lets go pavel

yes! that's why i say we scrap the whole playoff crap and go to a bowl game format! just kidding ... i agree with you, bounces go both ways, they may seem like a difference-maker but ultimately they're part of the game ... most of the good bounces aren't even considered bounces ... a puck of the crossbar is a bad bounce, but aren't all the ones that go in good bounces? the bottom line is it's just hockey ... someone can argue all they want that the losing team was the better team, but the bottom line is that the league by consensus has agreed that the winner of the cup is the best team ... the very feat of winning it singlehandedly makes the winner the best, it overrides every other argument, statistic, what-if and shoulda ... it's why theyt all say that winning the cup is all that matters ... last year the ducks were the best team (ouch, that hurts to say) ...

no, they don't contribute anything meaningful, but they are fun ... ultimately people come to this site because they enjoy it, and obviously based on the immense # of predictions every GDT people enjoy doing that ... that doesn't make them idiotic ... we have plenty of informative and explanatory threads, and plenty of discussions on players, lineups, trades, and everything else you can think of ... most are serious, and some are taken too seriously, but what's the harm of a fun one that people enjoy? there's worth in that ... and i don't think anyone would object to a separate thread for predictions if the main gripe is that it bogs down the GDT ... anyway, to the game, i agree that hopefully the 4th line demotion gets huddles moving, but i don't know that he'll get much going with ellis and downey ... i'm counting on a big game from dom though, it is phoenix after all ...

dude, lighten up ... who pissed in your wheaties? p.s. your post didn't contribute anything

exactly ... of course that would be a fan's knee jerking spasmodically as blood seeps from his/her gaping head wound ...

wings score 6, downey wins a fight, and gretzky gets so angry his head actually ejaculates ...

well clearly, after 8 games he has no points, which projects to 82 games and no points, so if he plays for another 20 years he still won't have any points ... why would we want a guy who will never register a point?

fair enough ... i know we were all hoping he'd hop off the plane and immediately be the second coming of pavel, and it is disappointing that not only did that not happen, but there are questions about his conditioning ... that said, pavel played 5 years in russia before coming over, and even then wasn't a top line player his first year ... because of the accident, grigs has actually had less development time than that ... i just think we need to give him some time before we throw him under the bus

no, no, no, and no ... did i mention no? lindros is the last thing we need, i'd rather have a small player who plays physical than a big player who can't ... lindros is done

what's to stop chris chelios from breaking the ref and the linesman over his knee and lining them up in a row at center ice so the other team can't get through?

winded walking??? i'm pretty sure the accident left him more than a little out of breath ... there's no reason physical therapy for an accident that serious couldn't take a while, and it has little to do with effort ... maybe he'll make the team, maybe he won't, but this whole notion that if he doesn't it's because he's another arrogant, selfish, lazy russian who sat on his his ass chugging vodka and smoking cubans when he should have been learning english is malarkey ...

i don't know, flip and kopecky don't shoot, and the third line is all shooters and no puck movers ... i think i might swap flip and huddles, and i'm still partial to homer with pavel, but i can live with giving kopecky a chance ... i'm guessing it'll be homer/pavel/sammy on line 1 though ...

man, if this thread had an enforcer then you guys wouldn't be taking (verbal) runs at each other! seriously, i'm not sure you're really disagreeing ... all eva is saying is that downey isn't going to stop people from taking liberties with our players because he doesn't play enough, which seems to be the case - not that he couldn't if he played more, or even that he shouldn't play more ... i think the other reality here is that downey (as well as drake) is smaller than most of the ducks anyway, and probably isn't going to intimidate them at all, they have plenty of folks willing to drop the gloves

this is like choosing between your left ******** and your right ******** ... why choose when you can keep both?

well said ... Dom is the #1, Ozzie is #2, and, agree or disagree, everyone knows that's the way it is ... i think the goal when it comes to deciding playing time is to keep Dom fresh, healthy, in a rhythm, and performing at a high level so that he is ready to go at playoff time. benching him for multiple games in a row if he has an off night serves no purpose, he's not a rookie having confidence problems who needs to get his head on straight, he's an old pro ... he gets a night off, then comes back strong. if it's april and Dom is losing more than winning then let's start this thread ... right now it's silly.

"I'm a Red Wings fan and Yzerman is my favorite player, but he wasn't very good" ... come on, that's like a Catholic saying Jesus wasn't a very good savior ... give it a rest

ouch

two words ... drain bamage

good article, glad to have him here ... he's also pretty good as an announcer, definitely enjoyed hearing him with mickey and ken the other night ... here's to a good game tonight, ozzie

Okay, long way off and purely hypothetical, but if Kronner continues with the up and down season (and i realize it's barely begun) I would consider including him in a package for Hossa at the deadline, assuming we can lock him up for a couple years. Hossa would bring us the much-needed goal-scoring forward, and it's decent odds that Atlanta won't make the playoffs and Hossa could want out ... and we've got some young D-guys waiting in the wings (no pun intended), particularly Quincey ... don't know if we can afford Hossa though ...

no ... but the real question is do the blackhawks miss robert lang? whoever that was wearing the lang jersey last night, it sure as hell wasn't old bobby ... last night #20 was forechecking! and skating! and showed interest! the real bobby lang doesn't do these things! where could he be??

games lost to injury ...

Jaromir Jagr?

actually i believe wearing frontal pads would hinder his ability to repeatedly fire pucks into the opposing teams bench, and should he miss and the puck end up in the stands he would risk the other team being penalized for delay of game ...

True, and you'll never please everyone ... what we have now does a pretty good job of giving opportunity to young talent, not every team but most ... even our team has some young guys on it and in significant roles, moreso than in years past, though I think that has more to do with the salary cap than league size, at least for our team, because we can't pay a team of HOFers anymore. Personally, I would rather sacrifice some of the young players' ice time and see better players on the ice more often, that's just the kind of hockey I prefer. But like I said, it's a matter of personal preference ...

I was reading The Code over the summer, and it brought up an interesting point with enforcers and cheap-shots ... often times the cheap-shot guy has to answer to his own enforcer, not the other team's ... let's say someone like Malts cheap shots Gaborik ... well the Wild are going to respond with Boogard, but he's not going to come after Malts, he would come after our enforcer ... now our enforcer has to go toe to toe with Boogard because Malts was an ass ... in the lockerroom you can be sure that our enforcer will have some words for Malts, and malts will think twice before doing it again because he's putting our own enforcer on the line to stick up for him ... but since we don't have an enforcer, and Boogard isn't going to come after Malts, noone is really going to have to answer for Malts' actions and he's morelikely to do them ... at least that's a theory anyway ...