ManLuv4Clears

I love me some Drake type players, however you won't get a lot of support for them around here. Unless he's putting up 2 points a game in the playoffs, this type of player has no reason cracking the Wing's line up. Come to think of it, the Drake had no contribution to the Wings' success last year. Lebda and a pick for Neil anyone? Other than that, no major changes are needed.

QFT. Proof's in the pudding.

Good find Esteef

It would be similar to this:

You sound like you have some good insider info. What else can your source tell us about what's going thru the players' heads?

I was hoping for the news to include any or all of the following phrases: "Making it rain" "Strippers" "9mm" "Shot himself in the leg" "Dogfighting" Oh wait, my bad, we're talking about a respectable league.

I'm going, can't wait. Got seats in the 2nd row next to the Ducks bench!! Wings have been scoring a lot but giving up a few as well so I'm going to say 5-3 Wings.

That's some pretty priceless commentating. I wonder if he plans those ahead of time.

Thanks for manipulating my post Opie. I guess where I said "more physical" I really meant fights every 5 minutes, as well as when I said "more seats would be filled" truly means 100% sell outs in the regular season. You’re better than that sir. There are common misconceptions about the D, not everyone in the area works for the Automotive industry, you won't get shot as soon as you step foot in the city, and not everyone loves the sport as much as the folks who post on lgw.com. That said; there's an entertainment value in going to see the Wings. I consider myself a top percentile fan and put my money where my mouth is. If you watch tomorrow, I have seats second row right next to the Anaheim bench. Will be sitting with three other guys and probably have a beer in my hand. Will be the 5th time this year I’ve had these particular seats. I'm willing to pay to go and have those seats because I love the game for what it is and the team the way they are, and will continue to because my love for Hossa multiplies as the day grows long. Simple economics, I just don’t like seeing the team get bullied around. There are a percentage of people in Detroit that would be considered more fair weather hockey fans as well and go for the entertainment value of the game. If the game is not entertaining to them (for whatever reason, physical or not), they're not going to drop the extra coin to attend, hence many empty seats. I don't know why that's hard for people to comprehend sometimes, but many Detroiter's (not all) are blue collar and like that type of hard hitting, hard fought, blood, sweat, and tears side of the game. You’re right though, there’s no way I can prove what I see because there is no hard evidence; but what do I know, there are people like you on these boards that live many miles away and know more about the demographic I live around than I do.

Another quick thought, I've been listening to 97.1 all morning at work and they're giving a lot of attention to the Hossa "fight." Mind you, this is the flagship station for the Wings, which usually gives them about 5% coverage during the day, which is probably close to half of the conversation thus far today. People are calling and emailing in about the scrum and they talked about the fans at the Joe chanting Hossa's name when exiting. My point here is to reiterate that the Detroit market loves this type of hockey, and if the Wings played a slightly more physical game, there would be a lot less empty seats at the Joe.

This is truly news to me. I've been watching the Wings since the late 80's and they have always had full-time enforcers and grit in the line-up until after they won the cup in '02. Don't know where you're getting your information. But then again, this is just another ignorant anti-enforcer poster who assumes the pro-enforcer crowd wants brawls on every line change, when really most of us just want someone in the lineup to stick up for teammates when s*** happens. Having Hossa have to do the dirty work, while awesome and respectful, is just not worth it because of the potential for injury.

Hossa is an absolute stud, enough said, but it's unfortunate that he is the one out there having to stick up for teammates. Just interviewed him on FSN, got a good bump on his forehead, but no worse for the wear. The interviewer also told him fans were chanting his name when leaving the Joe, he got a kick out of that.

I'm changing my name to ManLuv4Hossa

GMR, you're going to get me fired, because I crack up out loud sometimes at your posts. Thanks for helping me thru my day. As for Thomas, I thought I saw some promise in him before his knee injury, but as folks before have mentioned, he hasn't been the same since. He'll unfortunately probably be around as long as Hossa's here because of their relationship.

Why does everyone forget or refuse to acknowledge the fact that Drake played in pretty much every game last year and Downey played in a majority of the regular reason? It's always stat sheets to people on these boards. No one ever wants to give credit to the grinders and role players that go out with their heart on their sleeve and will do anything to help the team win. It's always what's on the score sheet.

I agree with this post. See the late 80's and early 90's. I also agree with your assesment that Lemieux could take most of the Wings' current roster as well. Lilja and Cleary could probably give him a run, Mac would probably get beat down or a hug fest, and Downey's the only player on the team with a hint of fighting ability that would destroy Claude. I still hate the guy and he's a d-bag, but I'm not going to look at this whole scenario while drinking Red Wing kool aid.

I thought it was more like this:

Good explanation. Thanks YG.

Obviously there's a lot of well deserved praise for Hudler on this thread, but I have one question for you folks. If Hudler is as great as everyone's making him out to be, what's to stop another team from putting an offer out there for him that Holland can't match? I mean if he is that great, I would bet that he would be with another team at the start of next season and the Wings would have a draft pick or two in their back pocket, unless of course Huds follows suit with the big guns and takes a home town discount to stay.

HAHA! That's priceless Icer.

I finally got Versus thru Wow last week and was able to watch both the Monday and Tuesday games and their coverage of the sport is horrible, so that can be added to their list of things to work on. They cut to commercial as soon as the whistle blows every chance they get no matter what is happening on the ice. Sometimes there is shoving and scrums that can lead to heated emotions and rivalries. These types of things build anticipation among fans for next meetings and Versus conveniently cuts this out of their footage. Versus also has a horrible replay system if one at all, they don't replay hits, good shot, scrums, or anything worth analyzing in the game, this also helps the late viewer learn more about the game in general. These are my beefs, but it may not be entirely their fault if they are on some type of time slot to meet, but again, it really hurts the viewing experience of the game.

Interesting stats, I'm happy to say I don't think fighting is going anywhere, especially after Mr. Kelly's comments on Versus last night.

Both WOW and Versus continue to disappoint me. I used my tax return to buy a nice TV and then upgraded my cable from basic to digital under the impression Versus HD was available. Turn on the NY/NJ game last night and it's in s***ty SD. It was also my first time sitting down outside of a bar and watching a complete game coverage (if you want to call it that) by Versus and was amazed how bad they cover the game itself. Maybe it's a good thing VS is only available in 60% of homes, but I digress. As for the HD feed, both WOW and VS have links on their home pages where you can request it, I did so, and I recommend anyone with a vested interest to do so as well.

No kidding, his bias towards Hudler is obvious in those ridiculous assessments. Hudler a "5" for hitting and Pavel a "6?" You've got to be kidding me, Pavs was the leading hitter on this team in the playoffs last year, and I don't recall Hudler ever giving a check, I like Huds and all but if he tried to throw the body on most people in this league he'd hit their waist and fall over.

He also touched on something along the lines of players body slamming each other and that leading to serious injuries and if there is anything they can do about preventing that.