VM1138

Well, I'm an historian. I don't discount factual evidence. Again, you've used individual examples like they are stand-alone instances. When they create a pattern, you can't just ignore that. And like you cited with the incident with Chicago, that was one incident, not a multiple decade long string of embarrassing events. And why would the media exaggerate what happens only in Philly? Again, as a historian it's hard to just ignore the evidence. And I'm not trying to explain why nothing bad has ever happened around you there, maybe you're lucky. The point is, that on the whole, Philadelphia has MANY more instances of gross misbehavior with regards to big crowds on a consistent basis than any other city I can think of. That would certainly logically conclude in a statement that Philadelphia has a much higher number of douchebag sports fans than any other city. Not all of them, but a much higher number than most people are comfortable with.

Because Boston has such a winning record against us? I'm tired of this tough guy garbage. Last playoff run the Wings dished out more hits than the teams we played, and San Jose was a bruising team. Yeah, Boston is tough, but tough isn't what wins. A proper balance of skills wins. I'm not denigrating Boston, they're the best team right now, but in a 7 game series I like our chances still. EDIT: Like Mick said tonight, Boston didn't win the Cup because of their physicality. They won because Vancouver couldn't score.

Terrible, god-awful, not-very-good first period, rest of the game was exciting. Even though we're not really on the same plane quality-wise, it'd be nice to play Toronto more often. You can definitely tell there could be a rivalry if we played them more often. I'm beginning to not like these multiple odd-man rushes against every game, whether we win or lose. And it's becoming clearer and clearer we still need some more reliable scoring. Datsyuk was a beast tonight, though.

You know, I don't see what's so unfair about having unbalanced conferences. Those lower Eastern teams won't go far so so what if they get a round of playoff revenue? Not to mention that Phoenix will be moving east and basically balance out the old conferences. As far as travel goes, that was about as close to perfect as they were going to get. The NHLPA won't come up with anything better. You can only go so far in fairness in sports. There are simply some inherent disadvantages that everyone has to deal with.

You really think I'm basing my judgment on one event? Have you missed the last 40 years where Philly has more than earned the reputation as a hive of terrible sports fans? In every sport? Yeah, there are bad guys everywhere, but show me another town that CONSISTENTLY shows disgusting levels of violence and disrespect as Philly. Even Ken Dryden in his 1983 book recognized Philly as the worst sports fans. They had that reputation ALREADY back in the early 80s. They've earned it. And, for the record, anecdotal evidence of your personal experience does not trump evidence gathered by news media for the greater part of 40 years. I hate that kind of defense. "Well I've never seen anything bad, therefore it must not be bad." I've never been shot or raped in Detroit but it happens. And, just to put icing on the cake: recently a women was hit by THREE cars in Philly, they all drove off instead of stopping.

I really hope they realize the league can't survive another lockout. Even drama about the possibility of a lockout would kill the progress the league has made. The NHL won't recover.

Ah, once again the public suffers due to a pissing contest. Bettman should have included the NHLPA, and the NHLPA should just move on. f*** both of them.

I see your point, but Perry just seems to be a flash in the pan to me. Wasn't it Cheechoo who scored 50, too? And I'm not saying Franzen is light years better than Perry, but Franzen has rarely had a healthy season. Perry has had three good seasons. Since Franzen turned into the guy we all know in 2008, he had a 59 point season, and then after that the only close to full season he had was 2010, when the team was decimated with injuries and everybody struggled. Now that he's having a healthy season he's almost a point per game player, he should easily top is 55ish point plateau. I'm just saying that when everything is taken into consideration, it's not as clear cut as some here say it is.

The more I think about it, Ruutu might be a good fit. He's their leading goal scorer, yeah, but their top four or five are all pretty consistently similar. They might be willing to part with him for two solid guys or a player and a pick. I can't imagine a whole lot of teams are looking at him and offering anything. But I'm not familiar with his game, whether he's lazy or not. EDIT: Then again, he's not even a consistent 20 goal scorer. It's amazing how hyped some players get on these boards.

People need to take Franzen off the trading block. I know even I had a glimmer of a thought about trading him early in the season, but he's having a good year so far and he's still clutch (half his goals are game winners). Plus, his proven playoff performance means he stays. As the year progresses there are fewer and fewer players worth trading. Stuart is having a good year, and our defense is so good right now Holland won't want to mess with that. So it'd have to be a forward or pick trade. And nobody wants the forwards we could spare, at least not for a great player in exchange. Unless he can find a team who needs to rebuild and can offer just picks for a player. And let me point out that Franzen is having a better year than Perry. Perry is not some amazing player who will change this team. He's good, but not the player the Wings need.

So I dug this off of the HF Boards. Google has compiled old discussion groups and if you search for the Wings and narrow down different dates and names you can find some pretty interesting things. For instance this tidbit: http://groups.google.com/group/rec.sport.hockey/browse_thread/thread/3be94c97b1e5b074/fd74a298e5d28cb9?q=red+wings,+lidstrom Apparently the Rangers were interested in trading for young Swedish defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom. Egads, just picture Lidstrom playing for New York?! Anyway, just thought it was interesting and wanted to point it out to you guys. Fun to see what people thought of things back in the day.

Topic already being discussed here: But it's nice to have some added meat to the rumors. Very exciting!

Can Philadelphia please be stripped of any and all sports teams? Their fans are among the worst human beings I've ever seen. Consistently.

I do. Imagine the Leafs chants battling the Wings chants. It would make it memorable and casual fans would be hooked by the atmosphere. And let's not forget people, the Big House has giant screens that could play the action, too, doesn't it? Or would they not play during game time, even in such a situation?

Apparently the NHL thinks Lidstrom needs to. Their new poll on who should win the Norris doesn't even include him as an option. Shocking. On a serious note, Brodeur and DiPietro should. I can't beleive DiPietro got hurt again yesterday off-ice? How does any human get hurt that much, especially an athlete? Makes me wonder if he really gets hurt or he just can't play through any kind of discomfort. I hope someone writes a book about how dysfunctional the Islanders are. I can tell you who shouldn't retire: Selanne. The guy just keeps playing at a high level.

Screw Perry, but I'd love to have Getzlaf here. Just imagine the possibilities! He's just the kind of player we need. But naturally, every team will be after him and we don't have anything to offer for him.

That article makes it sound like fights are common on every team. Really? I can't recall one happening on the Wings since I've been old enough to pay attention to stuff like that. I don't really see how fighting your teammate will make the team play as a team, though. I've heard of fights from goofing around, but a serious one seems like it'd be more trouble than a part of "healing as a team." Montreal is such a screwed up organization.

They have to put Conklin in at some point, and the standings are goign to continue to be close. It's one of those situations where we might as well get it out of the way now while there's time to make up points. Put him in against an easy opponent and give him proper support. I just hope it's not against Buffalo, I'm going to that game in two weeks.

Agreed. Any Original 6 matchup would be great. Honestly, a Toronto-Detroit would probably best for ticket sales, since they're close enough to draw fans from both teams to fill the Big House, plus the fans are ridiculous. I don't know about TV viewing, but as far as attendance and participation goes that would be the biggest potential winner. Outside of the Original 6 San Jose would be a good game, but again, I don't know about the viewing audience which is probably the key factor. I don't see why Minnesota is being talked about so much. Fans there are great, but they have no national following outside of the state. They can't be relied on to sell a WC.

I've heard that the players generally consider certain things off-limits. I would imagine a racial slur is one of them. Suspension and fine. Multi-game for message sending.

Not too familiar with Ruutu, but the general opinion seems to be he'd be a better fit than Hemsky. We need a shooter more than anything. And I don't see why we would be looking for a defenseman. We have one of the best defensive lineups in the league, and there's no one movable. Any acquisition would have to be a bottom pairing defenseman, in which we already have Commodore who is willing to hit. That part of the article sounds sketchy to me.

I've been hoping and calling for a Detroit-Boston final for a while now. I still think it will happen.

Kind of a must-win for Detroit. Losing ground to Chicago and St. Louis right neck and neck with us...need to come away with a win tonight. Time for the team to start playing with some urgency.

Has anyone figured out how to pronounce his name yet? I guess since all the announcers call him "Kopetsky" that must be it, but then I wonder...why not just spell it that way? Haha. I don't know...getting sucker punched can do that to a guy on skates.

I wonder why myself. I find I don't post as much during games as I used to, but I'll post afterwards. I'm just trying to focus on enjoying the games rather than analyzing this year. Could it be that with the economy the way it is, more people are away working? I know a lot of people here work second and third shifts.