StormJH1

I have to preface this by saying I'm an out-of-market fan (Minnesota), so I'm not a regular 97.1 listener and I'm not exposed to media coverage as a whole of the Red Wings. But I do stream in 97.1 or listen to podcasts from Valenti & Foster in particular, and their attitude towards Red Wings coverage really irritates me. Basically, their logic is as follows: Red Wings fans are "bandwagon" fans (which they don't find particularly shameful, since it's true of every market) The fans "know" this isn't a Cup team Any time they try to bring up a Red Wings topic, the phone lines more or less go dead... Therefore: 97.1's talk radio shows aren't going to spend significant time covering a product that most Detroiters aren't interested in. This logic is appalling to me for several reasons. First, isn't 97.1 the broadcast partner of the Detroit Red Wings? Don't they feel a professional responsibility to push the narrative in the direction of teams they actually put on their airwaves, particularly if it's a team on a playoff run, as opposed to more talk about Titus Young getting arrested? Second, even if I assume that this podcast (05/17/13) came on the heels of a pretty bad Game 1 loss to Chicago, is that even true that the fans all "know" this team isn't going to succeed in the Playoffs? They talk about the Wings like they're total dog crap - this team went 10-5-3 (IIRC) in their last 18 and stole a 7th spot when most national media were writing the obituary for their playoff streak. Does anyone actually think a low seed is a death sentence in the NHL Playoffs? (See 2010 Flyers; 2012 Kings) Third, if you're a radio station that tells listeners that their listeners don't care about their product, should you be surprised if your listeners don't just take their energy to other radio stations, LGW, or other forums for discussion? I guess I don't get it - here in Minnesota, the Vikings get year-round coverage even at the expense of the Wild, but the Wild are also a recent expansion team that's won all of two Playoff series EVER. I'd like to think the Red Wings have a bit more equity built up with their fanbase. Do you agree with Valenti & Foster that Hockeytown is "dead", or are they creating their own problem for their show and network? (How do I edit a thread title to fix the typo in "Hockeytown"? Whoops )

Absolutely. Look, any direct comparison to Datsyuk is going to sound ridiculous because they will NEVER be another player quite like #13. But if you watched Datsyuk play in that first rookie season (2001-02), Nyquist reminds me a lot of what I saw from Datysuk in those early years. Datsyuk had obvious creativity and puckhandling skills, but he'd string about 2 or 3 ideas together and then would either run out of ideas, run out of time, or get planted on his butt. What made Datsyuk into a world-class star was his work effort, added upper body strength, his dedication to the 2-way game, and the added experience of what he could do with the puck in the NHL. Logic tells you that a 34-year-old Datsyuk can't be as explosive as he was 10 years ago, but his game (like Larionov before him) is so cerebral that I swear there are times he's playing better hockey now than he ever has. Before this year, Tatar was the player that I thought was most "Datsyuk"-like. Over the past month or so, I've become a huge Nyquist fan. That stick check he does is so similar to Datsyuk's, it's almost as if he taught it to him one-on-one. Time will tell if Nyquist has the additional tools to put it all together, but could you think of a better mentoring situation than playing around 13 and 40? The idea that we have Nyquist, Tatar, and Jurco, and if two out of those three could become even 70% of what Datsyuk and Zetterberg are, this team could be in better shape than most people predicted.

I actually don't hate Valenti's overall "act", and I'm a Michigan grad! I follow him on Twitter, and I've seen him harder on MSU that the vast majority of the State fans, and I've seen him praise Michigan where appropriate. It doesn't even bother me that media personnel have inherent biases, so long as they own up to that. Along those lines, I suppose if he makes it regularly clear that hockey isn't his thing, then so be it. I just reject the premise that this isn't a big sports story right now. While the Tigers have been good, the only other Detroit championship in a "major sport" since 1990 was the '04 Pistons, and that team is just a disaster right now (and also not playing). What the Red Wings are doing right now is a huge HOCKEY story in both U.S. and Canadian national media outlets, so I think V & F are delusional if they think there isn't a critical mass of Detroiters that are consumed by it also.

I've loved Babcock's coaching from day one - he's a one-of-a-kind. Everything from his personality, to the respect he demands from his players, to his level-headed demeanor on the bench (and of course, that stare) exudes confidence. More importantly, he seems to have an idea in his mind of what needs to happen, and everybody from the 4th line center to the media knows that he's going to stick with it without panicking and changing things every two games. I admit that I was not a fan of the Abdelkader thing when he started doing that. Yes, the team's record has been great since he did that, but that line (and Datsyuk, in particular) did not do well for quite some time. Doing that not only created a balanced top line (and made #8 suddenly look like a legit Top 6 forward), it allowed the Griffins' kids to stay in the lineup and develop their own chemistry on those 3rd and 4th lines. Babcock makes teams better by the end of the year. People surprised by what's going on right now still have a mental image of that February team that was a defensive mess. They won't have that image for too much longer.

On the 97.1 topic, I understand that a lot of people don't listen to talk radio, period, and don't expect much out of a national CBS affiliate. I have SiriusXM and listen to tons of podcasts. Message boards obviously have replaced a lot of the desire people have to congregate and discuss/complain about their team. But it's not like the radio show doesn't have callers and listeners, so it probably says something if they aren't interested in the Wings. That "something" might just be that the hosts are a couple of tools who are only interested in discussing whatever they consider to be the "most popular" contact at a time. Half the time I tune in, that topic is something like Kwame, which isn't even sports at all. But if not there, then where? Can anyone name a better audio format for immediate Red Wings discussion and reaction? Especially given that they're the channel that promotes and broadcasts Wings games? The Marek vs. Wyshynski podcast had a pretty good discussion on Game 3. Wyshynski took a bunch of heat on Twitter for basically stating the obvious, which is that the refs messed up the Shaw interference call, and that "two wrongs don't make a right" with the missed illegal hit on Franzen that led to the Kane goal. He also said that it's stupid and non-sensical for Wings fans to pretend like they are "owed" a bad call because of all the years of bad calls against Holmstrom (and other crap, like "intent to blow"). I agree with Wyshynski, except I don't think any sane fan actually thinks the Wings were owed that call as "compensation for past wrongs". My argument would be: "Yep, they got it wrong, but since that happens to everyone, stop complaining and just overcome it". You could look to 20 other things that explain why CHI is down 2-1 in this series besides one bad call, ranging from Toews' absence to Crawford's crappy rebound control, to better physicality/role player play by Detroit.

I don't get the sense that either Valenti or Foster are particularly huge hockey fans, but they seem knowledgeable enough to carry a conversation about them (and I've heard them do so in the past). Valenti was the one pushing the "bandwagon" aspect more than Foster, so that may or may not be Foster's view. There has been discussion after discussion on this site and elsewhere about whether this is a "spoiled" fanbase, if it's "playoff fatigue", too many Europeans, not enough fighting (disagree), economic factors, etc. Those are all fine and valid discussions. I just felt that the 97.1 discussion was on a different level because the people selling the product usually aren't the ones telling you why you're right not to care about it. If you grew up as a teenager in the mid-90's, as I did, you're forever biased on this topic. You may never again recapture the cascading effects of a 40-year drought, the blood feud with Colorado, and "win for Vladdy", but I guess I refuse to accept that this is a "dead" fanbase. I see too much on the ice, in the stands, and on the forums to the contrary.

Tatar got the call before Nyquist this year and there have been times I really thought he would've helped the Wings 3rd or 4th line after they sent him down. But Nyquist really has improved as the year went on and he has a much more complete game. His speed and backchecking have been huge and he's even providing secondary scoring...they might have hoped for that, but couldn't have expected it.

Totally agree with the post, though he's been steady for much of the year to the point where it makes the observation almost seem obvious. Of course, when they signed him to his deal, it seemed anything but. The observation about some of our young D-men "hiding" behind Lidstrom or Kronwall is accurate - these guys realize nobody is going to do their jobs for them. Ericsson has a great slapper, but he doesn't quite have the poise or puckhandling ability to become an elite offensive force. But his skating out of trouble in his own zone has been very impressive. Kindl has also taken massive strides forward - I believe that he's been the biggest difference in the past 2 months (along with DeKeyser before he got hurt). There's a guy that couldn't even stay in a depleted lineup, and now he looks very steady. He actually has better hands and makes quicker decisions in the offensive zone, so I wouldn't rule out his offense continuing to improve with more time and confidence.

NBC broadcasts are terrible, but let's be real about a few things. First, I don't feel like the overall product is "biased" against Detroit. EdZo is probably not a fan of the Wings, and as a human being, that might shine through from time to time. But if think about the perspective of fans of every other team, players like Datsyuk and (previously) Lidstrom are pretty much universally revered by the hockey media - and even rival announcers/bloggers. Datsyuk can make a routine stick check and they'll still be raving about it after he turns the puck right back over. NBC's real problem is that they have very recognizable media figures (isn't Emrick a HoF voter?) who either are badly overrated at their jobs, or at the very least, aren't a good match for each other. Edzo offers very little insightful commentary. J.R. (another former Hawk) is personally annoying, but his strategy breakdowns in the intermissions are somewhat insightful, even if it's something like figuring out who screwed up an assignment on defense. Emrick is so polarizing. The people on my Twitter feed who are big sports fans but casually/disinterested hockey fans LOVE the guy. He definitely has his own style and there are times I like his enthusiasm. But compared with someone like Strader, Emrick's ego just won't allow him to actually CALL the game. He talks over plays with narrative about crap that nobody cares about, which is a real shame when the on-ice action is really good. Same with Pierre. Guy is creepy, obviously, but he has a huge wealth of hockey knowledge that just doesn't need to be shared in the middle of a play. Paired together with Doc's narrative rants, it really detracts from the game.

I've never done it or thought about doing it, but it is an interesting question as to WHEN you do it. Throwing it after the national anthem is a nice traditional way to do it that will probably get your "pi" on TV and Sobotka out there waiving it around. But if you sit on it too long, there's the possibility the Wings will be down 4-0 or something late in the game, which would be sort of anticlimactic. In Game 3, you got the sense that a bunch of people were sitting on them when Chicago looked like they were going to come back, and then after the Datsyuk goal you got the late stoppages when it looked like we might win. But that last minute took forever, in part because people were tossing the octopus. Great tradition, just be smart about when you do it.

This seems to be an LGW pattern year after year, but I always find it funny that when the Wings get severely worked over in a game or series, LGW'ers key in on that 12th forward or 6th defenseman as the thing we can change to turn things around. I think there's a lot of people with egg on their face about Tootoo, who dismissed the fact that he was a healthy scratch all year, and that (except for one surprising deflection down the stretch) he was an absolute non-factor towards anything having to do with a scoring sheet. The Hawks ultimately dominated that game last night - did Daniel Carcillo have anything to do with it? So what is it about this impulse to throw in bit players and expect them to completely change the dynamics of the 52 minutes they aren't even on the ice? Brendan Smith needs to sit down. I'll admit to being wrong about him - I had a (quiet) suspicion that he was "over-ripened" and showed Top 4 Defenseman potential. He might still do that someday, but he cannot be trusted right now. That was one of the single worst defensive performances I can recall as a Wings fan, dating back to the days when they couldn't figure out that Derian Hatcher couldn't skate anymore. We're talking Lebda's worst day, multiplied by four, levels of futility. He may have only directly generated their first goal, but his constant turnovers and inability to ever solidly possess the puck in our own zone were extremely unsettling to the team. Give me Ian White, Lashoff, whatever...just not that again.

Hadn't even occured to me that Helm (or DeKeyeser) could get back these Playoffs. Even if Helm could get ready, who would have much confidence he could stay healthy? Needs to sit it out and hope for better in October. Sad too - I think his injury was the single biggest absence from the lineup causing those early problems. Fortunately, Emmerton emerged as a steady pro, and replaced a little bit of the speed and energy Helm offered.

I HATE this question. I hear it all the time on LGW, as if it was some clear A vs. B choice. Nobody ever says "Why did we keep Zetterberg or Kronwall instead of Hossa", even though those guys have more comparable contracts - they only want to compare the two LH-shooting Euro power forwards. Here is why I lose ZERO sleep over the Hossa vs. Franzen thing: Hossa was a known mercenary from the day we signed him. He was a mercenary for Pittsburgh, and he was a stopgap solution for us. If both sides had been so committed to keeping Hossa here long term, he would've gotten more than the glorified "Alex Semin" one-year deal that he got in July 2008 from us (1 year, $7.45 mil, IIRC) Franzen and Hossa were roughly the same age (both born in 1979) and have similarities in their game, so spending $10 mil + on the same type of player would have been superfluous when we needed to sign goaltending and defense at the time. At the end of 2009, Franzen's reputation was as a clutch playoff performer, whereas Hossa had a disappointing playoff performance, which soured the fanbase on him. (The same fanbase, btw, ignores the fact that Datsyuk scored all of 1 goal in the '09 Playoffs on a bad foot, and celebrates Lidstrom's toughness for his "groin" injury, while ignoring played all 23 games with a destroyed shoulder) Franzen's contract was FAR more favorable heading into an uncertain CBA situation. Not only is the cap hit about $1.3 million less, but it's a year shorter, and notably less egregious in terms of circumventing the CBA with "backdiver" provisions, which was a growing concern of the NHL at that time, as they cracked down on the Kovalchuk deal While both are "power forwards" (and Hossa's defensive game is admittedly better), Franzen seemed the more likely of the two to assume the role of "guy who stands in front of the net, screens goalies, and picks up garbage goals. Holmstrom was on his way out, and the Wings really hadn't been absent a player of that type dating back to Ciccarelli in the mid-90's. Hossa is a better overall player, but (particularly in the '09 Playoffs), he plays more of a finesse game and stays on the perimeter a bit. Amnesty buyout. This whole conversation basically became moot anyway in the 2013 CBA. If Franzen's contract is so bad, they can just buy it out, rather than keeping it until 2020. If they don't do that, and elect to keep him despite the lower salary cap and other changes in the CBA, that tells you that they probably still view it as a pretty good contract. The Hossa signing only "worked" for Chicago because they had to bend and twist the 2005 CBA in every way possible. It was perceived at the time that it might cost them one of their other core players down the road, like Duncan Keith. What they did instead was bury Huet in the minors (which you can no longer do) and thin out all their role players, which led to early exits in 2011 and 2012. They have since rebuilt those lower lines, so the Hossa experiment has "worked", but it's not clear that it also would have "worked" for us.

I watched all of the Hawks-Wild series. I think the Ducks were a legit team, but the Hawks' regular season dominance is a more accurate reflection of their actual skill level than the Ducks' was. Some Wings fans are programmed to remember Corey Crawford as that scared 3rd stringer that got forced into the Playoff game against the Wings a bunch of years back, but the dude is legit, and their defense is STACKED. Minnesota created nothing against them. They're basically a super-powered version of Detroit (not unsurprising given the Bowman connection). Toews and Kane are "star" players that aren't as offensively dominant as, say, Crosby and Malkin, but they play hard all over the ice. Plus, Chicago has redeveloped their role players, which was a predictable problem for them in '11 and '12 after their contract with the devil (and the CBA) to stockpile as much top-level talent as the old CBA would "allow". But I feel good about Detroit right now, so I'm going Detroit in 6 (the most popular answer). I would not be in furious indignation if Chicago ends up with a 3-0 lead on us - they are that good. But much of this regular season really was an unexpected tryout to figure out which of our "B" or "C" level prospects could be NHL'ers, and what roles they would play. Abdelkader suddenly looks like he's built for the Playoffs, ala Franzen or Kesler (not to that level, but you get the poitn). Nyquist is a stud, and Kindl is worlds better than he was when he came up. And there's few, if any, goalies I would trade Howard for right now in terms of how he's played in the Playoffs. If we get any type of secondary scoring, Datsyuk and Z will eventually show up. But I do think we need a split in Chicago, or we won't be able to dig out against a team like this.

Ovechkin's an outstanding player, and you can find a million examples of him going above and beyond the expected level of effort. But what seems to get a lot of the Russians (and some non-Russians, like Franzen) in trouble is this decision "Whoop, I'm not really involved in this play, so why exert some type of 'false hustle' that won't change the outcome anyway?" More often than not, the extra effort probably wouldn't have made a difference, but the optics of it are terrible, and it's easy for Milbury types on intermission shows to pick them apart. I didn't see the full context of that play, but it looks horrible. I was playing in a rec league game (one law school against a rival law school). I'm a garbage ice player so I was on the third line - one of their guys got loose in the crease and was going to get an easy rebound goal behind me. I had no shot of catching up to him, but I dove anyway, hoping that I could catch his stick on the backswing and do something to mess him up. He scored anyway, but that's an example of "failure that looks good", as opposed to "failure after conceding defeat". Same result either way, but we tend to favor one strongly over the other. This is related to the evolving theory that you don't make a scoring winger a franchise centerpiece with a giant contract. A star center can make average wingers play great (see Kunitz and Dupuis on PIT), whereas a star winger with an average center will often get lost and become uninvolved in the game when things get tough. (See Ovechkin and Parise).

I don't understand Fleury's game. The worst part is that I really thought that would happen to him in both the 2008 and 2009 Cup Finals, but other than exiting the tunnel in his first game, he was actually pretty steady in both Finals. He's crazy agile as a goalkeeper, but he just looks hexed with terrible mental lapses or something. So much mockery towards Bryzgalov ever since his 24/7 appearance, but Fleury has been terrible in two consecutive Playoff series now, and the worst of it is that he's wasting an even better team. Fleury's regular season numbers the past 3 seasons have been solid and almost identical from year-to-year, then comes April and May and he's knocking stuff into his own net.

I guess I give it to Subban, though I haven't watched enough full Montreal games to know what his defense is like. Then again, NOBODY has actually watched enough hockey to vote authoritatively on all the candidates. The Norris isn't supposed to be the "reverse Selke trophy". It tends to go the defenseman with the best offensive numbers, so long as they are considered passable on defense, which is just backwards in my opinion. A lot of Minnesota fans think that Suter is a front runner because of his defense and the minutes he plays. I guess I'm fine with him being a finalist, but it seems to be forgotten that he was downright TERRIBLE for about 15 games with the Wild. He looked completely out of place, and no goals until about halfway through the season, and wasn't even assisting much back when the Parise-Koivu-Heatley line was actually starting off on fire. If his first half had been like his second half, I could see it, but Subban came back from that contract dispute and was awesome from Day 1.

Tootoo's penalty basically lost Game 1 for us. You can say it was a weak call, and you may be right, but the threshold for borderline calls on Tootoo will always be smaller because he is Jordin Tootoo. There's a reason he's been healthy scratched by Nashville and Detroit in consecutive years when the games REALLY matter. I agree that there are times 5 on 5 when Tootoo seems to bring energy to the team. But the bad will ultimately outweigh the good. Fans see Tootoo and notice him because he's playing "differently" than the other guys. He runs people behind the play. He makes checks to make a statement. He fights if needs to fight. Fans assume these must be good things because guys like Bob Probert and Darren McCarty did those things. But those guys played in a different era, and they could actually play hockey with Top 6 forwards, if needed. Tootoo cannot. And if you don't do special teams as a Bottom 6 forward, you don't have a secure job in the playoffs.

I don't understand what Eaves brings to the lineup. If we're going to play offensive non-factors, which is largely what Tootoo is, then I'd prefer non-factors that kill penalties instead of taking dumb ones. So, advantage Eaves in that regard. But I'd probably rather have Miller, and Tatar over both of them. You only need 4 forwards to kill penalties, and three of them should be Z, Datsyuk, and Emmerton. I don't find Eaves penalty killing to be particularly special, but Tatar's offensive contributions in limited playing time could be.

I actually got around to watching the NHL video just now, and while I agree with the suspension, it's interesting how vague they were about the PPOC on this hit compared to the Gryba/Eller hit. In fact, they didn't mention if they thought the shoulder/elbow hit Lydman's head, even though I think it was a clearer case in this hit that they probably did than it was in the Eller case. I just don't understand the rationale of fans who think this wasn't a headshot...are they denying that Lydman couldn't get up after the hit? That's he's missing games and has concussion symptoms now? It doesn't matter if the hit to the head was with the shoulder, elbow, or both - that contact was allowed to happen because he lunged upward at a player that he had taken several strides towards. How do you jump without accelerating? Isn't that physically impossible? For the people saying that he didn't leave his feet until after the hit, that would still mean that he accelerated through Lydman's upper body.

Then there's this: (via Rotoworld) Toni Lydman is considered doubtful for Monday's game in Detroit due to a migraine and neck soreness. Lydman was injured when Detroit's Justin Abdelkader hit him on Saturday, a hit that got Abdelkader a two game suspension by the NHL. Lydman did not practice on Sunday and it would seem that he could be out for at least the remainder of the series. "At this stage, it's hard to tell," coach Bruce Boudreau said. "Toni has headaches and he's got a stiff neck. Bright lights are bugging him. So I don't know when that's not going to be there." Reserve him for now, if you can. In other words, Lydman got a worse penalty out of this whole transaction than Abby did. NHL Suspensions are "reactive" remedies parading themselves as proactive measures. If the NHL really tried to police every malicious or gratuitous act in the game, you'd have multiple suspensions per game. The Weber/Z thing last year was bad, but didn't result in injury. Meanwhile, Gryba throws basically a legal body check on Lars Eller, and the league reverse-engineers a rationale for suspending him because the dude ended up in a pool of blood on the ice. Nevermind that much of that was probably from his visor bouncing on the ice and cutting his nose/face. The system if frequently flawed and imbalanced, but I think that Shanahan is doing the best he can to bring transparency into the process and to establish some type of reliable precedent. I don't think we have a legitimate gripe here.

No personal offense to anyone (I'm all for open debate of any and all questions), but the poll question here is moronic, and the results reflect that. GAA and SV% statistics are problematic over LARGE sample sizes to begin with, let alone over 2 or 3 games. If your logic follows, Braden Holtby and Josh Harding are clearly better goalies than Rask, Price, and Luongo. No, we are not benching Howard. For many reasons, not the least of which is that there is no viable backup. Howard's Game 1 was fine. Game 2 was weak, but he did win it. Game 3, he played fine again, until the 5 on 3 and a HORRIBLE Brunner turnover let the wheels fall off. The TEAM needs to play better, Howard included. Benching him will do nothing.

The Weber slam, yes, I felt it should have been punished by a suspension, perhaps 1 game, but that really has nothing to do with this hit. I had actually forgotten that play took place with about 1 second left, many people have assumed/reported that it was "after" the game. But that a very different type of play, where two players were already engaged. There was obvious intent to injure by Weber on that play, and it's really more analogous to what Bertuzzi did in '04 than a headshot on a legal check. I don't think we really want to have the discussion about what a thin line there was between what happened to Steve Moore and the thousands of other dirty plays that COULD have resulted in serious injury, without having any more malice aforethought than Bertuzzi had when he was trying to hurt Moore (but probably not trying to hurt him that bad). Crap, look what Sedin just did last night: But there is ZERO argument that a blown suspension call in last year's Playoffs means that Abdelkader shouldn't be suspended for a clearly suspendable offense this year. I think we can be partisan without being completely irrational.

I really have no problem with this suspension, in fact, I'm actually grateful it wasn't 3 games. Anyone who follows the league as a whole, watches the suspension videos, and knows the rules should not be surprised by this in the least. This isn't the 70's anymore, and it isn't even the mid-90's. The league wants this type of thing out of the game, and with the risks to players and the risk of litigation, I don't blame them. Red Wings fans have been somewhat insulated from this because we generally don't employ the type of player that gets close to "the line" frequently on this issue. The closest we have is someone like Kronwall, but the illegality of his hits generally pertains to unnecessary roughness and leaving his feet, not headshots specifically. If you want to draw up a blueprint for a multi-game suspension in today's game, do the following: Line up a player from far away and take several strides into him for a gratuitous hit Line up a player who isn't even facing you when you move towards him, even if he rotates late and is partially facing you during the hit Leap into the check so that you're in the air during or immediately after the check Make the head the PPOC (Principal Point of Contact) Follow through with a fist, forearm or elbow, instead simple body-to-body contact Abby isn't a "dirty" player, but he did ALL of those things on that one hit. I knew it was a mult-game suspension the moment I saw it. Let's just deal and move on.

I really don't like the suspension. It punishes the consequence, and is probably for no other reason other than to put Gryba back on the ice this weekend with MTL looking for their own "retribution". But I really don't view the principal point of contact as the head. These plays happen so fast, I think it's kind of ridiculous to show the video in super slow-mo over and over again breaking down which part of Eller's body was impacted first. He had the right to throw a shoulder check in that situation and it wasn't gratuitous to do so. Gryba was probably as surprised as anybody that Diaz threw the puck towards him. I'm almost convinced there are situations you could be placed in where you would accidentally get a suspension unless you purposefully tipped backwards on your skates and allowed the unsuspecting player to knock you over.