xtrememachine1

Green is terrible on defense and Franzen is a 30 goal scorer at a $3.9 cap hit, I wouldn't mind a few more of those. No way should we trade Helm either. That would be like the 90's Wings trading Draper.

LOL that's funny. Most of the posts on this board are about how Holland doesn't make big deals and makes all these little minor ones like trading for Quincey, signing White and Conklin. Here we have the exact opposite. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.

They've lost two games throughout the entire playoffs. I seriously doubt they're going to lose 4 of the next 5. But yes, Quick will win it for sure.

Good job, Shero. The team is having cap space problems and you sign back-up goalie for $2 mil.

I understand the whole notion of wanting to spend more time with his family, but I don't understand why he's "taking off for a year" and not retiring. He's in the final year of his contract anyways, so he's done with the Bruins, just retire and save your team the cap space. If he does want to come back in a year, then he can un-retire like Hasek has a few times and sign with someone. His voluntary absence without retiring is screwing the Bruins over. Also, I thought it was really cheesy to plug EVO Ultra fit during his announcement.

Quincey won't get more. He'll get a 1 or 2 year deal for the same price. Helm and Abby will be getting a little more than a million each. Actually Abby may get less than. Honestly, Helm is the only one I would care about returning and I'm sure he will, if the others drive a hard bargain for whatever reason... see ya!

Yeah, its definitely a tough pill to swallow. I think what hurts, isn't the fact that he won't be on our team anymore, its the fact that he's such a great person and the Red Wings were our connection to him. Without him on the team, we don't have that connection, which is why it almost feels like a death to us. All we'll have of him is the memories now.

You're absolutely right. Nashville and NJ would have these guys locked up by now if they were going to stay. You don't let a big name get this close to being a UFA if you're going to re-sign them. I think those two are out of the running for these players.

I don't mean to minimize the loss of Nick Lidstrom, arguably the greatest Red Wing of all time. His loss will be felt in our lineup and in our hearts. However, losing Lidstrom doesn't mean the Wings are going to be a crap team now. We have a ton of cap space and a smart front office. We'll never replace Nick Lidstrom, but that won't stop them from trying fill that void. Plus, it should be mentioned that there are 29 other teams out there that didn't have Nick Lidstrom this year and two of them are playing for the Stanley Cup right now. The last 4 Stanley Cup champions, won without Nick Lidstrom. We can too. Will it be harder? Of course. Is it impossible? Not even close. We still have Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Franzen, Howard, Kronwall and whomever we sign with the insane amount of cap space we now have. Being sad about Lidstrom retiring is one thing. It hurts, its going to hurt. He's been around for 20 years and is connected with pretty much all of the success we've enjoyed during that time. But don't be upset or worry about the state of the team because of him leaving. We'll continue to be competitive with the elite talent we still have.

Zetterberg will become the next captain and he'll be great just like the last two guys that wore it for the Wings.

Yeah, Stevie did too. He was out in the first round on the road as well. Makes you wonder if Holland is second guessing himself now for not doing more at the deadline.

Didn't he have a press conference last year about playing one more year?

This long layoff for the Kings will hurt them early on, not to mention they have the Devils are more experienced. I think NJ wins the first two, Kings win the next two and it ends up with the Kings winning it in either 6 or 7 games.

Answer me this then, who has a solid, tangible future in front of them? Vancouver? The team that's getting rid of their franchise goalie? How about Pittsburgh? No cap space. Chicago? Since winning that one Cup, a team which was loaded with talent thanks to entry level contract for Keith, Toews and Kane, hasn't made it out of the first round. SJ? Choke acts every year. Washington? They couldn't be in more disarray with coaching and player personnel. Boston? Thomas and Chara are both over 35 and those are some big shoes to fill. I know in other post, you mentioned Minnesota and its prospects. Prospects are far from something tangible and certain. They could end up all being colossal busts. I remember back in the mid 90's people talking about how great the Senators are going to be someday with those two centers Daigle and Yashin. They were "can't miss prospects". My point is if you don't trust the franchise that's been doing it better than anyone else over the past 20 years, who can you trust? EDIT: Seriously, Doc Holliday's post wasn't up yet when I started to write mine. lol

Just as an FYI, this franchise has been a winning for almost as long as these guys have been alive, so its been a little more than just 10 years. The Wings have been consistently winning and there's a reason for that. We have one of the best, if not, the best owner in hockey. He's willing to spend money and wants to be competitive, year in, year out. We have a fantastic front office that's made some remarkable trades and free agent signings to keep the team competitive all these years. We have one of the best group of scouts in the league. Despite all of their winning in the late 90's and early 2000's and drafting near the bottom of the first round (if in that round at all) built a new championship caliber team through the draft. No other franchise has all this in place. No other franchise can claim they won the Cup multiple times while at the same time built a new championship team through the draft to replace the players that retire. If you can't trust the Wings organization enough to sign with them, who can you trust? Who can you trust to be competitive for the next 5-8 years? Every other team in the league has rebuilt, fell apart and rebuilt again, while the Wings have consistently remained near the top. History should be a selling point. History tells them that this franchise knows what they're doing when it comes to building a winner and staying competitive.

See, this is crap. The refs were not the reason you were down 3-0 in the series and getting thoroughly beat down. The Kings owned them in this series and the 4-1 series result shows that. In my 27 years of watching hockey, I don't think I can ever remember a playoffs season where the players and coaches complain so damn much about the refs. Every series, every team, after every game. Its like they believe they're the best and if they lose, then its someone else's fault and they were screwed out of what rightfully belonged to them. Its disgusting. I don't recall Gretzky, Lemieux, Yzerman, Messier, Sakic, etc, complaining about the officiating when they lost a playoff series and those guys are infinitely more talented and more deserving of championships than the players whining today.

LOL oh yeah, that's an all time LGW classic right there.

While I think Parise will be a highly sought after UFA regardless, his post season performance recently isn't doing himself any favors. He has just 1 goal in his last 7 games and 1 point in his last 5 games. Combine that with the fact that he went from a 45 goal scorer in 2009 to 38 in 2011, to 31 this past year, these "give him whatever he wants" statements are looking rather ludicrous. People get all over Franzen's case and statistically he's been pretty similar to Parise and he's a $3.9 cap hit.

That's what I'm talkin bout!

I know where you're coming from and the league does typically overpay for players in the summer, but usually they overpay for the cream of the crop. Parise will likely have some absurd offer thrown his way. Suter will too. Semin, I don't know if he's in the same class as them. Like if he was coming off a typical Semin type of year (30-40 goal pace) somebody would throw $6-9 million his way for sure, but coming off a 21 goal season and another so-so playoff... unless someone is trying to get to the cap floor, I wouldn't expect him to get an offer from anyone that seriously wants to contend.

$6 mil for a guy that had a career low in goals (21)? I think not. He'll get $3-4 mil maybe.

I don't want Semin at all, but I wouldn't throw a fit if we picked him up cheap. Semin would be smart to sign on with a good team for a year with a low contract, have another successful season, drive up his price again and hit the free agent market again. This is a very "what have you done lately" kind of league. He won't get very much this off season.

“If you're going to get mad at me everytime I do something stupid then I guess I'll have to stop doing stupid things!” - Homer Simpson This feels like an appropriate quote for Gary Bettman.

Absolutely. Very surprised to see the Caps put on such a strong performance. Dale Hunter deserves a lot of credit for this win too.

I said 30%. With NJ's situation, its a good bet that he'll leave the Devils, however there will be a lot of teams interested in him and someone (it only takes one) will give him a stupid offer like $9 mil a year for 7 years and he'll be out of our hands. Holland won't overpay. The only way he comes to Detroit is if he doesn't care about getting the most money he can and he recognizes that his style of play really makes him a great fit for our team. Having said that, I had a dream I got a Parise Winter Classic jersey for Christmas. It was a #90 on the back. So let's hope it was more than a dream.