GoWings1905

Considered me shocked a team with Luke Glendening on its second line and an entire 4th line that shouldn't be in the NHL is getting badly outskilled. 

It starts with roster management by Holland, alleviating some of this log jam. Then it's Blashill's job to ice the right players and find line combos that work. I'm not sure I have full confidence in either right now... The coaching staff looks to be much improved, hopefully they can get the special teams figured out...

I really dislike Seinfeld. Have never found it the least bit funny, nor entertaining. A show about nothing (which I know is the idea) and that's about how much appeal it has to me.

Does any team value PKing as much as the Red Wings?? I value this thing called goal scoring, and we didn't do s*** today that will help that. Just for the love of god Blashill play the kids more next season, that would be fine.

That would be the most Red Wing thing possible. Talk about change, bring back Darren Helm and Drew Miller.

That would be the most Red Wing thing possible. Talk about change, bring back Darren Helm and Drew Miller.

I'm not saying we need to purposely tank. None of the free agents are going to make us contenders so why give a guy like Nielsen who is 32 a 5 or 6 year deal worth 5.5-6.0 million dollars just because.

He was a top five prospect in many rankings for much of last year. He's exactly what the Red Wings don't have in the pipeline right now. Much more upside with Chychrun than a project like Cholowski. Trading Pavel's contract does nothing for the Red Wings if you don't use the cap space or even worse, spend it poorly now. It was only for one year and the team isn't going anywhere regardless.

He was a top five prospect in many rankings for much of last year. He's exactly what the Red Wings don't have in the pipeline right now. Much more upside with Chychrun than a project like Cholowski. Trading Pavel's contract does nothing for the Red Wings if you don't use the cap space or even worse, spend it poorly now. It was only for one year and the team isn't going anywhere regardless.

I'm honestly dreading Friday with Stamkos not an option now. This is worst case scenario for the Red Wings. Holland with cap space and no appealing options that are going to drastically alter the direction of the franchise in the near future. I wasn't even fully onboard with pursuing Stamkos, but once Pav's contract got moved, it was Stamkos or bust for me.
Now we just potentially gave up a future first pairing d-man in the draft when they could have sat on Pav's money for a year, let the young guys play and continue stockpiling prospects. Instead we are staring at David Backes for five years or some other terrible contract when that is the last thing the Wings need at this point.
For once Holland, please do nothing. Kick every single tire, but I truly hope nothing happens. Give me Larkin, AA, Mantha, Tatar and Nyquist in larger roles next season.

As bad as the roster looks, and as bad as losing out on Stamkos is, it might be a blessing in disguise. We have to play young players now, we don't have a choice. No free agent that we could woo is going to make us a contender. At this point I wish Kenny would just buyout Ericsson and we go really young on the back end, a bump in the road for one reason during the retool could do a lot of good.

People still believe Miller is needed on this team? I don't get it. He's terrible 5on5 and is incredibly overrated on the penalty kill. I'm not going to complain too much about a $1M depth signing, but there are a number of kids that could have stepped in and provided everything Miller can plus more, and would have costed slightly less...

Miller and Glendening are possession black holes. Whatever positives they bring are outweighed by the fact that they spend all of their time at even-strength without the puck (often against top players, because reasons). You don't win with a fourth line that's "gritty and real good defensively." You win with a fourth line that's talented enough to be a third line and can devour other teams' bottom-sixers. Also, this is one less spot for a kid, which is always good to see. (yeah but thoes kidzn arnt real gud defensivly)

Does Backes still seem practical? He's going to want a long term and he's already 32 and his production was worse than Zetterberg's. It got to a point where St. Louis was using him on the third line.
2 year deal would be ideal but I think he's going to want a long term deal.

Honestly, I don't think it's an overpayment - just about everyone on the team had an "off" year. Guys like Shawn Matthias, Lars Eller and Colin Wilson all produced around the same as Riley last season and are making from 2.3-3.9M per. Sheahan was ranked #87 in the entire league last year in lowest cost per point. The deal will give both parties two years to see what kind of player he turns into, and he's still RFA after it's done. It's not a bad signing at all, IMO.

I'm assuming that comment was directed at me saying we shouldn't trade Jurco? I've always said that Jurco is going to be a very good middle 6 winger, with top 6 potential, same for Jarnkrok and Janmark. A player doesn't need to be a "superstar" to not want to trade him. To trade a player with Jurco's potential as a throw-in just to get rid of Datsyuk's contract with one year remaining on it would be poor management in my opinion.
I'd hate to lose Jurco in any trade right now just because I feel his value is at an all-time low right now. However if he was part of the package that brought in a top pairing defenseman, I'd be fine with that, but not just to trade Datsyuk's contract...

I disagree with the bolded part -- the drop off in Nyquist's goals was due to the fact the power play was a dumpster fire. He was still producing near the same level at even strength, despite poor usage and compounded by having much less talented players than him get the top-six minutes instead. If Gus doesn't produce getting Helm's or Richards' deployment all season, then I am more inclined to believe the notion that he regressed. It's befuddling though Blashill would decrease the ice time of his top two goal-scorers and then bemoan the fact your team can't score goals.
I just think expectations are the biggest foes of Gus and Tatar right now. They probably aren't the next generation of superstars like when Z and Pavel took over. However, 30-goal scorers in their primes aren't easy to find and with better usage going forward, I believe both will get back to that level. I really hope the Wings aren't thinking of dealing either of them at this point, though I fear that might be the case.

This whole "He played with Tavares" argument is false. Okposo's primary center this season was Neilsen, and he scored more of his points with Neilsen than Tavares. When Okposo played with Neilsen their overall possession numbers improved over when they were apart. The same is true of when he played with Tavares. Tavares improved Okposo's corsi, BUT Okposo improved Tavares' corsi as well. Which shouldn't come as a surprise. When you put guys who compliment each other together the sum tends to be greater than the individual parts.
http://stats.hockeyanalysis.com/showplayer.php?pid=932&withagainst=true&season=2015-16&sit=5v5
None of this is new though. This argument has been invalidated just as often as it has been true. Crosby is the best center Kessel ever played with, and Kessel actually scored WAY MORE after they were split up. Likewise, Datsyuk is the best center Hossa ever played with and yet none of Hossa's five most productive seasons were on Datsyuk's wing.
Saying "player X only scored as much as he did because he played with player Y" is only sometimes true, and absolutely isn't in Okposo's case.
Edit: AND Okposo's best points/60 came on Brock Nelson's wing. Not Tavares' OR Neilsen.

I like guys like Abdelkader. It's stupid to pay them that much on that long of a deal. Generally the idea of a long contract is to either lock up an elite player or to lower the cap hit for a lesser player. His deal does neither, and he's approaching the age where players like him tend to start breaking down. In three years I think we're going to be seeing him playing 60 Games on the 4th line scoring 8-10 goals, not hitting as much, and soaking up way too much cap.

How is AA ever supposed to learn the defensive game at center ice if he never plays? We are not cup contenders, it's time to move kids into the spots they need to be and have our coaches make them better. That's part of the job. If you have a strong system, you don't need every player to an ace defensively. We couldn't score to save our lives this year, that was our main problem. So get the kids who know how to score into the lineup, let them do what makes them successful and over time develop their defensive games.

After his performance this season and in the playoffs, he'll have a chance. Depending on what happens at the draft and FA, I would be shocked if Sproul isn't the #7 out of camp.

Sproul needs to at least get a shot out of training camp. I don't care so much if they lose Jensen, but it would be a tough pill to swallow if Sproul never gets a real opportunity on a team that has gotten nothing offensively from their d-men for years.

Sproul needs to at least get a shot out of training camp. I don't care so much if they lose Jensen, but it would be a tough pill to swallow if Sproul never gets a real opportunity on a team that has gotten nothing offensively from their d-men for years.

Sproul needs to at least get a shot out of training camp. I don't care so much if they lose Jensen, but it would be a tough pill to swallow if Sproul never gets a real opportunity on a team that has gotten nothing offensively from their d-men for years.

His use of Ericsson and Smith tell me that analytics have zero impact on his decisions.