lets go pavel

scoring in general has disappeared ... i don't think one can overstate just how important our top 4 defensemen are to our offense, not just for their point production, but because they are essential to our style of play ... we're a puck possession team and that puck possession starts in our own zone with the defensemen, it's largely their responsibility to run the transition from defense to offense ... how many times in the last few games have we tried to move the puck out of our zone only to have nowhere to go with it, or miss the forwards, or hit a forward with the puck but he has nowhere to go? our defensemen do so much more than play defense, and it's the "so much more" that the young guys, through no fault of their own, are not able to step right in and do ... prior to these injuries, if you look at players with 20+, 30+, and 40+ points we were the best in depth scoring out of all the playoff teams in the west ... in a system that relies so heavily on its defensemen, as disppointing as it has been to watch i don't think we can hold anything from the last 10+ games against anyone ...

if all 16 playoff teams were dropped in a hat and the stanley cup was awarded to the team pulled out then all 16 teams would have an equal chance of winning, including boston and detroit ... however, until they drop the playoff format in favor of the pull-from-a-hat, the stanley cup is going to be determined on ice, and on ice some teams have a better probability than others -- hence the different odds in vegas ... if hossa's main goal is to win and win now, then just like in vegas, the odds are better of him doing that here than in boston ... not guaranteed, but better ...

i'll second that!

i agree ... rest them now, get them healthy, and then get them back into the lineup with enough time left in the season to get back in sync with the rest of the team so they hit the postseason running on all cylinders ...

i agree that we have been consistently better during the regular season than most, but our playoff record (3 cups in recent memory) has also been better than most, even if it doesn't appear that way because of the regular season success ... my point was that 16 teams make the playoffs and only 1 ends up happy, so 15 teams that have good regular seasons end up with postseason disappointment ... and since the same team doesn't win the cup every year, most teams have had regular season success and postseason disppointment ...

i'm excited for this one ... calgary's got speed, size, skill, grit, and playing in their house always seems like a playoff atmosphere (at least on the tv) ... it'll be a good game to see what our young guys can do ...

and? the same can be said of every team (at least, that has done well) ... 16 teams make the playoffs, only one doesn't lose, and it's usually a different one from year to year ... the wings have a strong team with a few holes ... so does everyone else ... the wings need to stay healthy ... so does everyone else ... the wings could use a few pickups at the deadline ... so could everyone else ... but once the playoffs start, anything can happen ...

if stuart is too pricey, campbell will be way too pricey ... and as someone said before, ANYONE can win it ... the ducks were favorites last year, but i don't think too many people would have said that edmonton or calgary could have won the west the 2 years before that, and look what happened ... a lot of folks keep harping on how the wings' style of play is suited for the regular season and not the postseason, but i think they showed last year that they could adapt their style and play a grittier, more physical game when needed ... i know they didn't make it all the way, but it was a pleasant surprise to most of us and should at least give us some comfort that the wings can play a skilled puck possession regular season and then turn around and grind it out in the postseason ...

kaberle's nice, but it'll take a lot and for the price i'd rather have more size/physical play ... if we could sign havlat to a contract where we only have to pay for games he actually plays in i'd take him, otherwise no thanks, too risky ... i haven't seen much of marleau, but what i have seen hasn't impressed me, he's having a bad year, so a change of scenery might light a fire under him, but what would it take to get him? san jose is in the hunt, so i can't imagine they would let him go prospects and picks, i would think they'd want a top line forward in return ... i could see marleau and players going in a package for hossa (or sundin) if sj knew they could sign him long-term ...

i'm actually a bit disappointed ... i really hoped one of our rivals would shell out big time and count on him as their deadline acquisition only to have him gimp out ... now they may pick up someone who can actually play

so basically as long as we win you're fine with ozzie, but if we lose it's his fault because he's not elite ... is howard elite? or should we try to trade him next time he has a bad game too? did you want us to trade dom at the beginning of the year when he was struggling? and toskala ... nevermind.

"Dammit Ballard, is that your jockstrap hanging from the rafters again?? f***!!"

oh good, it's you again ... are you basing howard's superior reliability on one full game and 2 partial games??? come on dude, i didn't hear you call ozzie "average" when we were winning, if that was all about the team in front of him and ozzie was just getting lucky why weren't you suggesting we trade him then?? ... we're not trading ozzie, we're not trading dom, howard is going back to GR when dom is healthy, we'll have a strong goaltending tandem going into the playoffs, and howard will get his shot when dom retires ...

bad bad bad idea ... here's the moscow dynamo jersey from 2004 ... pretty plain, except guess which one is the team's logo? if you said the big winged thing in the middle, you'd be rooting for a russian insurance company ... the team logo is ... so maybe someday our jersey could look like .... :puke:

right ... a losing streak really isn't about the quality of the team, it's about the quality of the team's play ... if we had lost the same 6 games in the exact same manner but they had been spread out throughout the season i don't think anyone would be panicking, trading half the team, castrating the goalies, and fleeing the falling sky ... the nice thing about a losing streak is that when it's over it doesn't matter anymore ... noone will be talking about this losing streak 2 weeks from now or 2 months from now ... so let's just take a few positives from it -- it magnifies the team's needs and gives the team a chance to fight through some adversity ...

in watching the last few games he doesn't seem to be skating as well as usual, not throwing the body around as much, he doesn't seem as strong on his skates and he's getting knocked off the puck quite a bit more ... i was wondering how much of this could be due to his bad back? we know he skipped the all-star weekend to rest it, but has anyone heard anything since about his back is holding up?

it doesn't sound like we really disagree at all as far as what the wings need - another goal-scorer and a physical defenseman ... and i understand what you're looking at with this year's team vs. last year, i think one could argue that the growth of some of the players on offense, particularly cleary and flip, could offset lang's production, but markov's departure is an obvious hole ... however, while this year's team may not stack up favorably with last year's team, we don't have to play last year's team to win the cup, we have to play the other teams in the league, and i think we stack up pretty well with them ... nothing will be easy, and yes, i still worry about anaheim, i think they will give us the biggest challenge, but i think we have as good a shot as anyone ... we'll see what happens at the trading deadline ...

i say no, not because we don't want canadians, but because our needs have to do with what players bring to the team, not where they were born ... we could use some depth at defense, another goal scorer, and some big and physical players ... as long as we get those things, who cares where they were born? you don't have to be born in canada to appreciate the stanley cup, and no they don't play harder ...

if he's washed up he won't be back ... if he isn't there's a good chance he will be ... either way, there's no harm in crossing some fingers and spreading some love ...

we've managed 10 goals in the last 5 games ... they're part of the problem

i think they have as good a shot as anyone, i certainly wouldn't count them out ... i do think hasek/ozzie are capable of getting us there, and that i guess is just a matter of opinion, it can't really be proven one way or the other ... as for secondary scoring, we all agree we need more, but here's the interesting thing - every team does ... i just compared the 8 western conference playoff teams if the season ended today ... we have 10 players with 20+ points, only nashville and colorado are better with 11 ... we have 8 players with 30+ points, the next closest are minnesota and nashville with 6 ... we have 5 players with 40+ points, only calgary can match that ... we have as much if not more secondary scoring than anyone in the west ... as for our defensemen scoring, only 3 of those same 8 "playoff" teams teams have 3 d-men with 20+ points: detroit (25, 46, 57), anaheim (20, 28, 39), and nashville (22, 23, 32) ... the rest have 2, except san jose with 1 ... obviously anaheim's #s don't take into account niedermayer, but even so it would be hard to say that we don't have stellar scoring from the blueline ... i agree that we could use some bigger physical players, i don't think anyone would disagree, but i wouldn't say we can't win the cup without it ... i think there's a decent chance that will be addressed at the deadline ... holland tried last year with bert, we'll see what there is this year ... i think there's also a decent chance that mccarty will be back up before long - we'll have to see what he can bring, but he's obviously in grand rapids so the organization can see what he's got left, and from the sounds of it he's doing pretty well ... so in summary i think we have the scoring, defense, goaltending, experience from last year, veteran presence, speed, youth, heart ... add maybe one more goal scorer and physical depth defenseman and i think we have what it takes ... we've at least got as good of a shot as anyone else ...

and you're basing this on ... what? it's great to say things over and over, but some explanation as to how you're arriving at your psychic premonitions would make for much better conversation ...

would this be the same john ferguson jr they just s***-canned? well if he says so it must be true ...

i think maybe this guy IS toskala, and he really wants us to trade for him because the leafs are terrible ...

well maybe we can trade him to the tigers ... would that make you happy? seriously, ozzie has stolen at least as many games this year as dom, and is certainly capable of doing it again ... we have 2 solid goalies and should be happy, but i'm probably wasting my keystrokes with you, huh?