kipwinger

You saying the offer is market value doesn't make it so. Market value is determined by supply and demand, not "player comparables". I will donate $50 dollars to a charity of your choice if you can find a single Ken Holland reference to "comparables" prior to this year. It's a negotiating tactic. AA supplies goals. Ken Holland needs goals. Hence, Holland has to move toward the upper end of the price range. So far he's failed to do so, and has alienated a good young talent in the process. Saying that Holland should offer his young talent what some other GM, who's team is at a totally different point in their lifecycle is offering his, is way off base IMO. If Holland doesn't want to pay AA 500K more, trade him and be done with it.

If your boss offered you a salary, and you thought you were worth more than he offered, would it be your responsibility to take less to prove your worth? AA obviously feels he's worth more than 1.9 million. Why should he take less? You think he's dying to get back on the ice for a coach who doesn't use him much and a team that's going nowhere? Might as well just trade him at this point.

IMO the best thing that could happen is for Frk to get some time because of the AA situation and the Bertuzzi injury. If he can rack up a reasonably impressive number of goals, particularly because of the officiating changes this season, then we can flip him for a pick at the deadline. This season is tailor made for his success and we shouldn't squander that. Best case scenario Frk becomes a valuable asset for relatively little cost.

If we had the #2, and Dahlin went first overall, I'd trade back and try to pick up a late round pick. Supposedly it's a deep defensive draft, so draft a center early and try to get a quality defender later. Of course, it's really too early to tell how I'd rank these kids on draft day but right now I'd target Valeno early in the round and a defenseman later.

Straw man. I've never said Holland was an idiot, nor anything like it. I said he was lowballing AA to bail himself out of the cap trouble that he put himself in, but that's about it. If you want to respond to the people who call Holland an idiot, do so. But you responded to me, and are now insinuating that I'm in that same camp because I think Holland should sign the kid to a contract that you seem alright with. Your criticism of the "Holland sucks" crowd is appropriate, but it's got nothing to do with me. My only argument has been that maybe in a team as bad offensively as ours is, our GM should probably think about offering one of his better goal scorers more than he's paying Luke Glendening. And if you don't think this has anything to do with the cap, I'd point to the relative ease with which Holland signed any number of unproven or unproductive players when he had the money to do so. I notice he never held Glendening, or Helm, or Abby, or Sheahan, or Ericsson over the coals for a couple hundred thousand dollars, but suddenly he draws a hard line on AA. Hmmm...I wonder what changed?

As far as Frk goes, it looks like with Bertuzzi out he'll get a shot at a roster spot. With AA not signed he may well get powerplay time (given that AA was a feature of the PP that ended last season). That's his opportunity, and he will probably only get it this one time. If he shows up like he did tonight, I'd expect the Wings to send Bertuzzi down after he's healthy. If not, then Frk correctly goes back down to GR. Either way, I don't see anything wrong with giving him a shot right now.

I'm not really sure why you're playing devil's advocate here. All the way back on page 11 you agreed with me when I said AA should make between 2.5-3 million per year. Now suddenly you think 1.9 is good value. Seems like you're just being contrary. If Holland had offered the money that both you (as of a week ago) and I think is "fair" AA would be signed right now.

The "comparable players" argument isn't a good one, for a couple of reasons. First, there aren't many comparable players to AA. His goals/60 is INSANE. He's a complete outlier. Secondly, a 20 goals scorer (for example) on a team full of 20 goal scorers has less value than a 20 goal scorer on a team that doesn't have any. We need AA's offense more than the Penguins (for example) probably would. As a result we'll have to pay more. Ken Holland is trying this tactic and it seems to be sticking, but at the end of the day it's all about supply and demand. AA can supply goals in a league where that's important. The Wings NEED goals pretty badly, enough that they probably should just give the guy the 2.5 million he's asking for. As for Sheahan, I'm not sure why trading him is such an issue. Any or all of Neilsen, Larkin, or Helm can be our 3rd line center, and Sheahan hasn't even been playing center consistently. So you can add a bunch of wingers as well. He's totally replaceable. AA, on the other hand, really isn't on our offensively inept team.

Paying a guy what he's worth isn't "overpaying". This drives me crazy. Regardless of whether he's an RFA, he's worth the money. Ken Holland is lowballing this kid because he's put himself into a bad cap situation. I understand that Holland CAN offer a guy less than he's worth if the player is an RFA, but that doesn't mean he should. If he's made a competitive offer, as opposed to an insulting one, AA would be on the team right now. Also, Anybody who thinks that the Red Wings "can't" match an offer sheet is nuts. The minute AA signed an offer sheet the Wings would match and then trade Sheahan (as is being rumored). We're talking about 600k here. The league is doing Holland a favor here because now he can keep an asset he clearly doesn't want to trade AND he gets to lowball a kid on an RFA offer. But don't let that fool you into thinking he "can't" match an offer sheet. He can, pretty easily.

I like Valeno so far. And Dahlin, obviously. I don't want/care about Svechnikov. We don't need another winger, and I'm not convinced that a stud winger, without a quality center, can be a difference maker when it comes to the Cup. There are tons of super high end wingers who will never realistically compete for the Cup because they don't have top flight centers and defensemen on their teams. Hell, Ovechkin is one of the best wingers of all time, AND he's got a better center and #1 defenseman than we've got, and still there is no Cup in Washington. You could put 2 or 3 Andrei Svechnikov's on Detroit's team and they wouldn't win without a top center and top defenseman. And since you can't really trade for either one, you've got to draft them. So why would you draft anything other than a center or defenseman if you were Detroit?

It's insane to me that there are people who are angry with AA for holding out here. He's worth more than 1.9 million per year, and that's all our organization is willing to offer him. Every other team in the league would offer him 2.25-3.0 million. We can't, or won't, because our GM handed out terrible contracts to other players. It's not AA's job to take less than he's worth to bail out Ken Holland. It blows my mind that a guy with his offensive talent is being offered Luke Glendening money, and people are acting like AA is a prima donna for not accepting it. There is not excuse what so ever for the organization to be hard balling this kid right now. They've all but ensured he's going to walk as a free agent now.

I don't care where we draft. If we don't take a center with #1 upside, or a defenseman with the same, then we're not one iota better. Those have been our two most glaring issues for about 10 drafts now, and remain that way still.

So Holland's whole rationale for not paying AA is that he'd then have to pay Mantha and Larkin more than the standard "bridge" deals as well. He seems to be pretty dated in how he handles salary negotiations. Many organizations are foregoing the "bridge" deal and locking young talent up to longer term contracts these days. For example, Columbus game Alexander Wennberg 4.9 million over six years coming off his entry level contract. Likewise, Nashville have Viktor Arvidsson 4.25 million over 7 years. Both were coming off their entry level contracts and were RFAs. Considering both of these guys are better than AA, I'd say 2.5-3 million would be good for him, but over a long term

Yeah, assuming GR will lose Bertuzzi to the main roster, Callahan in the offseason, and maybe Frk to waivers I don't think this is a bad idea. I don't think any of our young forwards are ready to step in so it's not like he's taking a spot from anyway.

This. I remember Sproul looking really good in exactly one game, against Tampa in November when he scored a goal and an assist. Both came on the powerplay where he was used in the Ovechkin spot on the left side. That's pretty much optimal deployment for him and he produced, but otherwise I've never really noticed him that much. He'd definitely need to shape up his 5 on 5 play before he'd be anything I'd worry about losing. I suppose it's possible he's another Justin Schultz and just needs the right situation/team and a little more seasoning. But more likely he's Brendan Smith all over again. An "offensive" defenseman who never scores any offense.

I guess this... Nyquist-Z-Mantha Tatar-Larkin-AA Frk-Neilsen-Svech Helm-Sheahan-Abby Glendening Bertuzzi Dekeyser-Green Daly-Jensen Ouellet-Sproul

I'm a little concerned that our top 10 pick isn't earning consistent time at his natural position in the World Juniors Summer Showcase. Meanwhile, a number of his peers in this draft class are tearing it up. Hope it's just lingering affects from his wrist injury and not because we drafted a dud.

I've never even really watched the guy play much. I had a buddy who was a big Sabres fan and was pumped when they got him, but after he was traded to Colorado I quit paying attention to him. Seems intriguing based on his offensive upside, but I keep reading about work ethic issues. He scored 10 goals in 75 games this season. It's not good by any means, though it would have been 10th on our team. Given his pedigree and upside I'd seriously consider it.

I will preface this question by saying that in general I'm not in favor of signing anyone in free agency. That said, I see that Colorado did not qualify Mikhail Grigorenko and he will become a UFA. Grigorenko is a 23 year old center, former first round pick, has good size, is highly skilled, but has never been been able to put it all together (probably traumatized by having to play for Buffalo at age 18). If you could get him on a two way (prove it) contract, would you sign him?

Right, but we just used our highest draft pick in almost 30 years on him. So presumably you'd like to fill a need with it. Especially if that need is as important as 1C or 1D, both things we need, and neither of which Rasmussen will be if moved to the wing (where we're currently loaded with talent). And even then, if you were going to target a guy to be a goal scoring winger, why not take Tippett who is by all accounts the best goal scoring winger in the draft?

How do the two stack up in terms of powerplay production. One knock I've heard repeatedly on Rasmussen was that more than half his production was on the powerplay. But I haven't looked to see how much of Mantha's came with the man advantage.

You're conflating two discussions, which is partially my fault because I was talking about Ericsson with someone else in this Draft thread. I referenced Nashville's defense while talking about Ericssson because someone else said that Ericsson should be more physical and clear the crease more. I said Nashville doesn't have a "crease clearer", but that their defense is still really good regardless, because they move the puck well. And that hitting, and blocking shots, and crease clearing usually means you don't have the puck, which isn't a good thing. And that's where you jumped in with your comment about Dave Tippett. My whole point was that hitting is not a sound defensive strategy nor is it indicative of team success. That much has been proven. There does, however, seem to be some correlation between good possession metrics and goals against averages. However, I agree that being "good" at the defense you do play is just as important as limiting the amount of time the other team is in your zone.

Yikes, another "Loser" tag for our drafting this year. https://sports.yahoo.com/winners-losers-nhl-draft-2017-211925333.html?soc_src=social-sh&soc_trk=tw

Data: https://www.jacketscannon.com/2014/8/8/5983407/to-hit-or-not-to-hit-the-statistic-vs-the-reality "Teams in the Top 10 in hits were significantly more likely to fall in the Bottom 10 in goals per game (38%) than in the top 10 in that category (28%). For those believing that hits is a valid defensive statistic, the numbers do not provide much support. Only 30% of the teams in the Top 10 in hits were among the Top 10 in goals against per game, while 36% fell in the bottom 10 in that category. Conversely, teams that fell in the bottom 10 in hits, were the most likely (38%) to be in the Top 10 in goals per game." Here's another article talking about it: http://nhlnumbers.com/2013/3/7/why-shot-differential-is-important-item-45604 "The data is, of course, hilarious. As a whole, teams did far better when they got outhit than they when they outhit the other side. I suspect that there are two main reasons for this: first, there probably is a great deal of truth to the argument that teams without the puck hit more, which doesn’t facilitate scoring. Second, there’s probably an element of teams that are behind deciding to focus on laying the body to try and turn the momentum – “Send out the energy line!” I suspect that what shows up here contains some score effects although, we know that trailing teams tend to possess the puck more, which would seem to give them less opportunity to hit."

Don't get me wrong, I didn't want Vilardi or Rasmussen, I'm just suggesting there were other players still available with more (or similar) skill. Personally, I'd have preferred we move up one spot and take Mittelstadt, or else trade back 3 or 4 spots, take one of the better offensive d-men still available and then try to get into the late 1st round and take Kostin (the way St. Louis did). As I've said several times now, I don't think Rasmussen is unskilled, I think he's unskilled relative to some guys who were still available and therefore wasn't a good pick at 9th.