#1redwingfan

He also played one more round than Marian

ahahahahahahahahahahhah

Some guys from that list that I wouldn't mind up-front: Chris Clark Mike Fisher Matt Cooke On the defensive end, I am unsure... we seem to have a lot of defensemen...although mostly on opposite ends of their career (some pretty old, some trying to crack the line-up) but we have a nice medium in Brian Rafalski who is still fairly young, he will be our main defenseman when LIds and Cheli are done. I'm going to assume we're set on D. As for goaltending, I would think Dom is gone next year. I don't honestly believe Osgood could be a winning goaltender at this point in time (past his prime but still a heart and soul kinda guy) So maybe Howard/Osgood splitting time if Howard does his thing this year and is NHL ready by next season. If not, I'd say sign a fairly proven tender who won't demand a high salary and is older rather than younger. Fairly realistic I guess...

AHAHAH. Wow, that was outstanding ... and good post, its so true that they have better leaders on that team.

Lee Stempniak would be realistic, wouldn't it? ... I can dream

Thank you for posting this, it was satisfying to read. It is extremely accurate in comparison to some of the other ignorant posts that are in the thread.

do what? he didn't even get a good punch in.

Thank God. I had thought he was completely done looking. â—™

You punch my face with laughter

yeah. Grigs is only 5'10" 215lb... I know he likes to play a physical game and everything, but I wouldn't hold my breath on the glass-breaking hits. So yeah, secondary scoring line.

Anaheim went from not making the playoffs, to going to the semi's the next year and then winning the cup the next year. (If my memory is accurate anyways) And yeah I know they made the finals the year before that but that was all Giggy. Burke might not be a genious, but he certainly knows his stuff... if any other team lost a defenseman like scott niedermayer, they would be down and out, but Burke snags Schneider off the wings. And yeah I'm quite aware that Niedermayer is better than Schneider but that is a pretty damn good replacement. So you guys might not appreciate what he's doing for that club, but I recognize a good job when i see it.

That was inspiring. And yeah, I could see it. The Wings make bad players look good.

Some of the best news I've heard since the end of Detroit's season

ahahah, exactly... it didn't make sense as I read it. Last I heard, retirement meant you are done working. AKA Marty is done playing hockey.

exactly. Give Penner an offer that is low enough that if it works, we can fit him into our club, under the cap, but high enough that Burke will have trouble matching it. Someone has to stand up to this monster of a GM.

For a second I thought you were being serious.

Lang has hands... when he wants to use them. I'm really glad that he is gone, he is a huge floater and rarely lays a hit on anyone. I think that any of our young guys could replace his easily, but I would still prefer to get a secondary-scorer via free agency.

I don't believe I said anywhere that Markov is better than Rafalski, I just made the point about Rafalski being small and a puck handler. We already have Brett Lebda, the definition of a small Dman. Sure Markov may not be sniping the top shelf from the blue line, but ask any guy in the NHL and they'll tell you that he is no treat to play against. By the way, I'm not saying Rafalski doesn't hit or anything, but he just isn't as feisty as the M man.

I could not agree with you more. All our guys who have left so far - I'm personally glad they're out of Motown... for the most part. Lang - Goodnight. This guy has been hard to watch this past season, and for how much he is making, it is disturbing. Calder - Not a bad player, but he obviously wasn't getting the job done, he was a healthy scratch in the playoffs most of the time. Schneider - I'm gunna miss him, but for his age, he should not be commanding such a high salary, ... still kinda sad to see him go but Rafalski will replace him nicely. Bertuzzi - When the wings acquired him on the deadline, I was shocked. I could see how they wanted to improve the club by adding a big body and possibly a scoring threat upfront, but why risk it on a guy like Bertuzzi? I doubt he will ever be as good as he once was. And for 4 mil, no dice. We need to resign Markov, because as good as Rafalski is, he is not physical enough. We were lacking physical defencemen last season, and by adding Rafalski, we get another small, puck-moving defenseman. We still will not get the intimidating D-man we truly need. But as you said, We're fine..

i agree.

i cannot possibly agree with the statement that wings easily have the best 1-2 goaltending punch in the league. but i guess thats because i prefer the younger goalies and their technically sound positioning in comparison to flopping like a fish out of water. also because dom and chris are older. dont get me wrong though, they are pretty damn good

To Kindlwillbegreat: i didn't know about meech's situation... thats unfortunate. Hopefully the wings will be able to do something about this. maybe make a trade out of it. To Crymson: Yeah I'm aware that they all play the wing, i think holland will sign kozlov this summer and thats the only thing i didn't like about my line-up, putting him on it. so hopefully kenny proves me wrong and doesnt go after this guy and they have a centreman for that line instead. and on your point about cleary being second line material - i agree for the most part. there was a stretch of a month or two this season where danny was tearing it up, and he definitely deserves bigtime minutes when he is producing like that. although sometimes it looks like he couldnt finish a play if he had an empty net.. i guess thats just babcock using him as a grinder though.

Didn't you know? he can most certainly fly already.

I think this is fairly accurate as to what we will have next season...or what I hope we have Zetterberg Datsyuk Holmstrom Kozlov Smyth Bertuzzi (apparently Detroit is the front-runner in terms of getting RSmyth this offseason) Cleary Draper Maltby Filppula Franzen Hudler/Kopecky Lidstrom Kronwall Chelios Schneider Lilja Lebda (with Kindl, Quincey and Meech all being able to be called up) Hasek #1 Ogsood back-up Howard 3rd goalie