Firehawk

Pavel has such a great sense of humor...he makes me laugh.

We had 3 in 6...close enough? I see what you're saying sorta, but I don't know that I agree. In the salary cap era I think it's only fair to change the rules a little bit on what a dynasty is. You will never be able to keep a horde of talent like we had in 2002 together for a long stretch. Honestly, it would take something like a setup that the Red Wings have. I don't think any other team comes close. Even though the Wings haven't won the cup every year in the last 15 years, they've been favored each year to win it and hey, 1 out of every 3 years in this day and age is very impressive. The wings have pretty much dominated this league for 1 1/2 decades now.

Am I the only one that doesn't think much of Filpula since he's been here? Seriously...the guy disappears for LOOONG stretches in the regular season and doesn't do a ton for us in the playoffs. He always skates the outside with the puck (alot like hossa did in the SCF). We're paying him what, 3m right now? He scored us 40 pts in the regular season...and 18 goals +9. Big deal. You're paying Franzen 4m a year and he scored 71 pts and 40 goals and was +21. I do'nt know. Filpula played pretty well in the playoffs for us with 16 pts and a +8, but only 3 goals. in 2008 cup run he has 11 pts with 5 goals and a +7. I guess I'd like to see what he does in the next playoff run...but I just don't know. I voted yes. Hossa is a better talent and I have to think he would have had a better SCF if it were against any other team other than Pit.

Let me turn this thread into something more useful... Seeing as the wings have 4 cups in 12 years, were 2 goals and 5 key injured players away from winning the cup this year, been to the conference finals or further in the last 3 years, if they wings won a cup next year would you still consider them a dynasty? 5 cups in 13 years...but also usually the favorite to win the cup EVERY YEAR of those 13 years...

Uh, if you can get a 40-goal scorer for 4 million a year, you take it, no questions asked. People, stop thinking with your heart and think logically. Hossa was the Pens' best playoff performer last year. I don't pin this collapse this year on him. It's wrong to do that.

How can any of us doubt Holland? He'll make the right decision.

What I'd be more pissed about in regard to series wearing teams down is Betman moving the start of the SCF up. You might as well assume we played 3 7-game series in a row. Beating Chicago in 5 shoulda gotten us 1 1/2 weeks off. Instead it gets us 2 days off. That's retarded.

Good chance the Pens don't even make the playoffs next year. How many times haev we seen that recently? Disgraceful to be honest. How can you make a cup run then not make the playoffs?

I'm exceptionally proud of Datsyuk for playing on that F'd up leg of his, and extremely proud of Rafalski for playing through a herniated disk. Extremely proud of Draper and Cleary for playing with a severe groin injury. Extremely proud of Ericsson for coming back a day after appendectomy surgery to play. There's speculation that even Zetterberg was only at 70% yet still shut Crosby down completely. I'm so very proud of this team. I was very pissed last night, but the more I find out about the injuries, and then you add that to having to start playing 1 1/2 weeks earlier than you should have after ending round 3 (might as well have been a 7 game series), how can you not be proud?

It's pretty amazing that as the playoffs moved on, the rules changed. Every round, the rules loosened up more and more overall. You still had rules changnig from game to game though. I don't get it. You have the additional ref on the ice, yet they still are so inconsistent it makes NBA refs look godlike.

i love ozzie...

I think more has to be done to protect the stars. I hate the NBA, but I'd adapt this principle: If you want your superstars scoring alot more goals, then you call ticky tack penalties on players that hook or interfere the superstars, and you let the tickytack stuff go on the 4th line gritty players. It's an option that will allow the game to open up alot more. It will speed the game up. You'll see more ice time for the stars. I mean, imagine Datsyuk puck handling around players when all the opposing player can do is put a stick on Datsyuk's stick or check Datsyuk cleanly? I think the style the wings play is far more exciting than any other team plays.

Maybe if we score more than 1 goal a frickin game we would have won... Refs aren't the reason we lost.

I have a headache and don't feel like going to bed. I'm just reading the posts around here to see what the best fans in the league have to say... I always enjoy listening to fans that even in defeat, are gracious and respectable. I still can't believe we blew the series though. Hard to grasp.

I know, right? First time I ever heard fans blame lively boards as to why they were cheated LOL.

In regard to Ozzie... You know what's really interesting? When Fleury allowed those bad goals that bounced off the boards in game 1, I went to the Pens board and they blamed the boards, not the goalie for being out of position lol. If that had happened to Ozzie, we woulda been looking for his immediate removal from the team.

As muchas I've bitched about Stuart tonight, if we came back next year with the exact team we have right now and fully healthy, why shouldn't we expect that we can get back to the 3rd round at minimum next year?

I honestly don't think the Pens are the best team in the NHL. The best team doesn't always win the cup. A lot of circumstances have to go the right way. In this case, we were very banged up. Maybe if we have a 100% or even 90% datsyuk for the full series we win it. I'm not going to play these games too much, and not trying to take away from the Pens. They had alot more hunger to win since they lost it last year. we'll see how they handle having the target on their backs next year. Don't forget, the wings still won 50 games and they had the champion target on their backs all season...pretty impressive when you throw in the fact that they had the hangover going for alot of the season...

You sound like a smart person, I'd like to meet you some day lol. How can we not look at the Wings in a positive manner (after getting the hurt and anger off our chests after tonight) at what they accomplished? They were one bad ref call away from winning the cup in 2007, then they come back and win the cup in 2008 without anyone ever really questioning if they were the better team in all the playoff series. Then they come back in 2009 with alot of half ass efforts at times but still manage to get to a game 7 stanley cup with alot of injured players (and key players). I mean, when you look at the entire picture, I'm pretty ******* proud. And, there's no reason they can't make it back here next year. They're set up so well to make long runs in the playoffs every year for the next 7 years.

If I find out when the injuries come out that our top 5-6 players all had serious injuries, I'm going to turn my dislike for how we played in this series to proudness of the team, because if they were all as banged up as it sounds, then how can you not be proud of them for trying to come out with everything? I am very proud that they won the cup last year and were 2 goals from repeating as champions. That is awesome...and they almost repeated with half the team seriously injured. How can you not be proud of that?

I saw a gaping net and some Wing player coming in to shoot it, I thought the game was going to be tied. Hand it to Fleury...story of the wings tonight was waiting a second too long to shoot the puck. Filpula had at least 2 where he paused then wound up for a slap shot and they got a stick in the way. I don't get why they were so hesitant. Ericsson onetimes it and he scores...nuff said. Well, there's always next year.

He shook hands, he shook Babcock's hand at the end of the line...leave the kid alone. I actually like what Sid said when Mickey and Bernie interviewed him, about him not wanting to be out there in the 3rd and hindering his team.

Well, it was to be expected in the regular season, coming off a championship. They coudl'nt have been too bad, i mean after all they still won 50 games. No complaints. But yes, in games they seemed to do 'just enough' to win games. Lots of 1 goal games this regular season, especially early in the season (and let's not forget, Hossa was a big reason for those wins at the time). In round 1 of the playoffs, the Wings played complete games I thought. But, they seemed to start slacking in round 1 game 4 in that 6-5 win, then versus Anaheim they didn't play many complete games if at all (may be due to Anaheim though). Versus Chicago it was always a slow start, or a fast start and slow finish, or something. But we had such a superior talent and we weren't too banged up in the start of that series. It just finally caught up with us in the finals. Whether we were just too banged up, or if we took the opportunities for granted, who knows? To the Victor goes the Spoil. The one thing I was really afraid of after game 6 was the hunger and determination that the Pens would have in this game. It is only natural they had more because they lost last year. Had this been reversed, we would have had more desire and hunger and probably would have won.

I think that goal that Helm scored where it looked like he was shot out of a cannon against I think Chicago (can't remember) in game 5 and scored. Helm and Abdelkader grew up alot. Also, Ericcson was something special. He looks like another Lidstrom to me...just plays smart.

But something like that is not supposed to hurt a veteran team like Detroit. They should have been able to pick right back up where they left off. Again, I think the injury list is going to be extensive when we hear about all of it. I still blame Stuart. The penalty he took was absolutely stupid. Then he makes 2 big mistakes that result directly in goals. He's the goat for this game. NEvertheless though, despite Stuart, we had more power plays (didn't score), we have a superior offense to Pit and couldn't score. The refs favored us today.