kipwinger

I'm genuinely not trying to be snarky here, I'm just trying to clarify. Do you think that Tatar, Nyquist, and Dekeyser's ceilings are 2nd/3rd line, and 2nd pair?

I am a big fan of Mike Green. But like a lot of guys in the league, he's an excellent player for a particular role, and not too much more. And over the course of the year I've sorta come to the conclusion that I'd rather have a 30-35 pt. top four defenseman, than a 40-45 pt. bottom pair defenseman (and powerplay specialist). No knock on Green at all. But he just doesn't log the kind of minutes I think we need out of another defender. There's a reason Washington went out and got Orpik (who completely shutdown Tavares by the way) and Niskanen. Green's no good in the top four.

Drew Stafford and cody franson please.

Joe Thornton is an excellent hockey player, but I wouldn't want him. Anything that slows us down, I'm against. If this series against Tampa taught me anything, its that we're dangerous when we are fast, and mediocre when we are slow. Love ya Jumbo Joe, but no thanks.

How often would we need to win the Cup for you to consider our organization "competitive" if we aren't now?

I love her twitter account. You can actually see her getting more and more excited prior to the game. She had no idea what was in store, and how horribly wrong her night was going to wind up. It's like looking into the past and the future at the same time lol.

I honestly doubt it would have made much of a difference. Our defense actually played pretty well this series. Even last night's ad hoc bunch. We didn't lose because our defense is crap. We lost because we blew a third period lead in a game we should have won, and couldn't score any goals in the last two that were close.

I was wondering if that reference would be too in the weeds. I should have known better.

But it's not just "past successes". That's the point. He's still a very successful GM, and his teams are still very successful. It's not like we're stinking up the place, missing the playoffs, and competing for lottery picks. I agree that you should have total immunity at your job. But you also shouldn't be fired if you don't remain at the absolute apex of your industry in perpetuity. We've gone six years since our last Cup. Exactly the same amount of time between our Cups in 2002 and 2008. It would have been a mistake to fire Holland back then, and it would be a mistake now.

Whatevs. You just want another Wing to crush on. Ladies love Ryan O'Reilly. Just ask this chick...

They're breaking with tradition a bit here, and getting people from different venues to do it. Used to be they pretty much only used the various bloggers from SBnation (the local equivalents to our "Winging it in Motown" crew).

He's been a head coach for 3 seasons, went to the playoffs twice, and won a round. I don't know, because I obviously wasn't watching Colorado in 2003-2004, but that doesn't seem terrible. Maybe there is something there, but his record doesn't suggest a wash out to me. But like I said, I don't know. Because he's won a ton of games under arguably the worst possible conditions. And because he's done so with a roster that's about 1/5 as good as our current one. Fun fact. You know how many 80 point players Dave Tippett has coached in his entire career? Two. Mike Ribeiro and Mike Modano. You know how many 80 point players Mike Babcock coached on the 2005 Red Wings alone? Four. Think about that. The best players he's ever coached..ever...were Modano, Ribiero, and Yandle. His best goalie was Bryzgalov. BRYZGALOV!

I usually really love these, but this one was boring. Nothing like the Philadelphia eulogy from a year ago. That one was brutal.

My votes would be Tippett (if available), Blash, McClellen, Granato.

The realistic thing I'd like to see is the Wings signing a decent defenseman, and Drew Stafford. The unrealistic thing I'd like to see is the Wings trade Gustav Nyquist for Ryan O'Reilly.

Guys like Parise and Suter are significantly better than anything that we had coming up. Those 2nd and 3rd tier free agents are marginally better than what we had coming up (or in some cases not better at all). All free agents aren't made alike. I don't mind Holland trying to land REALLY good ones. I also don't mind Holland being conservative and not overspending on the SORTA good ones. It seems like people just want free agents for the sake of it. I don't. I'm happier with Nyquist or Tatar than I would be with Pominville or Vanek. Apparently, so is Holland. I also agree that some of his acquisitions have blown up in his face. Weiss, Cole, Zidlicky, Tootoo, Sammy, etc. Which should indicate the inherent risk associated with free agency/trades. I'm glad that we've got someone who's cautious when it comes to these sorts of moves, because they don't work far more than they do. It almost seems like people around here think that if Holland made MORE moves, that there would be LESS risk. Which is silly. Very few signings/trades are slam dunks, and when they are (Suter, Parise) you've got a lot of competition.

If Babs doesn't coach the Wings next year, I hope he stays in the East so that I can watch Blashill beat him all season long with his old roster.

I'm not sure why the measuring stick for Holland's success is free agents or trades. He's shown that in the past he's not afraid to go out and get higher end free agents, or make trades. But if he can get what he wants internally, why would he trade for it? In the last two years he's added two 25+ goal scorers, a 40 pt. third line center (who's also really big), a back up (and now starting) goalie, a top four defenseman, and a load of depth players. All of that was already in his system and ready to go...for free. Why should he have gone out and traded for any of that? He did what every smart GM would do. See what he had in his organization, integrate those players that were ready, reassess, and augment (Cole and Zidlicky) as needed. I suspect that had the Wings organization not been overflowing with talent, that he'd have been a little more aggressive. It's not to say that he's never made a mistake, or that he couldn't have done a little more. But we weren't in a position like Minnesota where we needed a bunch of pieces and didn't have anything in the cupboard. They had to go out and buy/trade for Pominville, Parise, Vanek, Suter, Neiderreiter, etc. We didn't. We already had comparable guys in the organization.

Whelp, I've given myself about 12 hours to digest this and my preliminary thoughts are... 1) If you don't blow leads in the third period, you'd be in Montreal already. 2) The kids were better than they were a year ago in the playoffs, so glad to see some improvement (6 goals and 3 assists from Nyquist, Tatar, Sheahan). 3) Datsyuk and Zetterberg look ooooooooooold. 4) Anybody seen Zetterberg, Abby, and Helm? Me neither.

Why would Kindl be on the ice during the waning minutes of an important game? Lol. Don't get me wrong, I love the enthusiasm, but I think the chances of Kindl getting an empty net goal are about the lowest on the team.

I'm going to hold you to this after Kindl scores his third of the night.

Dekeyser is nineth on the team in giveaways during the post season. He has exactly one giveaway in this series. Ericsson and Quincey lead the team, with 6 and 4 respectively. For what it's worth. And Jakub Kindl! I'm telling you, he's going to be a monster tonight. I can feel it.

I think Holland's plan for post-Lidstrom was..."We'll take a run at Suter, and if not, no harm done. We've got Kronwall and he's a legit number 1". I don't think failing to replace Lids was as big of a screw up as failing to round out the top four with legit top four players. We replaced Lids with the best we could manage, but we didn't replace Rafalski, Stuart, or Kronwall with anything special.

I'm trying to stay positive here. Losing Kronwall is seriously the absolute worst thing that could happen to this team right now. Worse than losing Pav, Abby, Mrazek. Anybody. I'm actually about to "follow" Kindl on twitter and spend him inspirational messages all day long. Just to do my part.