Frozen-Man

With the number 4 pick? One lower than Toews or Barker and three lower than Kane?

Actually, they built their team by sucking for quite a long time: 2007: 1st Overall Draft Pick (Kane) 2006: 3rd Overall Draft Pick (Toews) 2005: 7th Overall Draft Pick (Skille) 2004: 3rd Overall Draft Pick (Barker) Good job in not picking a lot of busts but come on the only reason the Hawks are good is because the sucked for long enough to get 6 top Ten picks since 2000 and 3 Top Three picks in four years. Its a shame but the best way to be good in the new NHL is to suck for 5 or 6 years in a row. Edit: Just ask the Penguins.

I'm not sure he thinks of himself as a 20 minute a night guy but I'll bet he does think of himself as a 25 goal 45 point a year guy . . . and I hope that doesn't make him want to demand too much for his services.

Visual example of carrying a team on your back:

Yeah what team would want a current Calder Trophy candidate. I'm glad we don't have Duchene and Myers too or the Wings future would really look bleak.

It is a question of whether that is good in the long run because it is obviously good short term. Kind of like Burke seems to build a good team as long as you don't mind the present at the expense of the future.

I guess its amazing what playing along all those "soft Euros" like Mule, Homer, Lids, Z, and Dats can do for Eaves' and Miller's confidence. Or perhaps Leino, like a whole lot of players, may play well with a change of venue or the offense of being the odd man out and shipped to another team. :hysterical:

I'm always impressed with how well thought out and presented your ideas are. The problem that I have always had with a luxury tax is that it makes it easy for big well financed teams, the Lakers for an NBA example, to constantly put out one of the best products because they can charge more for tickets, make more from merchandise, etc. so they can always afford to pay a lot more than say the Timber Wolves. If tickets in LA cost the same as tickets in Minnesota it might work but LA, NY (although they are proof that tons of cash doesn't necessarily mean a good team), Boston, etc. always have more money to play with. Add to that the fact that some teams have owners that have so much cash that they don't care about the luxury tax, a la Dallas, and it just makes a threshold that some teams can't compete with. There is a reason that the same NBA teams are always paying luxury tax (with a few others in one year and out the next). Compound that with the fact that when your team is winning you generally get more ticket and merchandise sales and it makes it even harder to crack into that group of good teams if you start out with a lot less cash. However, as far as luxury taxes go I think yours is better than the NBA model. What I don't like is that often it is not primarily good scouting but crappy performance that allows a team to get a top 5 picks three or four years in a row. They continue to suck so they continue to get players that have a very high likelihood of being great.

Most US sports have this problem. The West has had the vast majority of dominate teams in the NBA for a long time. That's just the breaks sometimes, there is no way to create that type of parity because the good teams change, back when Jordan played the East was much better then it shifted to the West. The point to the parity is that teams in either conference have a realistic shot of winning, and the fact that there is parity is shown in the two teams that reached the Eastern Conference Finals.

I think that they can be really good for a team and for a player, from a players prospective I think it would concern me less to enter into a deal with a team like Detroit who has a good long term record of competing year in and year out and is in a good established hockey market. You know that Detroit will always put out a good product and the team is sound so to me there is less risk of ending up on on a bottom dweller team.

I agree they over expanded and put some expansions too close to others. The atmosphere for a struggling Tampa Bay would probably be much better if it didn't have to compete with the Panthers for the limited number of Florida hockey fans. And anything to get rid of Anaheim I am always for.

Oh I agree with all of that. Incredibly poor implementation and they definitely over expanded. My point was more to the sentiments that we need to get rid of the "Florida's, Atlanta's, Nashville's" of the league. I think a much more gradual approach might have helped as well as better placement. The reason the NHL is not on ESPN and rarely on NBC (or conversely some other US network) is because there is not near as many viewers as the other major US sports. Getting rid of almost all US teams that aren't in the North East won't solve that problem it will only exacerbate it. If the NHL wants to be a smaller niche market (which might not be a bad thing for hard core fans) then leaving half the US with no local hockey team to root for will further accomplish that goal.

I'll bet Kenny is sending him over for the sole purpose of recruiting Kovy.

I'm kind of torn on the issue. I would love for both Winnipeg and Hartford to get teams and realize that teams in the southern half of the US have not done well but I also understand that it is in the NHL's best interest to have hockey nation wide like the other major US sports. Canada while having rabidly loyal fans does not have a big enough population (roughly 33 Million) to keep up, even remotely, with the numbers in the USA (roughly 310 Million) they cannot compete with the other North American sports by having lots of fans in Canada. It may not matter to Canadian fans but the sport will be further removed from ESPN NBC VS (ala Direct TV) and other US outlets because the demand will not be as high. I can't stand Bettman and think he has done a horrible job pretty much all around but don't disagree with him that the NHL cannot thrive if it is a North Eastern US and Canadian sport. His execution is horrible but I think his very basic premise is correct. Edit: I am talking more about moving the Florida's, Atlanta's, Nashville's (i.e. most of the southern US teams) rather than specifically Phoenix to Winnipeg. :clap: QFT

Absolutely true. He let in a few soft/untimely goals but overall was very good.

That is a pretty low bar to have to walk over.

Get well soon Matt. You will remain in my prayers.

That must be why the Wings have been such a failure as a franchise in the recent years.

I don't think there was any talk (other than on forums) that Kenny would trade Huds if he came back. It would greatly surprise me if he did so.

Not much better than hearing the Irish Jig after Shanny scored a goal or got in a fight.

TSN is reporting the same thing. After a year away from the NHL, it appears that forward Jiri Hudler is planning to return to the Detroit Red Wings next season. Link

TSN is reporting that Hudler's agent will announce as early as Friday that Huds will be back with the Wings next year.

TSN is reporting the three on the short list for the job are Dave Nonis, Steve Yzerman and Doug Risebrough. Link

Except the game winner giving the Hawks a 3-2 game advantage. See my comment above for the difference. I agree the two hits were not similar one was a hard check into the boards and the other was a push. I also agree with all three of the rationales that you provided for the no suspension and that is why I am annoyed at the NHL. Neither 1 nor 3 are supposed to matter at all. The reason for the rules and the suspension is to protect players from highly risky actions that can potentially cause very serious injuries. In using rationale #1 is the NHL saying that it is okay with highly risky actions that can potentially cause very serious injuries if they occur during the playoffs? If not then they should hold players to the same standard in the regular season and the playoffs. Regarding rationale #3 the potential for the injury is what is important not the result. Often players are injured in completely legal plays and there is obviously no suspension given because there was no infraction of the rules. Conversely players get suspended when there is not a serious injury because the actions are infraction of the rules designed to protect players. I do however, understand increasing the penalty for repeat offenders but even then I don't think the suspension should be because of the repeat offense the suspension should occur either way but should merely be increased for the repeat offender.