Nev

Detroits record is 27-38 since he arrived? Shurely shum mishtake? Edit: Or are you including shoot-outs as well? Clearly, its all Quincey's fault that we're 2-5 in shootouts this year?

Its true though, you can only constantly rip players to shreds for so long before you either entirely destroy their confidence, or they tune you out. Its why coaches like Hitchcock and Tortarella are great short term, but not so great long term.

Has it occured to anyone that maybe the management are concerned about just how young and inexperienced our current roster is? Nyquist: 23, 35GP Smith: 24, 43GP Andersson: 24, 38GP Emmerton: 24, 116GP Kindl: 26, 142GP Brunner: 24, 39P DeKeyser: 23, 6GP Throw in Tatar: 22, 27GP, and Lashoff: 22, 31GP and you have the youngest most inexperienced roster we've had in a long, long time. When we were rebuilding in the early-mid 2000s Datsyuk then Zetterberg, then Kronwall, Franzen, Filpulla, Hudler, Kopecky etc were all drip fed in, slowly, over 4 or 5 seasons. We're bringing them in all at once. Maybe, just maybe, Holland and Babcock feel we've reached the limit on how many youngsters the team can accomodate at once. Its a moot point anyone now, we can't bring Tatar up without another forward injury, and does anyone want to take that chance?

LGW would run this team like the Flyers or Rangers, constant big trades, FA agent signings and big buyouts, with questionable levels of success. And if you get rid of him we have no #3. Surely we need to keep him and try and add some high-end defensive talent? But I like your reasoning - Not as good as Lidstrom therefore he sucks.

I tell ya, nostalgia ain't what it used to be

Given the almost complete silence from Holland on contract talks now that Jimmeh is signed, I think its fair to day we're going to let them walk. Really frustrating 2 games. Outplay both opponents on the road but only get 1 point out of 4. That's got to be a very frustrated dressing room right now. If we miss the playoffs I imagine our shoot-out record will be the difference.

Sounds like we're missing chance after chance on teh radio, must be torture to watch.

Kicking it old-skool tonight - listening to the radio commentary over the internet whilst doing a nightshift. Not done this since, ooooh, 2008

Seems more likely to me that Toews and Kane are star players in their prime, rather than star players past their prime like Zetterberg and Datsyuk. Although it is a fair point that Hossa-Sharp is ahead of Franzen-Filpulla as the 3-4 punch, even if they have been injured.

Did you know Kirk Maltby scored 50 goals in junior? Buppy - great post, very informative, and kinda backs up what Holland has been saying ie we have plenty of depth but not enough star power in our top 6.

http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2013/04/red_wings_dont_know_pavel_dats.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Brown_%28ice_hockey%29

And that's a bogus list. Gustavsson is a backup goalie, you must have 2 goalies on your roster. Not would like. Not should. Must have. $1.5M for a backup is peanuts. Bertuzzi - this is the first season where he's been out for any length of time, his health has been excellent in his second spell. $1.5M for a veteran forward who provides the size, skill-set and points that Bert does is an absolute bargain. Huskins - minimum salary for an emergency signing to cover a crippling injury crisis? FFS, what the hell do you want from Ken Holland? Do you remember our injury list when we were forced to sign Huskins? When we didn't have 6 fit defencemen to put on the ice? And you do realise that we cannot physically pay less than $0.5M for a player? And you do realise that when our injury crisis on D went away Ken Holland traded him off the roster? Colo was a gamble but a cheap gamble. Tootoo provides something that no other player on our roster does. I'll give you Sammy though, injured or healthy he's not worth that contract.

That and the inability to put the puck on the tape of a moving forward. And the struggle of our forwards to win battles along the half-boards so that when we finally do carry the puck out of the defensive zone, he's 1 against 3 and then Carman moans about Datysuk turning the puck over. But yeah, Lidstrom was an absolute master at keeping the puck in at the blue line, as good as I've ever seen.

Words are wind.

Where did I say Markov had a glorious season, and I was nostalgic for it? You said "The biggest move he's made post-lockout #1? Bertuzzi?" and off the top of my head I was able to come up with 3 names without trying. Markov was what he was - a big hitting defensive defenceman who pretty much everyone wanted to keep, but who chose to go back to Russia. Nothing we could do about that. BTW, he acquired Quincey to cover for Stuart leaving. You may not like how Quincey has played since then or the price, but he did something in advance to replace him. And why does Rafalski not count? Was he not a success here?

No way Anaheim could beat Detroit in 2003. Not without injuries to Yzerman and Fedorov and Shanahan and Hull and Robitaille and Lidstrom and Chelios...

Brian Rafalski, Brad Stuart and Danny Markov all say hi As does Dallas Drake, who coincidentally is one of those re-acquired players you complain about, but also ironically considered by some on this board to have been the second coming of Jesus and the single most important player on the '08 Cup roster. Even more ironically, some of the people who claimed that are also the ones most critical of Holland in this thread

And if we have exactly the same number of points as Columbus and Dallas, that means we must be beating the teams that are beating them? Your point? Look, its going to be tight, the difference is probly going to be one team going 4-2-1 as opposed to 3-2-2, but if Dallas and CBJ were so amazing, they wouldn't be in 8th and 10th with the same number of points as us

All this "x is on a roll" talk annoys me. Contrary to popular opinion in this thread, streaks are not self-perpeptuating, quite the opposite in fact. Sure, Dallas have won 5 straight, doesn't mean they're going to win their last 7 and go on a 12-0-0 run to finish the season. The 5 games before their win streak they were 1-4-0, and no doubt all the Stars boards were full of "ZOMG!! FIRE THE GM!! FIRE THE COACH!! TRADE EVERYONE!!" threads. Now all the fans are in here bricking themselves becase Dallas and Colombus have exactly the same number of points as us and this somehow proves that they are infinitely superior and will surely beat us out of a playoff spot.

I forgot who first coined the James Tiberius Howard, but dammit it's such a great name! And I'm glad you already love me

Getting? He's been lazy for several years.

But who is available to replace those guys? There are very, very few quality FAs available these days. How do you replace a guy like Lidstrom? There is NO_ONE, not a single player, in the NHL right now who is as good as Lidstrom was. Chara and Weber are as good as it gets, neither is in the "all-time, all-NHL" bracket like Lidstrom is, neither will hit Free Agency, and if they were available for trade, the cost would be crippling. I do agree we are in decline - I've been saying it for several years - but even in a transitional year, we are still in a playoff spot. A bit of perspective. Our big rivals from the free-spending years. Colorado - what happened to them after Roy, Foote, Sakic, Forsberg et al retired? They've sucked ever since. What about Dallas after Modano, Belfour, Zubov etc went? They've sucked. What happened to us after we lost Yzerman, Fedorov, Shanahan, Larionov, Hull, Robitaille etc? Ken Holland went out and built another Stanley Cup roster. And now most of that roster has retired or left and he's rebuilding the team again. How many GMs out there have sucessfully rebuilt Cup winning rosters? Lou Lamoriello, and uh, I think thats about it. As I've said before, if he gets the blame for Suter's wife and Parise being from Minnesota, he sure as hell gets the credit for DelKaiser being from Michigan

I will miss it. SInce they got good again we've had some excellent regular season games against them, always really close, hard-fought games (7-1 excepting). The only shame is that we've only had the 1 playoff series against them which was a mismatch as they weren't up to our level. Since then they've gone up and we've gone down. Would have been nice for us to have both been elite at the same time.

This. I've been thinking lately how a lot of LGWers should take a long hard look at the likes of Philly and the Rangers. Every year that they don't win the cup they blow the whole thing up - big trades, big FA signings, big buyouts, big coach hiring and firings. And from one year to the next its a complete crapshoot whether they make the playoffs or not.