Opie

I stand corrected for a second time, it was Ronnie Francis!!! Damn this memory loss!!

He got injured and wasn't the same player in the postseason (with a leg injury). So instead of it being he was injured and wasn't 100% (viable reason for Cleary) it is he is old and can't play. I am in the "I trust Holland and Babs" mode right now and have been for 2 years, so if Holland and Babs think he is a worthy component for this team I will leave it in their hands. What I find amazing is that with cheli killing the pp and logging low minutes isn't good enough for most of this board, yet what exactly is Maltby going to be doing next season? And how many people on here are up in arms about Malts saying he should walk away? He was less of a factor in the post season than Cheli, oh but wait he was injured so it is ok!

I almost fell over laughing so hard, people came running to my cube to see what I was laughing at, I sit by a window so when I said nothing everyone was peering out the window looking for a fat woman with ripped pants or something!!!

While you will probably end up being 100% right, after Hossa even ending up in a Winged Wheel, I am not eliminating any possibility!

Yeah they have Huet at 5.625 and Khabi at 6.750 that is 12.375, right there. A lot of loot tied up in the net!

Again I am in no way advocating trading homer, however in your scenarios who would draw more trade demand? I think Homer right now, because he is bar none the best at what he does, Val is potential laden, Homer is proven.

I am not saying I want him traded or that he will be traded but here is a name to throw out there for trade bait to clear room. Homer. Hear me out, logically this makes sense. Homer's 2.25 off of the books gives the wings some room (short term only) and if he is acquired by another team that would be an expiring contract for 09-10. Franzen has shown the ability to do what Homer does, not as well as homer, however Franzen has more skill from the dots out, Homer (as much as I love what the guy does) is dots in. Homer is Luc/Igor slow. Remember how slow that line was. Again I am not condoning the trade, but he does clear up over 2 mil and would garner some real attention. BUT... if it means trading Homer to keep Hossa, I am all for it!

How on earth did I forget about this line I change my answer from Trio Grande to this, seriously.

If he sees a solid amount of time this year with either Dats or Hossa that deal will be steal this year, if healthy!!

I would say Kronwall was more risky than Flip, Flip has shown he can stay healthy, at the time Kronwall signed his deal he was injured almost as much as Floppa.(Edit: exaggeration please take it as that) He had yet to play a season with out incurring a major injury, yet he was supposed to be a hard hitter. A hard hitter that is injury prone is a lot more risky than signing a play making center who in his second year with the big club has shown no injury issues and scored 36 points. Their is a lot of potential in both players, but if one is injury prone that makes him the bigger risk.

I cannot see the wings pulling a sign and trade either. One of the things that makes this team so appealing to players, well other than winning, is the way they treat their players. I said it in another thread, the only real controversy they have had over contracts was Feds, Holland pulled that year away from him and the ordeal became a mess. Other than that what mistake have they made in terms of signing and releasing players. I see Lebda or Meech being shopped if not a combo of the both. My other thought here, and I said this last season(edit at the end of the season) and during the post season, everyone sees a D-man being shopped. But with the addition of Hossa ( I obviously wasn't talking about this in the past), the growth of Mule, the emergence of Huds and Flip I think Sammy has finally reached the status so many here (not me) thought he always was, not needed. He filled a role for this team for the past couple of years when secondary scoring was a weakness. Now the team has 9 forwards that could be top 6. Package Sammy with a D-man for a prospect, or Sammy for a late round pick. Look at a team like Pho, Min he could fill in there and give them some offensive support they need, I would say LA as well but they need to spend big to make the cap floor and Sammy is cheap, too cheap won't help them where they need it most. The wings get 1.2 off of the books and the other team gets a cheap 40 point guy with an expiring contract that if they don't need him they can let him walk.

1. Thanks for the compliment and the civilized debate. 2. I think he will stay too long, he played what 77 games last year, carried his team to the post season, and then looked tired in the postseason. As long as he can play 60+ games in the league I think he stays in NJ. They will have to force him off of the team, which would be very very tough, he is a legend he is their Sawchuck, he is their Roy. I really think he will decline quickly over the next 3 seasons, but I thought Ozzie was washed up a long time ago and look how that turned out. BTW great point about the health of him and Roy!!!!

I would think you of all people would have learned not to jump to conclusions, OT Nashville game 5 something like that.

That is a great deal. 5 years is a long term deal to keep him here until he hits his prime, this is eerily similar to the Z contract. When compared to say the Shawn Horcoff deal this is sweet, especially when you consider J-Willy just got 2.2 from Atlanta or Ryder in Boston 3 year 12mil. He was a key component to this years cup run, he was the second line center for a better part of the year, filled in with Dats when injuries hit. This is a good deal IMO!

Marty on the Wings would have been complete Domination, not only did the Wings have better than or at least as good of D they had better offensive than the Devils, and if you give Ozzie an 8 Marty is a 9.5. Brodeur played on average 2x as many minutes a season than Ozzie, Brodeur has only played under 4000 minutes 3 times in his career, once his rookie year. Brodeur has never had a year with a SV% under .900, Ozzie has had 5. Than there is the whole the league thinks he is pretty good thing with these: 1993-94 Calder Memorial Trophy 1996-97 William M. Jennings Trophy 1997-98 William M. Jennings Trophy 2002-03 William M. Jennings Trophy 2002-03 Vezina Trophy 2003-04 William M. Jennings Trophy 2003-04 Vezina Trophy If Ozzie is an 8, Brodeur has to be at least a 9.5, and I am not arguing that Ozzie is underrated, I already conceited that, however Brodeur has earned every single one of his accolades, he played behind great D's, sure, but it is not like he is Raycroft. And look at those Blues rosters again, Pronger, Demitra, Weight, Tckachuk, Stillman. Lets not pretend he was on a team like this years Kings.

I guess what is great about that is that the wings became the exact opposite of that to win. When the Illitches took over it became a more player friendly environment in Detroit. Then they were rewarded rightfully so with 4 championships! Kudos to the Illitches for having the right team concept in mind to build not only a contender but a place players want to come to, are willing to take pay cuts for. Besides the yanking of the year off of the table to Feds what other player contract controversies have their been. How many Wings players have said get me out of here, I can not play for this org. Lids arguably the most important and best player in the league is paid no where near his value, does he complain, nope not a word out of him about it. Hossa wants in, is told Holland doesn't want anyone to make more than Lids, and that he would have to check with Lids because he promised him no one would make more money. Hossa says don't bother I will have what he is having. A couple great things come out of that in my mind: 1. Holland shows he is a man of his words, thus not upsetting his all world defenseman. 2. Holland shows Hossa that he would love to have him on his team, but not at the cost of the team chemistry showing the importance of A. Lids, B. Team chemistry. 3. Hossa sees the importance of the chemistry and realizes that if he upsets that chemistry he could upset the wagon. 4. Every other player in the league (I assume) read the stories and also sees that the Wings as an Org are committed to winning but are also committed to their players. Man what a difference great owners can make!!!

True, BUT the trademarked name is Hockey Town USA ©, seeing as Toronto is in Canada, it could not be Hockey Town USA ©!

I was more referring to the post below yours that straight up said Brodeur was overrated and Ozzie should be the one getting his accolades. I understand your point about the two, however, do you honestly think Ozzie is a better goaltender than Brodeur. Can't we also look at international play and see the skill set that Marty possess. Martin Brodeur is one of the greatest Goaltenders of the modern era, him Hasek and Roy. That is the top of the list, in the 90's the D was great in front of him, but he was a stone wall behind it. There were many playoff games where he stole the show. "It's Marty Brodeur vs the world" (Thanks Doc!) Brodeur may have benefited from having a good D in front of him, but that D also benefited from having a great netminder behind them. I am of the opinion that without Brodeur behind him, Stevens can't hit like he did in Jersey, at least not as frequently. He knew what was behind him and that if he took the chance he more than likely would be ok. For instance the infamous hit on Kariya (link below) there were three ducks including Kariya entering the zone on 2.5 d-men (the third was slightly behind the play) and Stevens lays one of his top 5 hits (hard to label he had so many beauties). I think Marty being in the cage gave him the confidence, I could be completely wrong I have no quotes no links to back it up just my theory. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8up-tkxZ4r8 I will give you Ozzie is underrated, was underrated by me before this last Detroit stint, I called him overrated and I was wrong. Not just because he won another cup, but because I did more research on the guy. When he was in other cities, I didn't pay attention, so therefore I assumed he was as bad as the teams records in front of him. Silly me. And as far as your comment about the D dwindling and then lets see what happens, the dude is old now, yes goaltenders tend to age better than other positions, but still it is not like Marty of the 90's is playing behind a worse defensive team, we cannot go back and recreate that scenario. What we do know is Marty was awesome for 90% of his career and now he is a great goaltender(edit, just not this post season). Ozzie has been a very very good goaltender(I stop short of great, because he has never been the dominant tender) for 90% of his career and a solid goaltender for the other 10%. That is not a knock on Ozzie, I have 0, count them 0 problems with him in net for Detroit. He showed last post season he is still the very very good goaltender and with this team in front of him I wouldn't be surprised if he brought another cup home with him before the end of this contract.

I knew that, I posted both of the players stats in this very thread and included in that was oh, guess what games played. Question for you, is Feds the highest scoring Russian ever, or highest scoring in the NHL. It does matter, mainly because he has got to be the longest tenured Russian in the NHL, I would guess. By default that would give him and edge in that category. Not that that should count against him, just curious. Again no where have I said he is a sure fire lock to not make the Hall, I just stated my opinion that he was not a stone cold lock to get in, because his numbers are not the greatest. Sure he was one of the greatest players for a couple of seasons, so wasn't Pavel Bure. Is he a stone cold lock into the Hall, he was a better player than Feds. However Bure's career was cut short by injuries.

He is signed for this season therefore if he stays in Fla this season for the whole season, next off season he will be a FREE AGENT!!! If you look at my post you partly quoted you will see I broke it into two parts the deadline and next offseason, I suppose I should have typed it all out but I thought people could pick up on that fact.

You know what I think I have tried to type that in like 4 or 5 different posts but couldn't put it in those words!! A+ my man!

Not to derail the thread but same thought process as this, sure it is ESPN and they know Donkey Dick about Hockey, well except Bucci, but they named him best player and he only played 53 games this year. That is not objective, that is awarding him for the hype, hype which he cannot live up to, Wayne and Mario are once in a lifetime players, we just happen to be lucky enough that they overlapped a little bit. For Sid to be Wayne or Mario, which is the hype, he would have to put up some seriously crazy numbers, if he does he will be rightly deserved of the title and hype given to him, however the chances of that are slim to none, and none is in the lead.

And I think adding the C adds a very heavy burden, I guess it comes from perspective. I know when I was a Captain of my teams I took it as a much larger burden of responsibility. He has enough worries with being a 20yo superstar face of the league, now he has to be a leader of his team, which is a very young team as well. IMO they would have been better served naming Gonchar. That doesn't mean Sid can speak up or be a leader in his own rights, but when they named him Captain, regardless of if he wants to lead or not he has to now, he has to conduct himself as the captain every night. He has to get Malkin's legs that were "toast" motivated, he has to get the rest of the team to play with the heart and energy that Malone played with. Those are responsibilities of the leader, Stevie did that with his play, but he was almost always surrounded with a good veteran core that followed his lead even when he didn't speak up, but when he did speak up everyone listened. I think if this is a team full of Gary Roberts, Mark Recchi, Shanny, Roenick and then the youngsters it would have been a much easier transition to him being the leader, he would also have a bunch of vets in the locker room to help police the troops so to speak.

Trade deadline I think Pho, Edm, Col, Min, Pit any team that is currently light in the defenseman category. Edit: and making a playoff run. Next offseason I see a team like Tampa (if they can afford him) or Pho will be willing to give the most money for him long term. I could also see LA or Cal taking a run at him. Most Orgs will throw and offer his way as D-men are a commodity, however it will come down to whose D is in bad shape. I could also see Ana making a big push at him, after this season they will have exactly 1 d-man signed, Pronger for one year. One thing for sure, he will make some cash next season!!!!

DAMN IT!!!! That is one of those names like Bergereon or Desjardin that I always spell wrong, I re-read and think, mm how do I usually try to spell it and I will try the other way this time, and no matter what I do I friggin' spell the name wrong. Maybe I should use the internet instead of my own head to check spelling.