GMRwings1983

Well, we deserved to lose this game. I knew there's no way in hell we'd win 2 straight shootouts. Here are my thoughts on the game. 1. We gave up too many odd-man rushes, and our backchecking was horrible. That's not a very good combination. The guys looked a little lazy tonight. 2. I told you all before the game that Robert Lang = Mr. Clutch, and that he'd score a big goal late in the 3rd. Damn me for always being right. 3. Drake is going to get murdered by game 10 if he keeps this up. Time to call up Downey, especially if Franzen is hurt. I'm sure you all saw the way Koci was running at our players. 4. The lines combos look bad so far through 2 games. I don't see any chemistry out there whatsoever unless Pavel and Hank are creating it. 5. Rafalski looks like he's fitting in well, but he's got to cut down on the turnovers, especially on the shorthanded goal we gave up. 6. It's stil difficult for me to accept the fact tha Samuelsson is going to get a lot more ice time. I'm tired of his idiotic spin-around moves which are destined for turnovers.

As I've said before, Lang and Williams will carry them into the playoffs.

That's a good point, especially since we've already matched our fight quota for the season. However, with the "pain train" in the lineup, other teams are forced to dress enforcers against us.

Thank you for that post. I agree with everything you say, and it's amazing how people here have so bought into Holland's bulls*** that they've forgotten that no other organization has the same idiotic philosophy on this subject that the Wings have. Enforcers have existed for a long time in hockey, and they haven't been on teams just for the sake of being on teams.

Lang is going to play harder then we've ever seen him play before. I expect him to hit everything in sight, battle for loose pucks, fly through the neutral zone, and finally finish us off with a clutch goal late in the dying seconds of the 3rd period. Who knows, maybe he'll skate past Babcock afterwards and give him that infamous wink to say I told you so.

Some of you should be working for Holland's PR team. I wonder if any other team's fans are so proud of the fact that their team has no enforcer. Liking your team doesn't mean you have to buy into everything the GM believes in. I'm just convinced that Holland has no clue as to what he's doing on this particular topic.

PP opportunities aren't as important as keeping your players healthy in the long run. When Pronger hit Homer in the playoffs, you were probably the only Wings fan who was rejoicing over the minor fact that we got a 5 minute powerplay, even though the game was already over on the scoreboard. The rest of us wanted revenge. You and I will never agree on this topic, but I just fail to understand how we can't win and have an enfocer at the same time. I don't see the 2 as being mutually exclusive.

I love Homer, but neither him nor any other Wing are going to do anything when our players get run at. Downey wouldn't eliminate cheapshots because they will always be a part of the game, but having an enforcer does deter the likelihood of it happening. Just look at it from a common sense perspective. Who do you think teams are more willing to take runs at, Wings players, or say for instance Duck players, or even any other team in the league? Of course us, because they know that we're not going to do anything about it. It's always easiest to bully someone that you know won't fight back. As a fan I'd feel better knowing that when s*** goes down, we'll have someone there to stand up for the team in case a brawl breaks out. This way we don't have to see Lilja or Samuelsson drop the gloves. And for the last time, why are we treating Kopecky or Ellis as valuable 4th liners. What have they done to show that?

You're wrong once again. How's 1 enforcer going to change what we try to do as a team. We're still going to be a skilled puck possession team no matter what. Do Boogaard or McGrattan take away from what their teams try to accomplish? Did Dave Semenko hold the Oilers back in the 80's from being a top team? I guarantee you Downey would do more for this team than what Kopecky or Ellis can do. As I've said before, Holland is a good GM, but he's done a horrible job of managing this enforcer situation over the last 5 years. His idea of an enforcer is a guy who can score 20 goals, and not pick up any minor penalties. Well, looks like this will be another year where I'll know that I'm cheering for the pussiest team in the league, and yeah I'm a little embarassed about that to say the least.

I still think that Probie's 1st fight with Craig Coxe is the best hockey fight that I've ever seen. Also, who can forget his fight with Scott Parker when Probert was with Chicago. Absolutely classic.

Personally, I wouldn't give any of these guys a shot if I'm a GM in the NHL, except for maybe Markov, but only if he lowers his asking price. P.S. Did anybody know that Tony Amonte was still in the NHL? It was sad watching him against us last year in the playoffs being a complete non-factor.

Nothing beats those brawls in the 70's and 80's though. I'd love to have been around back then to watch some of the scrums that broke out.

Thanks for the info. I just saw the replay of that fight, and Boogaard did get dropped with a few punches. I'm still not ready to say that he has a weak chin, because every fighter gets dropped from time to time. With the size of some of the enforcers nowadays in the league, there's no way a fighter is going to be immune from ever getting tagged, unless he just grabs on for dear life like Brashear or Laraque do.

I think the "pain train" will take exception to your comment come Saturday night. Koci's going down midway through the 1st period.

I don't think there's anything wrong with Boogaard's chin. I don't know about his minor league days, but I've never seen anyone drop him at the NHL level. Laraque just wrestles him down, so that has nothing to do with his chin. Don't forget that Joey Kocur had the hardest punch ever in the league, but he go dropped on several occasions in his career. When you have the hardest punch, you tend to take more chances to try to land that big punch, thus often leaving yourself vulnerable. However, as I stated earler, I've yet to see that happen to Boogaard.

Go to dropyourgloves.com, and from there click on the big link on the left which says NHL Fights. After that, you should see the link for year by year fight data on the middle of the page. Hope that works.

I'd call it a draw, because although Koci controlled most of the fight, Boogaard landed the best punches of the fight. Koci fought very wide open last year, but was smart in this fight to not go toe to toe with Boogaard.

What the hell do they need Havlat for? They got one of the most clutch players in the league now in Robert Lang. Not to mention now that he's reunited with Williams, the best tandem in the league is back together.

To all you anti-fighting haters on this board, don't you think it's ironic how when one fight breaks out at a Wings game, we're already wanting to give nicknames to the player involved in it? One fight. The same thing happened when Lilja finally dropped the gloves last year. Neither Drake nor Lilja pummeled their opponents, yet it got a huge response from both the fans at the game and the people on this board. I can't even imagine what will happen here when Downey is called up and he fights every other game. Drake is 39 years old, yet he did something that no one on our team was willing to do last year when guys like Perry were running our players. We beat this topic to death over the summer, but even then I was sure there were many anti-fighting hypocrites here who would be overjoyed when a fight finally broke out. That shows you how long we've lacked fighting in hockeytown, that when it finally happens, we're ready to canonize Dallas Drake of all people.

I hope that you're joking about Franzen scoring 30 goals. Just because he scored that great goal to beat Calgary doesn't mean that he's all of a sudden a scoring machine.

With replays being used the way they are now, I'm not sure how long we'll see goal judges anymore, and that was brought up during the telecast last night. However, I don't think these changes would have been allowed if there was a chance that it might create more mistakes.

There seems to be one big flaw in your suggestions. What's the point of getting rid of the instigator rule if you're only dressing 16 skaters. Who's going to do all the fighting, the star players? If you eliminate the 4th line, you eliminate grit from hockey, as well as those underdog hard workers that every team's fans love to cheer for.

I guarantee you that Anaheim's players didn't receive as many chepshots last year as we did, and that's because other teams knew that they had tough guys in the lineup to deal with such problems. Less cheapshots means less injuries, and less injuries means a greater likelihood of team success. As far as I see it, as long as the instigator rule is around, you need goons out there to deter players like Nieminen, Tootoo, and Pronger. And for those who are afraid of giving up roster spots, come on already. You make it sound like we have all-stars on every line for crying out loud. I assure you most Wings players would love to have a tough guy in there to watch their backs.

No big deal with what he did. I would have also liked to see him deke, but it's not like he tried a slapshot or a wraparound. Now that would have been interesting to see.

But when you say that fighting isn't essential to success as a team, that is the same as being against it ever happening, because then you're saying there's no use for it. Personally, I think that if our players get run from behind and injured, that does affect our success as a team. Besides, I don't see how my original post was intended to start a flame war? It was just an ironic take on what we've been arguing about all summer.