Mikhailov

And you think if Hossa was just floating defensively that the coaches wouldn't say something to him? They just go in the locker room and say, "Oh he's Hossa, he can do what he wants. He needs no coaching." Same with peole bitching about Ovechkin, he does kind of lag on the back check he could probably hustle more, but coaches are coaches and aren't gonna take that kind of s***. I'm sure they're doing exactly what they're told or they'll see less minutes or be sitting next to Kirk Maltby or Chris Chelios(not saying that they didn't do what they were supposed to). As tactical as the NHL is, I'm sure people are in a spot for a reason. That's why Detroit breaks out of their zone so easy, because without even looking they know where each other is, or atleast the general area.

Hossa already scored the goals he got paid for. Players salary is for an 82 game season. Hossa and Datsyuk kept this team afloat throughout the season and there were definetly people saying that Flip needed to be traded. He made to much. Let Hudler walk, he's to small. Get sammy the hell out of here, he shoots to much, we need to sign Hossa. Every single person who's calling for Hossa and Datsyuk's heads are ridiculous. Probably the same people that were castigating everyone else who wasn't producing earlier in the season. Very rarely does a team fire on all cylinders, just an offensive juggernaut, yet have it happen in the post season. It happened for us last season, we had real spread out scoring. This season not so much. What's gonna happen when we go into Chicago? Do you think Q is gonna want Kane and Toews looking down at Pavel and Zetterberg? Hopefully those two will be able to take advantage of lesser defencemen, and capatlize on their opportunities. In previous series, they faced a pretty hot goalie, which Hossa and Datsyuk still got atleast one goal on, and they faced a pretty damn deep and good defence in Anaheim. I'm not making excuses I'm just saying. It's all relative, the scoring's gonna come from somewhere. Scoring goals was not our problem in the regular season, Goaltending and defence was. Problem fixed. We're still outscoring the opponent. 13 is still stripping people from the puck. He's dangling, Hossa is firing shots and taking the puck back when the wings don't have it. We're all still a "team" until the last game of the playoffs, so lets ship Hossa off then, or sign him then, whatever. For anyone who has the NHL network if you watch NHL: On The Fly you'll see the analysts talk about Datsyuk and Hossa. They're doing everything right, they're playing great defensively, s***'s just not going in. Those are former players and profressionals that know exactly what to look at. They know what's going on, and they're not just blowing smoke up everyone's ass because Holland asked them too. There's gotta be some truth to it.

Think of it from the view of an opposing defenseman. Last year, you're covering the ZDH line. Say Hank has the puck, you're covering him. If you're aggressive with him and try and strip him of the puck or force a bad decision or turnover, he's got two options. He can get around you with a nifty move and take a shot or pass. Or he can make the easy play, pass to Datsyuk who's open, and if he's not he'll probably get the puck from who ever intercepts it anyway. If Datsyuk gets the puck, he's probably gonna draw two defenders towards him. It's just human nature to try and be the guy who gets the puck unless it's an elite defensmen who can keep his head on straight. If you watch him, he usually skates up the boards waiting for a lane, and if nothing obvious is there he heads back down. He gets close enough to the guy at the high boards that he draws that guy in, then he skates back to the lower corner, and there's another guy there trying to strip him of the puck too. What does that do? It leaves atleast one guy on the ice uncovered if there's two guys on Pavel. As soon as that happens the other team is usually in trouble because there all gonna start to try covering for each other which leads to defensive breakdowns. Same thing with Holmstrom, especially on a rush. I don't know who plays hockey here, but if a guy is heading straight for the net on a rush that's going to open a couple options. If no one covers him, you've got a guy open in front of the net, perfect. Or usually two guys will head to that person(a center and a D usually), because that's like a huge red light in front of the net, he's gonna be in a prime scoring location. So once again there's automatically going to be someone who's left unattended on the Red Wings. It's not always going to be Z that's uncovered, so Detroit passes the puck around and the other team starts to chase the puck to cover the open man. Pass the puck enough, move the other team around, Z is open, Datsyuk gets the puck, he's an incredible passer, you know what happens next. Last year Detroit did this to great success(obviously winning the cup), and in a lot of post game you'd hear the other team say, "we just didn't play our system", or "we didn't stick to our game plan well". That's because Detroit takes them off their game by doing that. Now this year, same thing, except the opposing team probably discusses this line change first before the game. Any good coach would make big note of this change, especially teams in the west and more noteably in the central that played them so much last year. Now Hank doesn't have as talented play maker as last year and they know that. That means if they jump on Hank, and he throws the puck to Samuelsson, he's probably not gonna make someone look foolish. That's not a knock on him, just the type of player he is. He just isn't known for making brilliant passes or shaking two guys at once. So they're more likely to attack on Zetterberg and take their chances because Pavel isn't there to do something extroidinary. There is Franzen there that can do something remarkable but he's not Datsyuk either. Franzen get's around people usually one on one by going to the net with the puck. Datsyuk does that too, but his game is more keeping the puck to the side and drawing people in towards him. That's also why Hossa has had such success on the top line, because if they approach Datsyuk he can give it to Hossa, and he can work his own magic. So what it breaks down to is Hank, and his line, is probably being hounded a lot more, with less options for puck management. Hudler is a great play maker too, but untill he gets a rep around the league as one they probably aren't going to respect him as much as they would Datsyuk. Remember when Hanks power play unit was on fire? It's because it was essentially like playing with Datsyuk. There was one less guy out there, so someone was open at all times. If you put Datsyuk with Draper and Maltby, there probably wouldn't be the same production. Teams could almost afford to send three guys on Datsyuk because Drapes and Maltby aren't "scorers". A lot of it depends on your line mates and what type of player they are. Hossa being on the top line is almost like Zetterberg still being there, except the chemistry obviously isn't 100% the same as it is with Z. I'm not saying this is exactly what's happening, it's just my view on things.

I roam around a lot of hockey boards just to see what's sort of going on around the league. It seems Pittsburgh has had the same complaints we have had of late, except we have a better record to show for it, and I have been reading a lot lately that fans of the Pittsburgh Penguins are looking to accquire a player like Franzen or Holmstrom, either by deadline or UFA. It's also been said a couple times they would love to have Zetterberg, which I don't blame them for. But the suprising part of all of it to me is they think they have a chance at getting these people. What does everyone think of the chances of any or all these players going to Pittsburgh? And do you think if any left in the offseason there's a realistic chance they head to Pittsburgh? Here some quotes.. ------------------------------ On Fraznen: "Who knows right? Me, I think Franzen would be the man. It's hard to think they can keep him and we have some of the best young D in the league. Factor that with Lids and Rafalski ...getting up there. Perhaps, Whitney for Franzen?" ------------------------------ ------------------------------ On Holmstrom: "I never usually post "we should sign this guy threads" but... What's everyones thoughts on this guy. Next year he'll be an UFA; he makes 2.5 mill a year right now and he's 35. I know he's getting up there in age, but maybe because of that he could be had at the same salary or even less. Everyone wants big name wingers, but lets face it, despite my wishes it looks like staal may stay so that further eliminates us from signing a big name winger. Holmstrom is a guy who will stand in front of the net and take a beating something we desperately need on our power play. We have all the other main components, extreme amounts of skill on the outside, but no one to fight the tough battles." ------------------------------ ------------------------------ On Franzen: "While franzen is a good player. He is a center and I bet he gets atleast 4.5+ a year. Look what ryan malone got. " ------------------------------ ------------------------------ On Holmstrom: "i will cease to be a pens fan if holmstrom is ever on the team." ------------------------------ ------------------------------ "Pass on Holmstrom. Give me Zetts Ray Shero(their GM)." ------------------------------ ------------------------------ "I'd love to see Franzen on Sid's wing. He plays wing as well as C. Sick skill and a brute as well." ------------------------------ ------------------------------ On Conklin, and our Cap situation: "first of all, thats a terrible argument... especially the conklin part, he has a .901 save percentage and a 2.81 gaa and your acting like it was a big deal they signed him second of all, the wings got really really lucky.. zetterbergs cap number is like 2.6 or something like that.. after this season he'll be looking at about 7 or so, while franzen (0.942) is going to be looking for nice raise as well, not to mention hossa will be a free agent and will almost certainly be gone since they arent going to be able to sign all of them the wings have been really lucky so far as far as the cap goes, but wait til this offseason, they'll feel it just like every other team has" ------------------------------ On Ken Holland: "Wait till after this year when most of their roster is due a raise coupled with the cap possibly going down and we'll see just how good their GM is" ------------------------------- ------------------------------ This doesn't relate to Franzen I just really disagree with it.. "The Pens have a good goalie in Fleury and one of the deepest, if not the deepest, defenses in the league when they have their full lineup." ------------------------------

Here's another question regarding Franzen's paycheck. Say he carries on for the rest of the season at an average or slightly above average pace. Average scoring from him, nothing like he pulled off at the end of last season but a legitimate second line scorer. At the same time, Valtteri Filppula carries on with his current pace, doesn't pot too many goals or a load of points, but is good on the defensive side of the puck, does things right. I believe Filppula is locked up for 5 years at $15 million? Does Filppula's low point totals make Franzen's worth go up? Should it have an effect? Can Franzen use Valtteri as leverage in negotiations, in that he can say "well I got this many goals over Flip, more assits, I backcheck hard, I feel I should make more than him." Can Flip's salary be a point of reference or can Holland cite this as a case of under acheiving? Even though this sort of strays off topic I've always wondered why a team like Detroit, who we all know is an attractive team to play for for players, doesn't introduce a set salary into positions. Where as you could say, "well for a first line center we'll pay you $xxx.xxxx amount of money". Whether that's Pavel Datsyuk or Nate Thompson(NYI), if that's who you're top line center is that's what he makes. I know there would have to be some sort of standard and team accepted rule towards all this, with some flexibilty(I'm not even sure the CBA would allow something like that), as lines are shuffled all the time but I think you see what I mean. If Detroit had implemented this then Franzen would already know what he's going to make, so to speak. Hossa would've known the deal and what to expect numbers-wise this coming off season and everyone would have a better idea come contract time. There's obviously a lot of reasons that couldn't work but I haven't sat around and thought about intangibles seeing as I don't get paid to do that and am not a GM. Just a little brainstorm.