ogreslayer

I think everyone should know at this point that it's not the size of your players, it's how you use them. Or is that something that only teams with small players say?

I wouldn't necessarily say that. Given the criteria for selection, there may be a fair amount of voters that may hold some of his behavior against him. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if the Janney situation in St Louis & his public campaign to get out of Hartford played a part in Shanny not getting the required 75% on his first ballot last year. BASIS OF SELECTION OF CANDIDATES Candidates for election as Honoured Members in the player category shall be chosen on the basis of their playing ability, sportsmanship, character and their contribution to their team or teams and to the game of hockey in general.

You're right, just rechecked. Up to 69 NHL regular season/playoff games for him or 3 years pro which is the one he just hit.

Technically, I don't believe that's correct. Tatar is out of waiver exemptions but officially Nyquist & Andersson are not. Granted they have so few games left they can play in the NHL (2 & 12 respectively) before they lose exemption, that it really doesn't matter. So they're on the big club unless they're sent down with the intention of keeping them in GR the entire season.

I'm not convinced that Lindros ever gets in & if he does, it's going to take quite a while.

Plus you have the development of Andersson who now is clearly ahead of Emmerton on the organizational depth chart. Add on then the fact that the Wings have to shed a couple of forwards & they have the ability to call up Ferraro & Sheahan from GR with no waiver risk if injuries do happen. Emmerton is a cheap plug with 1 year left on his contract that really has no future with the team. He'll either be packaged up in a trade or sent through waivers to GR & I wouldn't be all that surprised to see him clear waivers too, like the forward he's been competing for a spot with the last couple of seasons. (see: Mursak, Jan) And as to Brunner, that ship has effectively sailed by all reports. His camp wasn't interested in the dollars/years Kenny was offering & Kenny wasn't interested in what they were asking for. Personally, while I would have liked to see what Brunner could develop into if he stayed in Detroit, I'm more interested in Nyquist & Tatar's development as they turn into full timers & think both of them will bring more to the table than Brunner too. Mark me down in the camp that's comfortable with Brunner moving on.

Doubt it will happen but I would rather see: Z-Dats-Alfie Mule-Weiss-Gus

A regular with the Oilers, Islanders, etc. or even Griffins soon enough.

According to the trade that just went down, the cost for Seguin, Rich Peverley, & Ryan Button was Loui Eriksson, Joe Morrow, Reilly Smith, & Matt Fraser: Bob McKenzie ‏@TSNBobMcKenzie11m Not confirmed but names mentioned as POSSIBLE in BOS-DAL incl Seguin, Peverley, Ryan Button, Eriksson, Reilly Smith, Matt Fraser, Joe Morrow

You do realize a number of names you point out as free agent acquisitions were in fact NOT free agent acquisitions? Calder, Cross, & Lang for example were acquired via trade & Miller was a waiver pick up.

The Wings wanted to take Bure in the 5th round of the '89 draft & were told he wasn't eligible due to the agreements with the IIHF. Turned out he was eligible when the Canucks took him in the next round though.

Given the rumors out of Toronto that Pheneuf is being shopped, I myself wouldn't say highly doubt.

How to read capgeek 101: The cap hit shown on individual players is the total potential impact if bonuses are fully paid out & charged against the year they were earned. Remember, teams can elect to defer bonuses (up to 7.5% of the cap's upper limit only) to the following season depending on their cap situation. That is why Alfredsson is showing $5.5m ($3.5m salary/$2m in bonus), Tatar at $840k ($680k salary/$160k bonus), & DeKeyser $1.35m ($500k salary/$850k bonus). As mentioned already, hover over the star next to the player's cap payroll hit to see the bonus figure. That puts the total possible cap payroll for the Wings as the roster stands right now at $65,002,879. Capgeek assumes deferral up to that 7.5% limit so subtract out the total possible bonuses that could be deferred to the next season ($3,010,000) from the cap payroll (total possible hit of $65,002,879) for the Wings' current cap space of ~$2.3m. I assume the reason capgeek shows the full potential per individual is that they don't necessarily know if a bonus trigger will be reached & with the total limit of 7.5% of the upper cap per team for deferral in place, anywhere from all or none of an individual player's bonus might be eligible for deferral until the next season. The only number then that they can accurately report on an individual basis is the full potential hit in the year the bonus was earned. Edit for TL:DR: Capgeek can't make the call on whether an individual's bonus will be paid or deferred until the next season so they just reflect the total potential hit if the bonus is paid in the year it's earned.

Just a reminder to everyone re: the salary cap. Teams may exceed the cap by 10% during the off season so really Kenny has another $6.4m (edit: on top of that $2.3m just to be clear) he can play with until the end of pre-season. There's really no danger of not getting the team's RFA's taken care of. The bigger issue is to see who among the bubble players actually plays their way onto the team in camp/pre-season and who plays their way out of town in order for the Wings to hit the regular season as cap & roster limit compliant.

Or he may end up playing more than we might expect but just on another team. I still think he's going to be one that Kenny looks to trade to get to the roster limit.

Is telling the truth "bad mouthing"?

I've seen 3 years at $3-3.5m being thrown around on Brunner One source for example: Helene St. James ‏@HeleneStJames3h Damien Brunner pushing for $3-3.5 million per season, 2-3 year deal. Price tag too high for Red Wings.

I still think one of those two are going to factor into a trade before the start of the season. Out of the two I would bet on them selling high on Tatar after the playoff run he had in GR. Edit: And I think if he hasn't already, Emmerton should have a go-bag packed & ready.

I think the Cleary signing was to distract fans away from this news. Huge loss for the Wings organ-I-zation.

Just hope the kids i.e. Nyquist, Andersson, & Tatar see this, come to camp with a chip of their collective shoulders, & the attitude that they're going to take these old-timers' jobs from them.

I believe Les Claypool is currently working on a tribute song for the Wings called "Too Many Forwards" Any chance another team could come in & steal Cleary away if the Wings don't get below the 50 man roster limit soon? Please?

Well it's a good thing that there aren't teams out there signing players to contracts that would put them out of cap compliance if it doesn't go up as much in the next few years as they though it would. Paul Holmgren, why are you in the corner crying right now?

Latest on the numbers from St James. Take it for what you will: Helene St. James ‏@HeleneStJames3m Damien Brunner pushing for $3-3.5 million per season, 2-3 year deal. Price tag too high for Red Wings.

Neil Sheehy.

That's called "The Brendan Shanahan Effect". On the Alfie/Bourque comparisons, those we really different situations. Alfie's leaving as a UFA where Bourque was traded at the deadline by a GM/organization that was trying to get him a Cup specifically.