother me so much if it wasn't the same people with the same absurd predictions/complaints. Every single year... I used to try and actually engage in conversation with them but found that a complete waste of time. I really do commend yourself and Krsmith and PVD and so many others for challenging them and saying what so many of us are thinking so much of the time. You guys have tremendous patience. Also...just because someone disagrees with an extreme view (pessimist/realist) doesn't make them the opposite (fanboy/apologist). This isn't a world of extremes. Well then again... maybe some of you are much more used to that in the U.S. I disagree with many of Holland's decision's and even some of the core beliefs of the franchise. Regardless I CANNOT wait for this season to start. Really excited. So many opportunities for new guys and unanswered questions with this team and roster. I think we can be one of the fastest teams in the league and really surprise some people.