Z Winged Dangler

I think Drew Miller would be the prime candidate for that spot. Kind of like Meech. Didn't Miller used to play a mix of D and Fwd when he was younger?

Pretty sure I'm ahead of Emmerton on the depth chart.

That would be a really good line, but Nyquist is a top 6 type player. He should be on a line with Dats or Z.

Toe drag....snipe! Another 1 goal series victory for Canada over Russia and the fans in Halifax go apes***.

After finally getting around to reading that article, I liked that the players are being more reasonable than the initial dickweed proposal from the NHL, but at the same time, they didn't go into great detail as to what else was in the proposal and there's some things like contract length that seemed quite important to the owners. I hope that TSN isn't just leaving key info out of their stories to make a villian/hero scenarion with the owners/players. I'd like to see what else is in the players proposal. Don't want to read 8000 pages, but point form of each topic would be nice.

Last year, forcheck sucked. Cycle was ok. Lacking in drive could have been attributed to the injury rash and everyone playing hurt. Dats and Lids were out for portions so Z couldn't rest at all and Cleary was a medicine ball. Mule got hurt too, but we were better when he was out and Nyquist was at .7 ppg before he came back. The hunger and dirty, hard-nosed demolition men....we got Tootoo and Eaves should be good to go. We'll have more speed in the top 6 hopefully with slow ass Hudler gone and Nyquist and Brunner possible top 6 guys that both have wheels. Sammy's not half bad for speed too. The new angles and shot options completely changes the attack. The Wings will have something we haven't had in a number of years having almost no RH forwards for the better part of 5-6 years and that's the element of surprise. When you have a team with only 1 RH player, teams know you can't attack as good from the left side and they load up the D on the side that you can actually one-time the puck from and you can plug the opposing team with a small box defence. Look no further than Tampa. We don't have a guy who can shoot like Stamkos, but when you have him and St. Louis on the ice at the same time who can both pass great to the guy across the ice and blast one-timers, it makes the defence spread out more and gives the offence more opportunities to get the goalie moving side to side and get him out of position. We should see a lot more shots with the goalies less square than we're used to seeing.

Emmerton is gonna look awesome in an Islanders jersey when they take him off waivers.

You're just bummed cause we didn't get Dan Girardi.

Had to meh...don't think the image is showing up. i'll try again tomorrow if it doesnt' work. couldn't get the pic to go on here properly so i made it my new avatar pic. Duh...Winning! Cartoon Charlie Sheen believes in the Wings.

we saw Nyquist get a handful of games in the top 6 and then get relegated to the 4th line with Homer and Emmerton so Mule could float around. Also, Cleary was providing jack skating around on 1 leg. As good as Stuart's been, he wasn't all there last year and was terrible in the playoffs. Homer needs to just retire already and not take up a roster spot. Conklin provided no support as a back up and then Joey Mac got injured. Smith should have been in the lineup. And lastly off the top of my head, we had 1 right handed player. ONE! now we have on top of White 5. Brunner, Sammy, Tootoo, possibly Eaves back. That completely changes the way the Wings can attack the opposition being able to more efficiently use both sides of the ice and one-time from both sides and actually get the other teams goalie moving instead of tossing s*** at the net from the outside. Just wait dude. adding a mix of righty's to the Wings is gonna be just what the doctor ordered.

has Oulette even played? can't find any stats for it on TSN and Canada's D looks pretty stacked unlike our forward group that takes a lot of low percentage shots from the outside.

The team lost Lids and Stuart, but we'll be watching a team that's way younger than usual and will have way more jump cause of finally getting the youth injection at least most of us have been waiting for. I guess i'll stop trying to convince you things will be ok next year cause it's August and you're already counting the Wings out. Later bud.

And then I won't have to wait longer than usual to get my roster update in NHL 13 Regardless, I'm taking the week off when it comes out as per usual cause i'm awesome! On another side note as i'm more or less off topic, i feel bad for any guys who are gearing up for their rookie season, which includes Nyquist, Smith and Brunner i guess could be lumped in there as he's new to the NHL (hopefully NHL). I wish the sides negotiating had that mindset. And realistically, if I was the Commissioner, I would set a mandate for the NHL and NHLPA to have their CBA proposals on the table to start negotiations the day the season starts in the last year of the deal, so this should have been drafted in 2011. I would not want to be the only commissioner in sports history to have 3 lockouts in my tenure. 3 LOCKOUTS! unacceptable!

15 million per year for these 2 until they're in rocking chairs on a front porch? The contracts they were given are handcuffs to Minnesota, who in all likelyhood with their great depth will miss the playoffs yet again or creep into 8th. And that's far from "Holland losing his moxie", that's Suter's wife wearing the pants and dragging Parise along in the side car cause they want to play together for the rest of their natural lives. And the other moves are factors. They added grit and depth to the bottom 6 and opened up a chance for Brunner and Nyquist to play in the top 6 and Smith to play top 4 mins. Sammy for the 3rd line and Tootoo to play on the 4th with Abby. There will be a lot more line chemistry this year than last. Remember Nyquist getting stuck on the 4th line with Emmerton and Homer, cause I do. Already ranting as you were posting this one.

1. UFA age should be 25 2. Max player salary $9mil and max years of 6. 3. Remove the instigator rule 4. Players 50%, owners 50%...50/50 always seems fair. 5. Agree with Frankgrimes, can revenue sharing. Support your own team and spend to what part of the cap you can afford. The Wings, Rangers, Leafs, Bruins etc should be able to spend up to 5% over the cap if they're paying other teams salaries...which brings me to... 6. Teams that can afford to can pay up to 5% over the cap, matching the % they go over the cap to a fund of the NHLPA/NHL's choice, be it a charity to buy underpriveleged kids equipment or to do concussion research. 7. I don't care if no one at all agrees with this one, change the equipment. Get rid of the armor that keeps ending careers with headshots. Have league approved equipment that is made for the changes in the game. Keith Primeau was apparently working on an equipment line that used the material to make crocks as the padding for shoulder pads and such. The players, weist up should be using materials that are less impactful when they hit a player, especially in the head. 8. No more front loading contracts. You sign a guy for 5 years, 25 mil, then he gets 5 mil per year end of story.

The NHL-FU

Like Number9 stated berore, you're making another general statement on behalf of everyone on LGW. I for one am not unhappy with this offseason. 1. Let Hudler and his $4mil walk 2. Got Brunner 3. Nyquist and Smith should get the playing time they should have had last year 4. Sammy will adequately replace Hudler with comparable points and way better 2-way hockey 5. Gustavsson is a good back up 6. This years draft was awesome...not 1 guy under 6 feet 7. Signed Frk and Jurco to entry-level contracts. They're officially in the system. If any true Wings fan looks at this and thinks that Kenny did jack this summer with no willing trade partners, then they need to take a step back. There's only so much a GM can do when the only guy willing to trade with the Wings is the former captain of the team. Until he overpays in a trade for JBo (Flip,Nyquist or Smith involved) or signs a terrible contract like 4 years, 30 mil for Doan then I for one will give him credit for at least trying.

My last 2 posts were on topic and somehow they disappeared while cougar's posts are on here that are much less constructive and just bash the Wings completely and all our guys one at a time. Here's something on topic....Detroit is the best place in the NHL to play cause you have a chance to WIN every year, even the last 3 which ended in busts. It's not Kenny's fault that other GM's in the NHL are so jealous of the success the Wings have had for over 2 decades and none of them want to be known as the guy that added to it and kept the Wings at the top. That is the reason that Kenny couldn't plan for Nicks retirement properly, cause no one would deal him anything. Hence the 3 way trades involving Tampa cause Stevie Y is there. Maybe guys should cut Kenny some slack cause of those reasons. At least we got some good prospects and Brunner wanted to come over to the NHL specifically to the Wings. Let's give these guys a shot before we hang Kenny for his actions over the past 3 years. Esteef....don't bash me on this one bud

Maybe we should trade for a Vancouver Canuck that will stick up for teammates by biting dudes...? Maybe then they'll think twice about running our guys. Doesn't matter who you sign, there's always an idiot out there that'll run your guys no matter what team. Any guess as to why? Cause the instigator is there to make sure little punks don't get destroyed by angry motherf***ers that can police the game better than refs. Tootoo will be more effective when the NHL gets some balls and cans the instigator and returns respect to the game amongst players.

Kronwall is a capable #1 dman. If you don't think so, then you need to watch more Wings games. If you watch lots of Wings games already, you need to pay attention to them. As for #2, just wait for Smith to show all you guys the way to be a #2 dman as a rookie and win the Calder. If Bouwmeester comes here, he should anchor the 2nd pairing with White or Ericsson. Things aren't as bad as they seem and worst case scenario another young guy gets a shot...Almqvist, Sproul, Lashoff. there's always an option whether it be a tryout for a young guy or trade for a top 4 like JBo.

Tootoo was awesome when he played for the Brandon Wheat Kings. Often drove there from Winnipeg with my buddy to see them play. He's always been a wrecking ball and he put up good numbers in the WHL too. You'll come around. Tootoo's good s***.

First thing i thought too...laughed a little at that. Overall, it looks like a very useless stat and it seems like the kind of thing developed by someone with way too much time on their hands. And if there's a stat for shots high and wide, Franzen gets #1 for sure. On a side note, there goes Emmerton's trade value.

That's more or less the package that i'd give up if i were Holland. Tatar is a really good prospect, Emmerton can be a good depth/role guy and Kindl could work out well for the Flames with more responsibility and ice time. With a $6.6 mil price tag, that automatically drops JBo's trade value cause the other team is eating his salary and his past 3 seasons all under 30 points leaves much to be desired as Drake said. There's no way Kenny offers more than that, but at the same time, we need another Dman to jump in the 7th position if Kindl goes. I wish Janik was still here to be that guy. Also, with Bouwmeester on the trading block, teams know that the Flames need/want to get him out to shed salary and beef up their terrible roster with at least a couple good players.

just look at my sig, it'll be there all season. there's your surprise list. and i think Smith takes the Calder. Nyquist runner up followed by draft lottery Yakupov. Emmerton will be in a package deal for Bouwmeester and hopefully Cleary scores 20....for the Flames.