kipwinger

With seeds or without?

All of our best players (aside from Abby) are skill players. The fact that Babcock chooses to play Luke Glendening and Drew Miller 15+ minutes a night doesn't make us a "heart and soul work team". It just means that our coach's system gets more out of grinders than it does out of 25+ goal scorers. But that doesn't negate the fact that our skill players are out best players. If he had a team full of guys like Brandon Dubinsky, David Backes, and Andrew Ladd then I'd agree with you. But we don't. We've got more skill than most teams. It's just not being utilized effectively. Edit: And this isn't even really a knock on Babs. He does a fantastic job of getting more out of guys like Abby, Helm, Glendening, Sheahan, Miller, etc. than most coaches could. I only posit that given the current makeup of our team, it's more important to get more out of guys like Tats, Nyquist, Jurco, Pulkkinen, and Weiss. Because those guys have game breaking skill sets. At his very best, Luke Glendening or Justin Abdelkader probably can't dominate a playoff series. Nyquist could though (just look at Tyler Johnson). I'd rather Glendening, Helm, or Abby be invisible than Nyquist or Tatar. And Babs' system doesn't seem to be able to do that.

Too bad for Europe. Because those uniforms look awful.

Agreed. I think he'll get a deal similar to the one Ryan Johansen signed a year ago.

Let him work with what he has, evaluate the teams' success, and then make changes/acquisitions as needed.

Word on the street says that Ed Snider is "all in" on hiring Babcock. So maybe.

Is there any way that we can bring Tom Brady on board in some capacity? No there's a guy who'll do what it takes to win.

So did I. That's the weird thing. I don't mind excessive celebrations. I just hate that particular excessive celebration.

Analogies are tricky. They don't always make as much sense as you think they ought to.

Keep dreaming. Backes is never going anywhere. The main Blues rumored to be on the block at the trade deadline were Oshie and Berglund. Not really sure if either of them help us all that much, but that's what they were dangling back then. Of the two, I suspect Berglund is the more likely to be moved considering he's a center and reports are that Vladimir Sobotka is looking to return to the NHL next season and would occupy that same position for St. Louis.

Yeah, I don't know what it is about the knee slide. I really don't. And it's not even like I have a problem with cellys either. I love how pumped Tatar gets. And if I think about it rationally, I lighten up about the knee slide after a minute too. But when I see it happen in real time, my gut reaction is always a combination of irritation and loathing.

Hire a coach who's teams score at even strength regularly, and not just on the powerplay?

Ugh, I don't know why I have such an aversion to guys sliding across the ice on their knees. I mean, I realize it's an important game, and you just scored a hat trick, and that tons of guys have done way worse and all. But I still get this overwhelming urge to throw a battery at his head when I see him do it.

I don't disagree that Ovi is better, but I don't think anyone in the league is "far" better than Steven Stamkos. He's pretty legit.

Plastic surgery is pricey. So yeah, probably.

She looks like a mannequin.

Anybody know of a way to watch the Griffins tonight that is both free, and able to be communicated via a link in PM?

Well played lol.

Drew Stafford. I can't say it enough.

Well I certainly don't disagree with that. But I think this is slightly different. He's overpayed, overvalued, and underproducing. No need to acquire a guy like that just because he's "real big" and "real tough". He's a bad player and his own team is dying to get rid of the guy. That should tell you something.

If Lucic was only making Drake money, and getting Drake playing time, I don't think anyone would care. Instead, he'd be making 6 million bucks to be slow, and a complete drain on your team's possession, for about 18 minutes a night. So no, he's not really the same at all.

It's easier to win in the Olympics than in the NHL. So Olympic accolades don't really mean much. If Olympic Gold Medals meant more than Stanley Cups, Slava Fetisov would be considered a better defenseman than Nick Lidstrom. Which is silly, of course.

Speaking of big guys who are totally awesome, and could help the Wings; have you heard of this guy Brian McGratton? He's an AHLer in Calgary's organization and is just the kind of power forward that Detroit needs to A) keep the rats at bay, B) deter cheap shots against our stars, and C) create space for Dats and Zetterberg. Just a thought. Ya know, because he's the biggest Laffy Taffy of them all.

And it might very well have been. All I'm saying is that I don't find anything too wrong with being hard on the kid. Especially if you're a person in a position of authority, who is (at least) partially responsible for the direction of the team. I'd rather the organization, or management be overly critical of the kid, than make excuses for him (I realize you're not advocating this). It's really hard to be an elite NHL player, and even harder to track that way when you're 20 years old. But it seems to me that the organization, or it's leadership, wouldn't be saying things like this if they didn't think the kid would respond. I mean, look at Frk. He was a stud in Juniors, and completely fell off the earth, and nobody said anything about his play. So maybe they're being hard on Mantha because they think it'll motivate him. Didn't we hear stories about how Babs was harder on Tatar than anybody on the team because A) he needed it, and B) he could take it?

He's a watermelon Laffy Taffy that you stretched out to three times the size of all the other Laffy Taffies (i.e. he's better because he's bigger). Get with the times dude. Big is good. Small is bad. It's science.