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Not at all a BOLD prediction, but a prediction nonetheless... Larkin will score at (or very close to) a point per game pace, while playing 20+ minutes a night in all situations, against the best centers in the league, and dummies will still say "he's not a true number one center"...

1) Smith will play more games than not. 2) Mantha will fight and not break any bones. 3) We will make the playoffs by the skin of our teeth.

Now THATS bold!

The only one on that list that interest me a little bit is Oliver Kylington(23yo LHD). 1 PPG player in the AHL and 7p in 48 NHL games last year. Only 23 years old. Seems unlikely though since we picked up Djoos. https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/142238/oliver-kylington

He could have kept him in Detroit, practiced with the team, and maybe give him a look in the next couple weeks when a player(s) inevitably gets injured. In the short-term it should. I don't think it was the smartest move, but I could see it going either way with Svech.

Hurricanes will claim him.

Ryan, Helm, and Svechnikov are all either injured or out due to Covid protocol. No, Djoos isn't injured as far as I know. That line of players should have been IR / healthy scratch. Basically the remaining players that make up the 23-man roster. Apparently Svechnikov is on waivers... You can't waive a player that is on IR, so I assume that means he's healthy? Hopefully he clears...

Larkin is awesome. He got some maturing to do and he definitely needs help. The Red Wings being a one line team makes things a lot tougher on him. I don't really care where people rank him today, what's important is how he looks 3-5 years from now and I don't see any reason why he shouldn't be able to become a "true" 1C.

Makes me appreciate Lidstrom retiring when he did. Sure, he could have played a few more years easily. But I'm glad we never had to sit back and watch him be a shell of his former self, and that he got to go out at an elite level.

This should interest some of you! (re Larkin 1C/2C?) Top 100 NHL players: The Athletic’s Player Tiers An email was sent out to 20 or so people in the NHL. The request to this group of coaches, executives and analysts was a little more complex than usual. For starters, it included a color-coded PDF with over 100 players’ names on it. And we weren’t necessarily looking for concrete answers. Just for people within the walls of NHL teams to check our work. It was an audit, really. The work? We were attempting to replicate our NBA colleague Seth Partnow’s project in which he separated the NBA’s top 125 players into five tiers. In our case, we were omitting goalies, already covered in our annual Goalie Tiers package. We wanted it to be more than just a player ranking or even the less subjective results of a mathematical model. We wanted analytics to have a say as well as those who collect a paycheck doing this for a living for one of the 32 teams. This was our attempt to meld analytics and the eye test to determine where players rate right now, heading into this season. And thankfully, people in the game were willing to play along. “Thanks for including me in your exercise …” started one response from an NHL assistant GM who then went on to provide detailed bullet-point breakdowns of where he disagreed with our first attempt at sorting the Top 100. “This is a great exercise for all of us,” said a Western Conference executive. And it was! Starting as a conversation between the authors whose bylines you see on this piece, with Dom’s model as a baseline, we spent hours on the phone shifting players up and down, debating the merits of each player’s individual value. Then, as the responses arrived from coaching staffs and front offices, we shifted again and debated again, merging quantifiable data with our own intuitions and observations. The result, below, is our final version of many. Let’s start with a pair of young centers at the top of 4A. Both Pierre-Luc Dubois and Dylan Larkin received support to move up this list. Dubois especially has had visibility over the last year, with a strong performance (10 points in 10 games) in the playoffs. Now he’s in the spotlight because of his trade request, and it’s no surprise teams are calling. “I would move him up, and here’s my opinion: He’s a size and strength centerman that the (coaches) know they can throw out against any centerman in the league and not have to worry about it at all,” said one executive. “He may not get the 80 points that some of these other guys get, but his 55 points might be just as valuable as Mark Scheifele’s 70 points.” When sources made their case to move a player up, we’d often counter by asking who they’d move down. You can’t just load up the top tiers. “I’m taking Dubois’ next five years over Stamkos’,” answered one. “But I’m not sure that’s the right lens to look through for this project.” “Huberdeau for me. You swap those guys: Florida is a better team, Columbus is worse,” answered another. There’s also a case to move Larkin, whose exposure to those around the league has been diminished because of the Red Wings’ rebuild. In the last calendar year, he’s played a grand total of 26 games. Sure, he has points in 24 of those games, but nobody noticed. He’s rounded out his game, is better defensively and is expected to be named the captain in Detroit. As the program there rises, so will his stock. Both Larkin and Dubois have potentially interesting comparables as they mature: Only mention of Mantha in the article: A couple drivers of play in Anthony Mantha and Jaden Schwartz worked their way into this tier. Mantha is an interesting case because he shows glimpses of star power but also can’t stay healthy. He’s a candidate to move up if he can put it all together for a full season. f*** you for beating me to it!

Craig Custance and Dom Luszczyszyn just released an article today ranking the top 100 NHL players... https://theathletic.com/2311395/2021/01/11/nhl-player-tiers-mcdavid-mackinnon-matthews/ NHL coaches, executives and analysts from around the league helped put these rankings together. "We wanted it to be more than just a player ranking or even the less subjective results of a mathematical model. We wanted analytics to have a say as well as those who collect a paycheck doing this for a living for one of the 32 teams. This was our attempt to meld analytics and the eye test to determine where players rate right now, heading into this season." Broken down into tiers... MVP 1A - McDavid, MacKinnon, Matthews 1B - Crosby, Draisaitl Franchise 2A - Eichel, Pettersson, Point 2B - Malkin, Barkov, O'Reilly, Couturier, Bergeron All-Star 3A - Tavares, Barzal, Aho 3B - Scheifele, Zibanejad Top Line 4A - Dubois, Larkin 4B - Seguin, Horvat, Cirelli, Hertl, Karlsson 4C - Toews, Kopitar, Backstrom, Hischier So based on this, Larkin is a top 20 center in the league, on a league worst team, with still room to grow. Look at where O'Reilly was in his career at the age of 24 (not as good as Larkin), and where he is now (a franchise caliber center)...

So looking forward to Thursday. Drop the puck.

1. Bobby Ryan scores 20+ goals and gives us a first at the deadline. 2. Zadina scores 15+ goals and has 30+ points 3. Mantha has 4 5+ points games this season and agreeing on these ones, apart from the deadline pick

That's my point though, and the same applies to Larkin. Zadina projects to be a top line caliber winger (regardless where he ends up in the lineup), and Larkin has been and will continue to be a top line caliber center. If we acquire a center better than Larkin, bumping him down to the 2nd line, that would be great, but it doesn't change the fact that Larkin IS a top line caliber center. Regardless, the only way I see Larkin getting bumped off that top line is if we draft Shane Wright in 2022, and even then, it would likely be 2024 (at the earliest) before he would be ready to take over the top line (and that's if he actually is McDavid tier)... Larkin will be the top line center on this team for the foreseeable future. He may never be elite, but surround him with elite wingers, and add depth behind him, and this team will be fine.

Yes - I believe you are right, but the remainder can be a mix of D/forwards, or even possibly an extra goalie on top of the required one. I am so looking forward to this upcoming season.

Zadina may well be a 1st line winger. He has improved every year so far, but he would need to bump Mantha down. Possible, but not likely as Mantha has shown flashes of being a top 10-15 range power forward. So, a tough road ahead. Understood about 3 scrimmages. I want to see Fabbri, Nametsikov and Zadina together for 10-15 games. That will give them time to gel together and give us a good idea of how good they can be. I think Brome has earned a 3rd line roll. He looks to be able to play 2nd line if needed.

Zadina may end up playing on the 2nd line, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's not a 1st line caliber winger. Teams rarely have their top two wingers (especially if they're both better suited on the same side) on the top line. Zadina will be in competition with Mantha, for that top RW spot. If both are top line caliber wingers, one will have to play on the 2nd line. It depends on how Blashill wants to spread out the offense. Same applies to the power-play units. I'm not sure if anyone's stock should go up or down in one (or even three) Red/White games, but I agree, Zadina and that whole line looked really good. I'm really likely Fabbri at center so far, and Namestnikov has been impressive in all three scrimmages. Brome has looked good as well.

Do you have anything to contribute other than "Larkin is a 2C" and "Zadina Sucks"? You're like a broken record. Anyway, some articles I found that seem to contradict you. From actual experts. https://thehockeywriters.com/red-wings-larkin-2020-21-production/ Article highlights Larkin's challenges as a 1C and that he will put up the points as the team gets better. https://www.nhl.com/news/nhl-fantasy-hockey-best-centers-top-50-rankings-2020-21/c-299921028 https://www.fantasypros.com/nhl/rankings/c.php Both articles put him at 31. Not flattering, but still a 1C. If you're spoiled and comparing Larkin to the likes of Yzerman, Federov, Datsyuk, and Zetterberg, you're being unfair. He's never going to measure up. That said, Larkin doesn't have to be a HOF to justify being a 1C. Even after a poor season from him, he's still a low end 1C. His performance 2 years ago shows that he has the ability to be a top 15 NHL center in the mold of a Jonathan Toews. As the team improves, so will Larkin's numbers. He'll never be a top 10 or elite NHL center. That doesn't make him a 2C.

1, Red Wings are still mathematically in the playoff race comes deadline day April 12. 2, Larkin finishes the season with well over a ppg record 3, Philadelphia Flyers wins the cup

1. Detroit finishes 27th overall ahead of Chicago and falls to Florida by 1pt. Jeff Blashill gets a new 3 yr contract. 2. Bobby Ryan has an exceptional year w/19g and 28a. Gets resigned by Detroit $4.5 x 2yr. 3. Anthony Mantha stays healthy all year.