Buppy

Is there a guy you would hesitate to move if he can bring in a better player? He scored over 50 goals in juniors.

It's the only way to be sure.

If you really liked to argue you'd argue against the person telling you to argue. Nothing that mentions Cholowski's exact situation, but from https://www.nhl.com/flyers/news/who-can-play-where-and-why/c-889461 Jeremy Morin is an example of a USDP player who went to the AHL at 19 after one year in the CHL. Again though, I'm not sure if that means Cholo could be moved mid-season. Moot point anyway, I'd say.

Actually, since Cholowski wasn't playing in the OHL when he was drafted, that rule doesn't apply to him. I don't know if there's any rule about being moved mid-season though.

Lies What exactly do you find sexual about eyes-closed, mouth-open dummy-heads and violent spank-bots? And don't make it weird.

Am I the only one uninspired by the higher-end picks, aside from Dahlin? Seems all the top forwards are wingers, and all the top D play like they are. Not that I would hate a Boqvist, Hughes, or Zadina, I just wonder how much difference they would make. Seems like the middle of the 1st has the more well-rounded, potentially higher-impact players. I really like what I've read on Evan Bouchard and Noah Dobson. Also Wilde, McIsaac, and Veleno even though their numbers aren't great.

If he confirmed it, it wouldn't be a rumor. This is a rumors thread not a confirming thread. Stay on topic.

Photoshopped

I know. Everything I've ever said is wrong. Including that. But at least I just destroyed any evil robots that might have been reading. You're welcome.

Shows how much you know. His advanced stats went to hell in Arizona even with a higher OZS% than he had here. But that's all beside the point. You don't have to be a top-line player playing against top opponents to contribute in the NHL. Every team has sheltered players. And again, being a good possession player isn't the same as being a good overall player. And not nitpicking words. "Could" denotes possibility, "would" denotes certainty. English 101, man. But enough of the silliness. Coup de grâce time. Yeah, I was absolutely wrong about how Pulk would turn out. I also thought Sproul would turn out, and Smith. Didn't think Jimmy would maintain his improved play from last year. I could probably list a bunch of draft or UFA targets I would have liked that would have been bad, or vice versa. Unlike some people, I won't even make excuses or try to shift the blame. Thus I have conclusively proven that including me with the rest of you stubborn mules is baseless defamation. Once again I am victorious. Admit your defeat, if you dare. But how do you make the other teams win? Should we trade Howard to them?

More correct things I said. I was on a roll. "proved it could translate" doesn't mean "will be successful long-term" by the way. Did I win a ribbon or anything? Seems like I should have won a ribbon. I'm not a killer of women and children, but still, deserve's got nothing to do with it. People want what they want and will make any argument they can think of to convince others, but that doesn't make it hypocritical. Situations, however similar, are not identical. While it's fair to question the apparent contradiction, in this case the person wanting Mrazek already explained himself. Speaking of making any argument... If what we wanted was to be close, but still lose, we would actually be better off with Mrazek (at least if we assume each would continue at their present stats). Mrazek has allowed 3 goals in 4 of 8 starts. Jimmy has allowed 3 in only 5 of 31. Allow more than 3 goals, you probably don't have a chance, less and you'll probably win. Mrazek has allowed 4+ 3 times, to 7 for Jimmy, so if roles we're reversed and Mrazek were given 4 out of every 5 starts going forward, you'd only expect to see an extra 3-4 such games. Would that hurt team morale? Maybe. Other way around though and we would expect 10 or so extra games allowing 2 or less, so if we want to lose we'd have to simultaneous root for the offense to suck, which would likely hurt morale even more. Overall, the team is .500 with either goalie starting. 13-13-5 with Howard, 3-3-2 with Mrazek. Statistically though, if each continued at current levels, we would expect to win more with Howard, so again if you want to lose but still be close go with Mrazek.

No no no no. His advanced stats were very good. I was right again. Good job, me! Not my fault if you think "good possession player" and "good NHL player" are synonymous.

False false. But also, all I ever said about Pulk was that he had potential, and his success in the NHL would be determined by how well he developed after he came up. His development since then is nothing (negative, really), as was his success in the NHL, ergo, I was right. Now admit defeat.

Don't lump me in with your irrational obstinance. I would readily admit defeat if it were only possible for anyone to defeat me.

"Seriously harm his health" isn't a factor. It's more like just not feeling well enough to play as the result of a condition that is expected to last at least 10 games. You could claim LTIR for a player with something like mono. LTIR is not a disability benefit, nor intended for retired players. It's just being used (abused, some might say) to avoid retirement penalties in a handful of cases.

I just mean that "handshake" deals, anything not expressly stated in the contract (like signing a 7 year contract with the agreement that the player will only actually play 5), are considered circumvention.

First, if pet hair in your food is something that worries you, you should work on your risk assessment. Hossa's case is the first with a truly suspect "injury", so I don't think we can draw any conclusions. Yeah, it's probably bogus and it's very possible he had always planned on retiring when his salary dropped, and that may also be the case for many of the old long-term deals, but those players are only a small fraction of total LTIR claims. Well, we are saying he's lying. Not about having the condition, just about the severity of the effects. But his pants are definitely on fire. But I don't think there will or necessarily should be any major changes to LTIR. Most of the old cap-circumventing contracts are gone or are near the end, and you can't get the same kind of benefits with contracts anymore. Relatively few contracts carry any kind of retirement penalty for the team. The only real issue now would be a team signing a player for more years than they intend to play, with the additional years being essentially deferred pay and LTIR used to offset the post-retirement cap hit. However, that kind of deal is already illegal and the penalties can be severe. It would be very difficult to prove, but I still don't think teams would be too willing to take that risk for what would at best be only a minor benefit. That said, LTIR is not meant as a retirement benefit, and doesn't (and shouldn't) require a "life-threatening or career-ending injury". If it were to be changed to "partly count toward their cap", it would impact the intended use; allowing teams to continue to ice a competitive and full roster even if they have significant injuries. If there were to be changes, it should be aimed only at retired players. For example: LTIR can only be claimed for a player in active treatment with the probable result of returning to play. Possibly limited only to players who played the previous (or current) season.

Don't get too full of yourself, Mr. Man. I checked your credentials and your troll loving isn't certified by any reputable authority. What is this world coming to, people lying on the internet? Despicable. You've sullied your family's honor.

None of that has anything to do with what I said. 5 years of mediocrity doesn't even put us close to league laughingstock status. It's just a normal down cycle that every team goes through. For the record, Kings missed the playoffs 11 times in 17 years prior to their Cup, not to mention had been mostly irrelevant since joining the league in 67. Boston had been mediocre or worse for 15 years. So was Chicago. At least try to be a little objective. Furthermore, no one is suggesting to rebuild strictly through the draft. (And by the way, Edmonton has plenty of UFAs and trade acquisitions as well.) We go after UFAs every year, and will continue to do so. Some people may not want Carlson specifically, and most probably don't want Cole or de Haan (and shouldn't, because they aren't notably better than what we have), but that doesn't mean anyone is against UFAs. Trades are another matter. We can't get the kind of players we need without creating other holes just as large. Best we could do is trade for prospects then hope they develop into something, but that strategy isn't anything all that different from drafting. Shuffling our middling players for different middling players isn't likely to do much either, though once we're sure of what core players we have that can be done to tweak things. But we're not at "tweak" stage yet. Anyone we move should be for picks or prospects. But the bottom line is 5 years of mediocrity and adding the pieces we have is doing very well, no matter what some spoiled fans think. Even just a couple top picks in the next couple years could conceivably get us heading back toward the top. It's pretty remarkable actually, considering we haven't really even had any particular luck in the draft.

First spin on http://nhllotterysimulator.com and this happened: Technically, it could be worse. Chicago is currently a lottery team, but the site is out of date. Just imagine the joy of Pens and Blackhawks missing the playoffs, but then them getting the first two picks and the Wings dropping to 7th.

Just imagine how Arizona and Buffalo would feel if Edmonton won again. Or maybe even worse if we did. So much combined suck and neither has had a 1st overall since the 80s.

Not sure what you're trying to say here. Top UFAs don't want to come here, so we need to sign a top UFA like Carlson to show some "direction"? I think the whole "top players only want to play for top contenders" idea is way over-stated. Lot of reasons a player will choose to play somewhere, and I haven't heard anything to suggest that Detroit isn't still a very well respected organization. It's not like we're the only team in NHL history to miss the playoffs. Don't know why so many Wings fans have this idea that it's so egregiously bad for the Wings to now go through what literally every other team in the league has gone through multiple times since the last time we did. What will make it difficult to land any of those guys is that it is unlikely that any of them will actually become UFAs. I would be pretty surprised if even one of them do (including Carlson this summer). If they did, we'd still be only one of many teams vying for them, so even if each team was given equal consideration the odds overall would still be against us. If you really think "a couple of years" more of this would put us in the same category as Edmonton, you need some seriously intense psychotherapy. They missed the playoffs for 10 consecutive years, over that time finishing with 86 fewer points than any other team, last twice, bottom five 7 times. And that decade of awfulness was immediately preceded by more than a decade of being mediocre or worse. Overall for that 25 year period they were a bottom 5 team in the league. We've been middle of the pack over the last 5 years with last year being the first time finishing lower than 15th overall. Still haven't finished bottom 5 (though we're working on it this year). We still have the 15th most playoff wins over the last 5 years. We are a long, long way away from anyone making fun of us, much less Edmonton doing so.

While I can understand the idea that adding Carlson could possibly hurt our draft position in the future, I think you're under-rating him a bit. I'd put him on basically the same level as OEL; 2nd-tier guy not all that far behind the elite, Norris-caliber types. Also think having an excellent all-around, all-situation, big-minute defender in his prime would be great for the young players we already have, and might add this year. A deal in the $7M range is probably workable even without any effort to shed salary (other than just letting Green and Mrazek go), and also wouldn't be likely to handcuff us any in the future. I think there's little chance that Washington will let him go, as they're in good shape cap-wise. But if they do he'd be a great target to go after. Better than trading for Karlsson, I'd say. Also rather have him than go after Tavares. Dekeyser-Quincey was our primary shutdown pair in Babcock's last year, and that was Dekeyser's best season. I don't think he's regressed because he's been playing over his head, but maybe the other way around. Why he's regressed is a good question. Both Green and Blashill seem to be a bad fit for him, but likely more than that. Maybe just other players have figured him out and hasn't been able to adapt, or maybe he was just unusually lucky his first couple years. If we could get him back to what he was in 14-15 it would be as valuable as almost any addition we could make. But replacing Green with Carlson doesn't change anyone's role. 5 years in which we have added quite a few good pieces, even core pieces, for the future while not even actually "sucking", but rather just being a low-end playoff team. Whether you or anyone wants to admit it or not, it does take time, and some luck. 10+ years would not be at all unusual. Yzerman is #1 in pretty much everyone's slideshow. He started with Stamkos and Hedman (who could take a decade to find by themselves, without considerable luck) and the 6th overall pick. Added two more top 10 picks since, plus a dream 2011 draft, and only now 8 years later are truly looking like an elite team. No doubt signing Carlson and/or OEL would have a huge impact, but it's unlikely that either will even be available, much less that we would be able to sign both.

There is no limit to LTIR. The 10% rule is that you can only exceed the cap by 10% during the off-season. You can't use LTIR then, so it could potentially prevent us from using the maximum relief for both Franzen and Kronwall, though in practice we would most likely be promoting some kids from GR and they wouldn't count toward the off-season cap anyway. Very unlikely we would have any problem. However, Kronwall has been holding up well so far this year, and playing decently too. LTIR is probably a moot point.

Just let them all dope, they're going to do it anyway; be it trying to get away with using banned drugs or finding new ones that work but aren't yet illegal. I don't even understand why people get so upset over them anyway. It's common knowledge that the Captain of all America used PEDs, and everyone considers him a hero. Hypocrites.