StormJH1

I don't know if people were saying they should've BUILT a rink, just that it sucks we're not getting real "Olympic" hockey. There's irony in the fact that they had to compromise the whole identity of Olympic hockey because the host country happened to already HAVE hockey facilities in place (albeit a smaller size).

I'm a Minnesota Wild "follower". It's a fairly even deal. On the face of it, you're getting the #4 pick (Pouliot) for the #45 pick (Latendresse) in the 2005 draft, but Pouliot was not working out at all. Jacques Lemaire hated him, but even the new coach hasn't been giving him regular playing time. The skill is there to score 20 goals, but he's also pretty soft and doesn't do anything particularly well. Latendresse was a rushed prospect and got butchered by his hometown fans, so there's a chance things change around with a fresh start.

Yeah, I was gonna say, we should just retire Bertuzzi now then. The league should've grown a pair and made him sit out 2005-06 after the lockout, rather than pretending like they actually punished him for what he did.

I'll accept it. I said that 5-10 games was the range of suspension I thought appropriate for the offense. But the league has boxed themselves in so often under-penalizing other actions, so 5 games is realistic given that unfortunate history. For those keeping score at home: Careless clubbing a guy in the face with a stick blade and then blantantly tripping someone and causing ligament damage within a 15-second period are worth only one less game than talking about your ex-girlfriend's ****** in front of a television camera. Got it.

They did. But we have reset our expectations to a more realistic level. The Red Wings have a crappy draft position year-in-year-out, and yet have had a great track record nabbing a few elite level players with extremely low draft picks. But just like any other team, they've missed on far more prospects than they've hit on. Helm was a 5th round draft pick, and was never really hyped as being a legimiate Top 6 goal scorer in the NHL. He played nearly a full season in the AHL in 07-08 and scored 16 goals. Those should be his expectations. But put on the Winged Wheel and suddenly people think you're a hidden gem. Plus, he played out of his mind in both of the last two playoffs, yet still only scored 4 goals in 23 playoff games last year. Even if he kept that level up over a full regular season, that still only put him on pace for 12-15 goals. Ericsson hasn't looked as steady either, but the obvious counter to that would be that he was basically Nicklas Lidstrom's defense partner once Rafalski went down last year. This year, he plays with Lebda. Yeah, a little different. Leino has disappointed me too, though only to the extent that he hasn't generated a lot on his own. But when the opporunties are there for him, he has shown an ability to finish plays that you can't teach. Again, though, as good as he was in Finland, his AHL numbers last year weren't even as good as Helm's, so you have to have realistic expectations.

And my question to you was "Do you honestly think Kronwall got injured because May wasn't in the lineup?" I'm not sure that you ever implied it would have made a difference, but if you did, I disagree. I look at the problems with this team (even before the injuries started), and it just strikes me that you can't solve "toughness" issues with guys who are regularly going to be healthy scratches because they can't play. (Don't get me wrong, Brad May has actually surprised me with how well he has played, and that goal against Dallas should have counted and been a huge play). But just like you can't add "team speed" by trotting out a 4th-line player who happens to be fast, you can't add team "toughness" using 4th-line hacks who are pushing it if they get 8 minutes of ice time. And you certainly can't change it mid-season acquiring out-of-work waiver wire veterans. I'm a Red Wings fan, and to a certain extent, your team just is what it is. If my team of choice were the Ducks or Flyers, I might watch the games looking foward to seeing my guys cheapshot other players and manhandle opponents. But neither of those teams have a player that can dangle like Pavel Datsyuk, or possess the all-around game of Zetterberg. When an opposing player cheapshots and injures one of our players, why does that have to be a failure of the Wings organization? Anybody can cheapshot anyone else, just as easily as you could go grab a steak knife from the kitchen and stab someone on the street. But you don't b/c that doesn't interest you and b/c there are repricussions. I'm mad at Laraque, I'm mad at the league for not coming down harder on this stuff, but where you and I differ is that I don't see it as a failure of my team when stuff like this happens. It happens to every team in the league, including (arguably) teams that Kronwall has played against.

Exactly. Good luck with the boring Lemaire neutral zone jam-job on Olympic ice. See ya! Haha.

Hate it. And I raised that point in the other thread about Olympics. The way I look at it is this: the players nowadays are so much bigger, stronger, and faster than in the days of Howe, Lindsay, and Delvecchio, that the rink should've increased in size many years ago to keep up the integrity of the game. By the 90's, you had these super-skilled athletes playing in the equivalent of a fish bowl. Now, we're stuck in some weird limbo phase where we want the game to be more "European" and high scoring (no two-line passes, obstruction), yet we apply those rules to the same dinky rink. Also, the biggest lie is that there's no hitting on the Olympic rinks. B.S. I'm pretty sure anyone who rips on Olympic hockey never actually watched the Torino Olympics. The commentators were even noting how guys like Teemu Selanne who were labled as finesse pansies by NHL fans played like physical power forwards on the big ice when it was a pride matchup like Sweden v. Finland on the line.

I think we're screwed. It's good to see us moving in the direction of younger and faster to compete with the European teams (and Canada), but out of the 21 players you listed above, if all of those players were Canadian, how many of them would make the Canadian team? I count two or three, maybe: Kane, Parise, and Rafalski. That's it. I also don't have faith in any of the U.S. goaltenders on that type of a stage (Thomas' Vezina was the product of a great defensive Bruins team...see Manny Fernandez's numbers from that year if you don't believe that) Plus, at the very time our team is getting smaller and faster, we're going to an Olympics in Vancouver played on NHL-SIZED rinks. In other words, if our one shot was to build a finesse team based on skating, hard work, and chemistry, we'll be playing a style of game totally different from past Olympics on international-sized rinks. So, our players could play more like they would in the NHL, and we don't have the best NHL players. But the tournaments are quick and crazy, and there's a lot of screwy stuff that goes on with referreeing, etc., so you never now. U-S-A! U-S-A!

This is exact same argument that justified the war in Iraq. No, I'm not bringing politics into this, but the logic is identical: Something really bad happened --> Our two choices are do SOMETHING or don't do anything --> Doing something will make me feel more secure than doing nothing, so... --> Let's hire a bunch of goons! (or invade Iraq) Your only real argument is that if we do nothing we're "guaranteed" of not doing anything to solve the problem. But if you really can't prevent someone like Georges Laraque from cheapshotting a Red Wing (and you especially can't prevent Franzen or Williams from getting hurt from plays not involving cheap shots), then the truth is that no matter what that "something" you do is, it's not going to have any effect on making your team safer. Plus, the human body is what it is. No amount of "toughness" is going to improve the structural integrity of Kronwall's MCL. And even if somebody Laraque were afraid of retribution from another team's goon (which he's not), the instigator rule shields him from having to fight someone he doesn't want to. Just ask Cody McLeod, Jordin Tootoo, Cal Clutterbuck or any number of NHL pansies who run around playing as rough as they want because they never have to fight someone they don't want to. (And, no, the solution is not to do away with the instigator rule b/c then the whole sport would turn into a WWE match.

Without even reading this thread, I can tell you that there will be people saying that this is the whole reason we needed Brad May, and that we need 2 more Brad Mays on our team to get even tougher and prevent it from happening. But that's completely wrong, and what Laraque did is a perfect example of it. You can't prevent guys from getting hurt. Period. Georges Laraque is a garbage player who has no role in this league other than to intimidate and possibly injure opposing players. If we have a goon, and Montreal and every other team has a goon, does that mean that the other team's goon is going to stop doing what he does? Of course not. The only reason Georges Laraque is in the league so that my goon can fight your goon everytime somebody hurts one of your players. It's a sideshow and a mini-game within the NHL. And it does nothing to prevent injuries. I follow the Minnesota Wild also, and I can tell you that there probably isn't a more feared goon I'm not opposed to fighting in the NHL, but the idea that the fighting culture can "solve" the recklessness of the game, which is becoming faster and more brutal by the day, is a joke. Nobody can solve it but the league. Baseball has a "tradition" of bench clearing brawls that are an embarassment for the sport. Hockey and basketball ended that tradition by making it an automatic supsension to leave the bench. Hockey has the power, with the suspension, to remove these careless plays from the game, and they should do it, instead of worrying about Sean Avery and "sloppy seconds."

I don't care if Bertuzzi had 10 goals right now, I never wanted him on this team. It's an embarassment. You aren't even getting a shadow of what he was in 2002...the guy plays like he's on sedatives. And yes, he's lazy and his reactions are slow. He's like a forward version of when we had "Maid" Derian Hatcher on this team.

Whether or not there was a goal judge should be irrelevant. Replay is far more accurate than a goal judge is spur of the moment, but it wasn't properly used here.

And again, I simply cannot believe that this ref would've told Toronto that he ACTUALLY meant to blow the play dead while the puck was still in play. The timing of his whistle was 100% appropriate...why the hell would he lie and say that he did his job wrong? This was on Toronto to fix this, and they screwed it up.

The problem with that is that the referee never made the "intent to blow whistle" argument...that's just what Alex Auld said, and his opinion is irrelevant. What the ref on the ice actually said was that the puck went in after the whistle blew. That's a factual statement, not a judgment call. And not only is it patently false, but it should be totally reviewable and they STILL screwed it up! But even if the league does come out and defend the ref based on his "intent" (they haven't said anything yet, right?), that doesn't work either. If you watch that ref, he SAW the play. He didn't budge until the puck was in the net and that's when he blew the whistle. The only mistake he made was the initial call (not seeing that the puck was in the net). So, given that set of facts, how can you argue that the ref "intended" to blow the whistle any earlier than he did? The NHL's only argument to defend its ref is to say that the ref actually intended to make the wrong call (that the play was dead), but made the right call by accident (waiting to blow the whistle). NICE!

Okay, first of all, we need to tone down the conspiracy talk here. It's fun to kick around now and then, but do you honestly believe that the league thinks it could stop the Wings from making it to another Cup Final by strategically blowing obvious calls in non-descript regular season games in November? What's the plan, to make us finish out of the Top 8 in the West? I don't think so. We know that fans of other teams occasionally visit this board, and I'd hate for them to get the impression that we've got nothing better to do but cry about how unfair it is to be a Wings fan. That said, the call was terrible. Intent to blow the whistle? Two things wrong with that: (1) Why would you intend to blow the whistle for a puck that was free in the slot? Besides, the ref's explaination after the phone call was that the puck went into the net AFTER the whistle blew, which is a factual inaccuracy. (2) Look at Auld's face when he stands up from his butterfly. He knows he just got scored on, and the reason he knows that is because he did a butterfly with his left toe in the net! There was never any question about where the puck was--it wasn't trickling into the net. Auld was positioned wrong, such that it hit him and was ALREADY in the net.

Agreed (though there are certainly other Wings like Datsyuk and Zetterberg that could end up being "shoe-ins" some day, but it's just too early to tell. Then there's Chris Osgood. I agree that he's by no means a "shoe-in", but I also feel like the story is not finished with him yet. Much like nobody thought of Kurt Warner as a "hall of famer" until he resurrected his career with the Cardinals, Osgood is still in the process of scripting his comeback phase. And it's almost as if he's negatively impacting his credentials by hanging around, unless he makes another strong playoff performance in 2010. But even though all the credentials are there for a # retirement (IMO), you also feel like there are at least 20 goalies in the NHL right now that (if they were Red Wings) would seriously threaten his regular season job. And the longer that goes on, the less I'm inclined to put #30 in the rafters (if that makes any sense).

First of all, the guys above arguing that Draper and Maltby had any remote chance of ever getting their name in the rafters are nuts. If Shanahan and Fedorov are even questionable, then the Grind Line has ZERO chance. Retired numbers are for iconic players, not guys who played for you a long time and made super-awesome Little Caesar's commercials. I don't think Shanahan will have his number retired, and I'm starting to think Fedorov won't either (but I think Fedorov is probably deserving). But it's not for the reasons you said. I disagree with the "defining a franchise" definition. First, if you do have a defining player (like Howe or Yzerman), it's not impossible that their may be other H of F caliber players also on that team deserving of a number retirement (like Lidstrom and Fedorov with Yzerman, or Lindsay and Delvecchio in the 50's). You can't penalize Fedorov for Yzerman being around. Yzerman resurrected the "Dead Wings" and is obviously #2 or #1a in terms of "most important Red Wings" (up with Howe). But without Fedorov, Yzerman couldn't make this into the elite team that they became by '94 and '95. Shanahan also added the "missing piece" of toughness that was necessary in its own way to make us a Stanley Cup champion, but his contributions were not as significant as Fedorov's. I totally agree with Fedorov's famous quote that if he were named "Sam" instead of being Russian, he would've been viewed much differently. But I became more convinced that he'll never have his number retired after hearing Holland talk about how much they debated trading for him internally before the '08 Cup run. The fact that they were so conflicted (and chose not to do it) tells me that there really are lingering issues there. And we know that this organization does hold grudges (ask #6). From a technical standpoint, though, it's somewhat of a moot point b/c nobody will have the balls to come out wearing a #91 on the back of a winged wheel jersey. Therefore, in Illitch's mind, it's really only the question of whether or not you want to extend this symbolic gesture to a guy that they feel wouldn't properly appreciate it, and whom many fans still dislike to this day (for reasons that largely escape me). That's why I don't believe it will ever happen. But if Shanny gets it and Fedorov doesn't, I might throw up.

For Kane, perhaps moreso last year than this year. I hear he's going to work for HBO to be the new interviewer/driver for Taxicab Confessions.

Yep, that's exactly what I said in the post after yours. The Hossa contract is a joke (and by extension, so are the Zetterberg and Franzen deals, to a lesser degree). I don't even know why the league has a hard salary cap if they're going to allow this to go on. The 24-year, $80 million deal I outlined above is not fundamentally different from what was done with Hossa, Zetterberg, or Franzen--it's just a matter of degree. But the NHL has not stepped in yet to define what that upper boundary of absurdity should be.

Remember when the league was looking at the Progner and Hossa contracts over the summer, but nothing came out of it? It will be interesting to see if they test their luck further here, by doing somethign crazy, such as signing them to a 24-year deal for $80 million total into their mid-40's, front loading the salaries for their early years (as in, before they RETIRE), and having a cap hit of $3.33 million a year. Hey, if anyone had the balls to try it, it'd be the Hawks.

Twitter shouldn't really be this huge innovation in how we communicate, but it tends to SEEM like that because people don't understand that posting something on Twitter isn't any different than if you were carrying around a microphone with you 24/7. I don't know much about sports agent do's and dont's, but I'm guessing that criticizing/mocking teammates of your player is not a classy or effective means of promoting your client. Halak and Price should have a friendly competition, but it also should be a working relationship, and now Halak's agent is basically putting words in his mouth.

Haha, SpiritFan beat me to it! I thought the Panthers guy is hilarious. I heard about him on the radio, and I'm pretty sure that viewers get to submit things for him to say on the air, and he either picks his favorite or there's some other type of contest to determine what he goes with. Hey, for a crap franchise like that with zero following and no tradition, I think it's great. Anything you can do to make the game fan-friendly. Sure, maybe you could care less if the Panthers score a meaningless goal in March to contend for the 12th spot in the East, but you'd definately be listening to hear if "YOU STAY CLASSY, SAN DIEGO!" got picked b/c it was YOUR idea. Haha.

Okay, two responses: (1) I thought the hit was clean and should not have been a suspension. Richards damn near kills a guy from his blind-side, and here was an identical hit face-to-face with no momentum built up, how does THIS one get a supsension? (2) I completely disagree that there is a double-standard AGAINST the Ducks whereby they receive more penalties/suspensions. I think it's exactly the opposite. The Ducks over the past few years (at least during the Pronger era) established a reputation as a team that plays physical and pushes the boundaries of the rules. Therefore, if Pronger or Getzlaf made a questionable play, the refs more often than not let it go because it's "just the Ducks being the Ducks". If some Euro like Datsyuk or Zetterberg made the same play, the refs would be stunned and appalled and throw them in the box for 2 minutes for sure, b/c it looks "out of character". That's my view on penalties. I'm not familiary with a systemic bias relating to suspensions against the Ducks, but honestly, I think the whole thing is out of whack, and it's based more on player reputation and perceived intent than what team you play for. There probably is a bias favoring stars, but other than the Mike Richards thing, I can't think of tons of examples where superstar players commit clear suspendable offenses and get away with it.

Feel free to have your opinion, but if you come away with the idea that the Oilers deserved to win or the Wings deserved to lose a 65 minute hockey game because of something analgous to a free throw/slam dunk competition, I can't help you. 4-on-4 OT hockey is some of the most entertaining hockey there is. Why give a point to the losing team? Expand it to 10 minutes (which would probably be completed in less time than it takes them to resurface part of the ice and go 3 or more rounds in a shootout anyway). Heck, make it so that it's 3 on 3 following any stoppage after the 5:00 mark. I refuse to accept that teams wouldn't be interested in winning when the difference between losing and winning is 2 points instead of 1. Also, it's a heck of a lot different to try and play for a tie holding out for 10 minutes, as opposed to 5. The shootout is a joke, and the fact that some of the best scorers in the NHL are some of the worst shootout takers (including Ovechkin, I believe, who is extremely ordinary at it) tells you all you need to know. Nobody ever watched a NBA 3-point contest and concluded that Mark Price was the best player in the NBA.