Nev

I've heard top dieticians say that it can take up to a fortnight to work booze out of the system....if drinking weren't such a big deal, why did he fall from a predicted 5th to 21st? That's the difference between being a sure-fire NHLer and could end up playing in the British Elite League (as happened to my wife's ex, who was drafted 15th overall IIRC). And for what its worth, I wouldn't want any of our players eating fast food either. I used to cringe when I'd read Kronwall talking about heading to McDonalds. Thankfully he's not said that for a couple of years, so I hope he's had that beaten out of him. Proffesional sport is a short, highly competetive career with enormous rewards. If it were me I wouldn't do *anything* to jeopordise that.

Making it in the pros - in any sport - is a whole different level. If your mate really knuckled down and dedicated his body to hockey who knows what he might achieve. You don't have to be an alcoholic for booze to derail your career, and it can generally reflect upon your off-ice work ethic in general. As Sir Alex Ferguson, one of the greatest coaches ever, in any sport says "Show me the evidence that beer makes you a better player, and I'll let you drink beer". Many a proffesional sportsman has identified the turning point in their career as the moment they stopped boozing and started looking after their bodies. It just worries me that in Abdelkader, Smith and Sheahan we have 3 players who we hope to be the cornerstone of our franchise in 5 years that have all had booze related off-ice problems.

Well, I never mentioned points totals - you Newfy & Zetty brought that into the discussion. I just happen to think that his all around play last season did not match his standards of the previous 3 seasons. At times he was like the old Pav, but never night in, night out like we've gotten used to. Helps that he was in a weak class this year, but like I said, this is for the one he deserved to win in 2007 - but the rest of the league hadn't caught on to his defensive brilliance just yet.

I'm not entirely sure Pavel deserves it for his play this year - but it makes up for 3 years ago when he almost certainly did deserve it (1st in plus/minus, 1st in takeaways, top 10 in face-offs).

So? Last time I checked it was the Hockey Hall of Fame, not the NHL Hall of Fame. That's not to say Dino is more or less deserving than Makarov, but your logic is flawed.

Interesting interview with Dats posted on Mlive (translated from Russian). Best bit is right at the end BWAHAHAHAHAAHA! http://blog.mlive.com/snapshots/2010/06/red_wings_forward_pavel_datsyu_26.html

On a serious note, I thought it was interesting how Pav talked about how much hockey he's played the last 3 years, what a grind its been etc.. He sounded mentally and physically jaded - which is just how he looked for stretches last season.

That's because its the last year of their ELC- their big money contract extensions signed ~6 months ago kick in next season. The cap hit is the average value of the contract, so a 3 year contract paying $3M, $2M and $1M would have a cap hit of $2M each year. The bonuses would go on this years salary, but they have no room under the cap, so it has to go on next season.

What a great race today! The first half of the race I was struggling to keep up with who was where it was all so frenetic - especially with all the kids squabbling and arguing around me! Good guys won in the end though

08 Wings vs 02 Wings? Man, thats a tough one. '02 has the clear edge in talent, but as Doc points out, with the system that we followed in '08 we were quite simply an unstoppable machine. Talent + Hunger + System = a cup win that when you look back was never really in doubt. And what a regular season we had too, 1st in points, shots for, shots against, goals against, 2nd in goals for. And that was with a month of February when we had 10 starters out injured and Lilja-Lebda was our 1st pair! Against that, Bowman said that the '02 team was the best of all the teams he coached. Better than the 1970s Montreal Canadiens. Better than the Lemiuex-Francis-Jagr et al Penguins. And that WCF against Colorado will go down as one of the great series of all time - at least 13 Hall of Famers on the ice, plus more besides on the bench and upstairs. The 2-0 road win in game 6 is one of the greatest performances I have ever seen by the Wings. But then again, so were games 1 + 2 of the '08 finals. So tough.......

Drake - nice work on putting together a "roster"

Not much.

I don't think Cheli is going to be one of those ex-players who wonders if he retired too early

I don't quite think you realise the depth of your problem - you have just 14 players signed for ~$58M. ie you're right at the cap and 8-9 players short of a roster. Add to that the bonuses due to Toews + Kane and suddenly you're ~$4M OVER the cap and you're STILL 8-9 players short of a roster! You need to waive/trade Huet just to get back beneath the cap (and now you're 9-10 players short with no goalie). Forget about re-signing your RFA's for the moment, if every player you sign from now on is on Minimum Salary you still need to create another ~$5M in cap room to do that. Obviously Campbell is the albatross hanging round your neck right now, but he has an NTC so you can only waive or buy him out. If you waive him, you're paying a guy $7.1M a season for the next 6 years to play in the minors (and I'm sure the NHLPA will have something to say about that), although you might get lucky and someone might be prepared to pick him up on waivers. Or you can buy him out and have a saving of ~$4.8M, but a cap hit of $2.4M for the next 12 (TWELVE) years, and now you're 10-11 players short of a roster. You're almost enough below the cap to fill out your team with min salary players but you have only 3 defencemen and no goalie. You listed Hjalmarsson and Niemmi in your core 10, but they are both RFAs earning $0.6M + $0.8M respectively and you have no spare money to re-sign them with the raise they deserve. If you want to keep them the only way to find the money is to trade one of Sharp/Bolland/Versteeg/Butmuffin (and now they need to be replaced too). Can you even afford to offer your RFAs offer sheets? What if no-one else offers them a contract? Now you're left with even more players you can't afford. And good luck keeping Seabrook the year after that. Look, we all knew this was coming from the second Chicago signed Hossa - everyone on here said the same thing "Chicago better win the cup this year cos they're screwed after that". Congrats, you managed it but you're about to find out what Anaheim, Detroit and Pittsburgh found out about winning the cup - the key is good players on Entry Level Contracts which allow you to fill out your roster with decent players. Anaheim - Perry + Getzlaf on ELCs Detroit - Zetterberg, Cleary, Franzen, Filpulla, Hudler, Sammuelsson all earning MUCH less than they are now Pittsburgh - byebye Scuderi, Gill etc, hello worst set of wingers in the NHL. Chicago - Toews + Kane on ELCs Right now its hard to say whether you can do a Detroit and remain a contender, or slip down the Anaheim/Tampa Bay top-heavy garbage chute. As Ken Holland said last year "there's only so many minimum salary guys you want on your team".

Have you seen Pronger's fight card? Dan Cleary, Michael Handzus, Jiri Slegr........and, er that's about it I think. Guy is the biggest coward in the league. And I'm with Doc on this one - if Burish can't criticise Pronger, then you can't criticise Burish.

Well, according to CapGeek, if the Hawks buy out Campbell, there'll be a $2.4M cap hit FOR THE NEXT 12 YEARS!!! They're already right up against the cap and they need to sign another 8-9 players. If/when they buy out/trade a couple of players that makes it 9-10 players they need to sign, most if not all of whom will have to make $500k-$1M (or bring up some cheap kids, but I have no knowledge of their quality of prospects). They're not going to suddenly suck, but they are going to lose a ton of depth. One only has to look at the likes of Anaheim and TB to see what happens to top heavy teams in a cap world.

That's just insane - they're already at $57.5M with only 14 players...

Yep, Wings fans are going to have to be very careful - the Blackhawks are officially better than us now. We'd better suck it up and act like a man about it (except for the women) instead of being whiny petulant children. I haven't seen enough of the playoffs to make a judgement on this one, but I do know this thread only makes us look bad.

Poor old Brett, no love for the guy who gave us the drunk-as-hell radio interview the morning after the cup win

Unless he's injured again.

What a terrible article. Not a single thing to like Yzerman and Bettman and Tampa Bay other than the writer pulling it out of his own ass. Not even a made-up quote from an "insider"

Williams said when he re-signed with us that Datsyuk* was the best conditioned athlete he'd ever come across, and he's seen a few as he bounced around the hockey world *And Draper.

Thanks for the reply, but I still don't get it. The way I see it is honouring the spirit, the toughness etc of native americans, it doesn't imply that they are an inheritively violent people, any more than the Minnesota Vikings imply that Lidstrom, Kronwall and Zetterberg are inherently violent. I see it as a compliment, not an insult. To keep with the Vikings analogy - you're a Swede visiting Detroit, you go to see the Lions lose at home to Minnesota. A Detroit fan yells out "Vikings suck", should they be offended? I think they'd get slapped down pretty quick if they did. Ain't that the truth.

How is a picture of a native american in traditional garb "somewhat racist"?

That would be so much more appropriate (and funnier)