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Didn't Athanasiou teach us that irrespective of how many goals you score, if you give up more then it's a net negative for the team? To the extent that Cholo has offensive ability it is overshadowed by how often he gets scored on. Blashill has stated as much. No team (that's trying to be good) is going to throw a defensive liability on the ice game after game just because he scores a point every 3 or 4 games. Sure you can mitigate his shortcomings and accentuate his strengths by sheltering him at even strength and gifting him powerplay time, but he's still got to take a regular shift and he's shown that when he does he gets scored on disproportionate to how often he generates offense. When Cholo learns how to limit the chances against him he'll earn a spot, and get an opportunity to score, and that's how it should be. Otherwise he's just a defenseman version of AA, and those guys suck.

I honestly think the kid could use a full AHL season. He hasn't exactly lit it up there yet either. Once he is too good to play down there, then call him up.

Hes gonna be 23 , he needs to have a good look this season to see what we have ppl can say he didnt produce in the ahl and thats fair enough but outside hronek we dont have any offensive dman and a few yrs ago cholowski got 7 goals in the nhl and 0 in the ahl the same season. Just cause he didnt produce in the ahl doesnt mean he cant get numbers with the wings(griffins roster’s pretty bad anyways) all that being said i dont think he makes the roster with all the additions , if he wont play hes not worth keeping around over a biega who can basically sit 56 games for all we care

As has become tradition, let's see some bold predictions for the 2021 season. I'd stick with 3 each, and try not to make easy choices. Saying "McDavid will lead the league in points" isn't really that interesting or fun. Here goes: 1. Bertuzzi will score more goals than Mantha. 2. Detroit finishes 5th in their division (ahead of Nashville, Florida, and Chicago) but still misses the playoffs. 3. Troy Stecher produces career highs in goals and assists and finishes the season with 23-27 points.

Biega is the safe choice if Cholo or Lindstrom show that they haven't improved at all since last year. Again, he's not helping you but he's not hurting you nearly as bad. I'd give those youngsters their chances, but if they suck then Biega plays until Seider is done in the SHL. To some extent every player on the Wings is chasing the play (aside from Mantha and Larkin). Nobody has very good possession numbers. But what separates Cholo from all the other defensemen is how much more often he starts in the offensive zone (58%). He leads the team in o-zone starts and his shot share is 46%. Compare that with someone like Nemeth whose shot share is an nearly-as-bad 49% but who is buried in the defensive zone 60% of the time. So the Wings actually generate MORE offense under Nemeth (despite having to go 200ft to do so) than under Cholowski who is already right there. The same is true for Hronek (40% o-zone starts, 47% shot share). So yes, the whole team sucks but Cholowski plays the easiest minutes on the team and sucks worse at keeping the puck pointed in the right direction. He is (by far) the most egregious example of this on the team. The next closest player in terms of o-zone starts is Mantha. He starts in the o-zone a lot, but keeps the shot share in the Wings favor pretty significantly (56%).

I watched the scrimmage. "Helped off" is a stretch. Bertuzzi skated along beside Svech because he initiated the contact that caused the injury IIRC. Bert was just being a good teammate. Svech didn't need assistance, he was basically fine. Not clear that it was even his arm, could have been a shoulder. Svech was just bent a little over keeping his arm tucked up under him as he skated off so everyone assumed arm.

This. We need more offense from the back end. Cholowski can provide that. Also, this. The expansion draft should be a major factor. We need to get a good look at what we have in Cholowski this season. I don't care if he's in the lineup for game one, but ideally he plays 40+ games this season. Lindstrom sucks. As of today, I'd protects Larkin, Mantha, Bertuzzi, Fabbri, Namestnikov, Svechnikov, Rasmussen, Hronek, Stecher, Cholowski, Greiss

If that isn't fuel enough for Cholowski to earn his spot, it's probably for the best he seeks an opportunity elsewhere. As of today, I'd protect Lindstrom over Cholo.

Agree! But at some point, he will no longer be waiver free. As a matter of fact, this is his last season to be waiver exempt, according to capfriendly. Also, if he doesn't make the team, or hold a spot all year, do you protect him at the expansion draft? Right now we (I am assuming) protect Hronek and Stecher, will Cholowski be the 3rd D or will that be Lindstrom? I am pretty sure DD won't be protected. For me, that is who it boils down to, Cholowski and Lindstrom battling for the final protection. Related to that, I have Svech and Smith battling for the final FWD protection as well. Obviously Greiss will get the G protection. But, yes, bottom line is THIS is the season that Cholowski needs to make the leap to either the NHL club OR top D prospect playing in GR.

I think Grand Master Y signing Merrill/Stecher, getting Staal via trade, and a healthy DD more or less has Cholo watching from the press box, or playing in GR.

Lindstrom, one of his direct competitors, has been playing. The others are done developing so it's less of an issue for them. He's fortunate he doesn't have to compete against any of our other prospects for the time being, Maybe the time off won't hurt him, maybe it will. Yes, Green had a terrible year that led to his retirement, and he put up similar numbers to Cholowski. Daley was also in that ballpark given the difference in ice time. Even in points per game there wasn't that big a difference. Staal produced as much last year with no PP time. Nemeth and Biega were both more productive at even strength, Merrill as well. Might have done better on the PP had they been given the chance. All of them suck offensively. "Whether or not that offense translates to the NHL" is not at all irrelevant. It is the entire argument. Everything about your argument is predicated on the idea that Cholowski is good offensively. He hasn't been up to this point. He's barely even been better than players who suck. You say "earn it", but at the same time say only 4 or 5 players should be ahead of him, and arguing against adding anyone else who might be better. I agree he should probably be ahead of Biega. Biega shouldn't have been resigned, and I don't think we should have traded for Staal either. I think we should have tried to get someone good. I think we should have kept Bowey (and still should). I think we should try to get Vatanen. With no pre-season there's limited opportunity to win a spot, but at the same time he has less competition, and could benefit from the taxi squad rule and the later AHL start, plus the almost intentionally weak roster. And with injuries there will be plenty of opportunities. Let's see Cholowski do something without PP time. Let's see him actually produce well in the AHL. Let's see more than one hot stretch of 11 games followed by two half seasons of sub-20 point play. Let's see more than the one season as a 19/20yo in juniors that you could actually call "good" offensively. You know, actually earning things.

so I am cleaning up the office and I stumble across an old recording (from tape that I put on a DVD) of an old Wings game from Nov. 26, 1999. It is vs. Edmonton, broadcast on UPN 50 (Ray Laine is on it!) and it features Yzerman's 600th goal! So in celebration of the season opening (finally) I am going to kick back and watch this classic for a couple of hours!) Draper, Fedorov and Osgood out with injury, Ken Wreggett in goal, Darryl LaPlante and Aren Miller called up. You can tell it came from a video tape, but I don't recall how I got it on the computer to make a dvd. But hey, it was 21 years ago, and I have forgotten a lot since then! Box Score: https://www.hockey-reference.com/boxscores/199911260DET.html