wings87

Weiss played almost 16 min vs NJ and I honestly remember seeing him twice.

Great win, let's keep it going tomorrow. And as supportive as I have been with Howard, Gus has to get the start.

With the roster compromised like it is. I don't care how ugly todays game is as long as we win. Yep

With the Columbus story he just seems like a prick. He was never good enough to be so full of himself.

Would love to hear something from the Wings perspective. But I think Babs is an old time coach that believes you have to earn a spot in the lineup instead of being given one, and just like every other coach he has guys that he trusts and will play more, Cleary, and guys that haven't earned that trust who will play less, just like Weiss is.

I doubt it has anything to do with the East, teams like Anaheim, San Jose, Nashville, and Vancouver always played us a lot tougher than most of the teams in the East have this year. Other than the Datsyuk injury, we shouldn't be surprised that Z or Helm got hurt, it sucks but it's not a shocker.

Knock on wood.

Let me start off by saying IMHO retaliation is one of the most important parts of Hockey, it keeps the other team honest and protects your own best players. There are teams that do it well and the right way, there are teams that take it too far, and there are teams that don't do it at all. More times than not the Wings fall into the third category and while keeping a cool head and leaving emotions out of it is an important and difficult aspect of games in some situations not responding sends the wrong message. Let's take tonight's Wings Senators game. Good win but a disappointing game, it looked like none of the players on the ice cared that Datsyuk was blatantly elbowed. Now I wasn't looking for the Wings to goon it up but can someone lay a big hit or crash the net or do one of a million things that would show the rest of the league that we won't stand for our stars getting pummeled every night. Winning is the most important thing and I'm not naive,I wasn't really expecting them to do anything but was hoping, because not doing anything speaks volumes. In baseball if the opposing pitcher hits your best player intentionally your pitcher is expected to hit the other team's best player not injure him or anything just show that things of that nature won't be tolerated. And if there is no retribution it sends a message to your star player that you as a pitcher don't have his back and it also tells the other teams in the league that it's open season. Now I don't presume to know what the mood is like in the Wings locker room regarding this issue or how the top Wings players feel to have a bullseye on their backs knowing that if push came to shove more likely than not no one in that locker room will have their back, or maybe they don't care at all. What I do know is that the Wings are damn lucky that Datsyuk and Zetterberg have stayed as healthy as they have while getting run constantly without any repercussions.

Pretty soon we'll only have three lines and Cleary will be on all of them.

It was fun when there was one outdoor game a year. Now they may as well play every game outside.

I want to cry but I'm afraid people at work will laugh at me.

We are seeing less of those type of hits lately and In the heat of the moment I would argue that players that make that sort of a hit aren't thinking at all. So making it a major instead of a minor in my opinion would do little to change that.

I think it's an oversimplification. While saying that though, if every game is analyzed a pattern will emerge that points to most goals being scored when you take advantage of your opponents mistakes.

Won't matter if we fall asleep in the third again.

That has been the theme throughout the year.

Ones they start sucking, they just can't stop. They are like a bottomless pit of suck.

I miss the old Howard, the one that would pummel players in front of the net. What happened to that guy?

Nyquist gets punched, Abby gets pushed into the boards and the rest of the Wings are just standing around watching. Good stuff.

While Weiss wasn't terrible in the first he looks like he's carrying a u-haul on his back.

Nick has been great, I just wish that Holland would get a solid stay at home defenceman to pair with him so Nick can roam free and show off his offensive game more.

My day was going so well and then I read this and it went in the crapper. Let's hope he at least gets back by the Winter Classic. Why the f*** is Franzen moving to center? He will be completely out of position, with how hot he's been lately why move him. Why not just bump Weiss up? Weiss is completely worthless on the fourth line with Cleary and Sammy, why not move him up and see if he can rediscover whatever it was that the Wings saw in him that made them give him 5 years.

I see what you are saying but I think Tatar has shown he can play at the NHL level he just has to learn that some of the moves that worked in the AHL won't work up here. He should keep getting better and better although I don't expect him to get that much stronger. he has a small frame so not much room to fill out. A B+ seems more than fair.

Who's attacking who? I didn't agree with your post and I said as much. I Wasn't attacking you or even the points you made. I don't have the need to hide behind insults to make my point. But you seem to be a little defensive. And when I wrote if you watch the games I wasn't referring to you specifically I was referring to people watching games in general so that stats make sense. I thought it was easy to discern in the context of my post, I never accused you of not caring or watching hockey. And lets get something straight I never called myself a scout, I said that teams have scouts to see players play they don't just rely on stats. I don't think me and you can discuss this topic like adults with you taking everything so personally and turning to childish insults so let's just go on about our day.

You are probably right but like you said Pavel deserves it more. Also if Russia chooses Radulov they deserve to lose even though we all know they will anyway

Why are you getting bent out of shape? You tried to make a point that there was a lot of complaining about Wings moving out east,you tried to make that point by showing the amount of posts and in that context there is a definitive difference between 200 and 2000. You want stats here you go: East 2011-2012 season: Boston: 102 points Ottawa: 92 points Toronto:80 points Montreal:78 points Tampa:84 Winnipeg:84 Central 2011-2012 season: Blues: 109 Nashville:104 Detroit: 102 Chicago:101 When the Wings where moving out east the teams in the west where getting better other than Columbus of course. I've made this point through out the thread the Wings have always had the ability to turn on the physical play when they had to whether it be in the playoffs or a big game. I'm just not sure this team has that ability. I think I said that at some point on the first page if you bothered to read it. You also seem to forget that teams don't magically end up in overtime. Being able to hang around for the extra point is the only reason this team is anywhere near the top. They should be commended for tying some of those games but they where lucky not to get the loss in others. Furthermore how many times did the Wings blow a lead this year? 7, that's having a lead in half the teams losses, and in a lot of them a 2 goal lead. Has the team been playing better? Absolutely, but unfortunately we saw this in early October when we won 4 straight and than lost 12 of 16. Lots of lazy turnovers, lazy penalties, and at times lazy goal tending contributed to it. Being tough doesn't mean getting in fights for no reason it means being heavy on the puck either defensively or offensively. Just as the eye test, numbers are subjective unless you watch the games stats don't provide a comprehensive picture. A player might have a certain number of goals but how many of them where empty net goals or how many points were racked up in a blow out when the other team stopped playing. How about penalty minutes? If you don't watch the game you might not know that the penalty saved a goal. Stats alone are pretty to look at but that's why major sports have scouts because numbers don't tell nearly the whole picture.