evilzyme

Why the hell are they hashtagging detroit? He's with Philly now... unless I have zero idea how they tweeted that or something. I haven't seen enough replays of it, but it certainly looked dirty from what I saw. Seems like he clipped him at the last second because Huskins moved his head.

2-0 chicago

I think you would need to define "value" then, because there is certainly not a single player in our farm system that would bring what Bert brings to the table for this team. If they did, they would've been called up and replaced his spot rather than Abby. There just isn't a single youth player in our system right now that will hold on to the puck, win puck battles, cause havok, create space, and produce as much as Bert will. I really hope he can come back and provide what he did previously because he will change the dynamic of this team. No, I don't believe Bert is the second coming of Jesus himself, but I do believe he brings an element we need desperately in the top 6, which is someone else to actually hold onto the puck for an extended amount of time.

It would be a big boost for the boys to see Bert come back. Not only would that help push bottom 6 players back into the bottom 6, but Bert is a centerpiece for Pasha. Those boys got some weird connection and they make some magic. Always trying to one up each other, mock each others shoot out moves; they love each other.

Accident, because it was a defected puck from his own teammate. I'm positive he didn't purposely want his face to get rocked by a 60+ mph piece of rubber.

I can understand that, but if you put it within perspective, it isn't nearly as bad as some hyperbole fans put it out to be. Like I said, you drop off that 7-1 horribad game played by us, and you have 3 1 goal games that all required extra time to find a winner. It should show you that Chicago isn't directly dominate against Detroit, and they aren't "for sure" games for them. You have the first game of the season, while our team was still playing like a bunch of slumps. You have the second game that took to overtime, in which we should've won if we didn't take a horrible penalty to allow them to tie it late in the third. You have our horrible game and there more than enough excuses to fire down range. The last and final game, once again took to a shootout. So I sit here, watching my home team take on the best team in the NHL, and yet we can take them all the way to extended time. Chicago has a hard time against Detroit, we should know this. What I said is, if it's one team that could take out Chicago within the first round, I would see Detroit doing it rather than any other bottom seeded team.

Somehow I allowed that one to go over, i'm sure you get the overall point of the message though. I wouldn't be nearly as "scared" as many of you are.

Skated for the first time this morning since the accident

If it's one team that would honestly beat Chicago in the first round, it would be Detroit. We just play differently against them. We lost against them in OT for the first game, another in a shootout, our 7-1 horribad game, and then another shootout. So we haven't been beat once in regulation by Chicago. Nonetheless, that second game should've been the game we ended their streak if it wasn't for Ericsson pitchforking it out of play. So in reality, bounces in any direction would've changed the games. I wouldn't act nearly as horrible as you're making it out to seem.

What a beauty. Each game I fall more in love with this kid, just absolutely love him. You can call me Don Cherry and he's my Kadri. Good stuff kid, good stuff. On a real note. Brunner and Goose have some chemistry together and need to stay together. They were moving the puck good, and easily could've potted one of them. I like the hustle from the team, good to see that we actually want to play come April 30th. Jimmy played out of this world the whole game, really keeping us in there during the first period. Good to see once we had our legs under us, we were full speed ahead. Cola and DeKeyser are shining stars for me right now on defense. Smith is frustrating me simply because he is trying too hard. He wants to do things that aren't available to him, in a forced style. If the shooting lane doesn't exist, don't become Sammy and throw it in the non-existent lane, go wide or distribute it. He was looking real good up until his injury, and he just hasn't caught his footing again it has seemed like. I can't even make sense why the hell he thought it was a smart idea to cut to the outside man, giving his man the inside. That whole play just made me cringe on the inside, hard. Although, the actual call on the penalty shot was weak for me. His stick barely made any contact and he went down like he got tripped. It just didn't make sense to me, if anything they should've called a slash on Kindl and embellishment on the shooter (I can't remember for the life of me.. butler was it?).

I think that has to do with timing now. He can't get his shot off because he delays too much, or he'll try to drag it too long. Defensemen are just getting their sticks on the puck and forcing it up or aside. It could all be fatigue, or the league not giving him as much space, etc.

Absolutely. Mrazek can ease his way into the lineup then. He doesn't need all the spotlight of needing to be that #1 immediately, he can slowly take on more of a bigger role. It also allows Howard to gain a responsible, good back-up that can take some of the workload off of him. Jimmy is being overplayed season after season, exhausted by the time the playoffs hit. The only problem I could forsee is if Mrazek becomes one hell of a goalie, and they go split-time; the following contract on Mrazek's ELC, he could try and demand around Jimmy's money. If that happened, we obviously would take the better of the two, and better for the future which would most likely be Mrazek and move Jimmy. His contract isn't as binding as Luo's. With all that said, I have no idea how the caphit works with the contract so for all I know Jimmy could be a lot cheaper down the road (I think it has to be like within a 5% decrease limit in the new CBA?). Him and Mrazek can turn into a really solid goalie tandem alongside our young solid defensive corps. Make our focus on our forward group and we'll be back before you know it.

I agree with about everything except for Semin. We know that Holland "kicked tires" but most GM's didn't want to touch Semin. He was asking for a bigger contract with a long-term commitment. His reputation, regardless if it was Washington's system or not, was that his work ethic was horrible. Just because of that stain on his resume, most turned him aside. Carolina really took him in and he's surrounded by a good bunch of characters that helped him out. I would say Detroit would do the same, as we expect, but i'm almost scared he would've caught the "I don't care" bug from some other players on this roster. Gaborik would've been really nice but his 7.5m cap hit is hard to swallow. The way he's playing in Columbus, it could make it a lot easier to take in, but they wanted Brunner in return. We all know Holland; he thinks Brunner IS Gaborik, but at discount, so he said no way.

Why's that? They actually have the most chemistry and experience together considering they've been playing as a pairing for majority of the season now. I understand much of the Quincey hate; we gave up a 1st rounder for him, he played horrible in the beginning, but recently... he's been playing good. Not out of this world, but good enough to keep him in the top 6. The only thing I could see better, but it would be scary is putting Smitty with DeKeyser. Smith would have the flexibility to play his offensive game, knowing that he has a solid stay at home covering the back-end. But, I wouldn't want to put that much responsibility on DeKeyser, especially being a rookie.

Big game, Ericsson is asking all fans to seriously not boo stewie. I really don't feel like he will but I could see some not understanding the situation and just seeing him playing for the sharks and boo. Detroit fans already embarrass us enough with booing Hossa. None the less Suter and Praise like they were red wings property at any given time (ehh suters been datsyuk property a few times if u know what I mean ). In the end.... let's win please?

Stop. Praise didn't want to come to Detroit. Just frickin stop with that garbage. You act like Holland can force players to come to Detroit, he can't. Players can pick where they go and Praise wanted Minnesota, nothing you can do about it except sit there and cry.

Holland was praising him yesterday and said he's signing now or in June but the sides weren't far off at all. Looks like he got his 6 year 5 mil contract. We all know it was gonna be 5 mil, just wish the length wasn't 6 full years. Goalies can have the most inconsistent trajectories.

Holland was on Hockey Central today, some quotes: All tweets from George Malik Article: http://kuklaskorner.com/tmr/comments/red-wings-gm-ken-holland-talks-to-wdfns-sean-baligian-about-playoff-chances They have the audio feed there.

That actually sounds about right. I remember them showing the playoffs within the first round or two because all games weren't nationally broadcasted. Once the conference finals came into play and all games were televised, they cut support through center ice and gamecenterlive. Although, last season I believe didn't they start the "broadcast every single game" on national television? Blah, can't remember if it was all playoffs or just after the first round.

Bertuzzi is a top 6 player, while Abdelkader is not. He simply needs to play that role. You're asking a 3rd line player at best to go ahead and play on a top 6 line going against harder pairings and more skilled fowards, ofcourse he's not going to resemble Bertuzzi. What I was saying is that Abby can play a similar role to Bertuzzi, given the right opponents. He can hold on to the puck, and he's decent at boardplay; he simply buys Pavel more time within the zone. That's what Pavel needs, and wants. Pavel jokes around saying that there are people who play the piano, and there are people who push the piano. Abby pushes the piano. He's right, he's alittle workhorse and that's what Pasha needs. Pavel would love to have Bertuzzi back, hell, I think they seriously got one of those weird friendship things going on. Also, I think that Abby can be a consistent physical player given that he continues to play wing. When he was slotted to center, we saw that style go away from him, but when he's winging, he has more leeway to go dish and finish checks deeper in the zone.

Holland: and finally Holland on Helmer: I should be done now, enjoy your morning quotes.

Babcock about changes and the franchise:

He's playing Bertuzzi's role which is to not score mad goals and provide insanely high points. While that is great, and Bertuzzi does his share of producing, that's not his main cause as he's not the scorer on that line. Pavel is normally the playmaker, Bertuzzi on the other hand is the net front presence and space creator. His job is to carry the puck around and allow for his teammates to space out the defense. His job is to retrieve the puck at the corners and to delay the play on the boards. Give time for someone to support him. If he's not doing those things he's moving around the slot and using his bigger frame. Right now Hank is playing the role you want, so go tell him to start potting them at the cyclic rate. Otherwise it was Franzen, so go yell at him but you'll most likely have to join at the back of the line. In other news, Babcock says the Wings "aren't going away" "I don't know if it's optimistic; I think it's realistic," Babcock told NHL.com. "Optimism, I think, is a totally different thing than a realistic approach of what we've got going on. I think we're a team that does a lot of good things. I'm a big believer that we're just going to get it done, but I think like that all the time." "We're not going away," Babcock said. Also, when asked about if he knows who will be the 6 defensemen against San Jose:

He could have complained about Cleary, and rightfully so, but he's never complained about Abdelkader. People really need to stop using this, "he's playing with s***ty linemates, he's going to Russia" argument. It holds absolutely no substance if the man himself praises the play of his linemate and asks the coach for him to remain on the line with him. Until Bert gets healthy, or we have another person to fill his role properly, it's not going to happen. Well... Stuart's situation is a tish bit different. Stuart and his family wanted to move to Detroit, unfortunately his wife's ex didn't allow for the child to be removed from the state. They couldn't get full custody, so the family HAD to stay in California. You're right that it played a huge part and the only reason why he left, but unlike Pavel's situation, Stuart's family COULDN'T come to Detroit. Pavel has always just wanted his daughter to grow up within Russia, but has said he doesn't mind where she ends up when she grows older. He just wanted her to experience the Russian childhood/culture so it wasn't lost within his family.

You act like he doesn't already have the skillset. He doesn't need to "develop" more than just getting used to the style of hockey. He already HAS the skills needed, he just needs to learn how to utilize them in a new environment. As for being 26/27, who cares, as long as the person is willing to learn and not be stuck in their ways, they're going to keep developing. He has already shown that he's willing to listen to the coaching staff and become a better NHL player. The biggest thing for him right now is simply travel and workload. He's not used to it. Now that he knows what it's about, he can work his tail off and know what is in-store the following season. He can better prepare for the new style of hockey he belongs to. People can explain things to you all day long, you can watch videos all day long, but up until you actually go live and try something; you just don't know and can't train fully. It's like practice and training camp. Sure, you're playing scrimmages and you're pushing hard but nothing is like game-time and game-pace. You can think you're in shape until you actually go through your first full game. I mean, look at NHL veterans, they need 10-15 games into the season to get up to speed and into it. If they need 10-15 games to get up to speed and going, you can expect Brunner who's not experienced with the league to take much more. Account for that within a compressed 48 game schedule and it's just not working well.