kipwinger

Atta boy Franzen. Nice shot block. Showing some heart kiddo.

Yikes. That was brutal. I just get done defending that pairing and Kindl blows goats on the next shift. Story of my life lol.

Gotcha. I guess I'm giving the whole defense an A for tonight's effort. Tampa is awesome offensively. If we can keep them from scoring 5 on 5 (or keep the scoring to flukey goals like the one they scored), I'm happy with the effort. But I understand your point.

Helm's all over the place tonight. Having a heck of a game. I wish to god he could finish more reliably.

I know right. Not buying it. Which fans said Tampa was one of the greatest teams of all time as you've suggested? If you can show me one I'll recant.

Didn't they score on two powerplay goals and a weird Stamkos snipe from his knees? If Kindl and Quincey are sucking where's the bad result? They're not getting scored on.

You're on fire tonight. Are you drunk?

Who are you telling? I'm the one that picked the name. I fully realize how awesome Kip Winger is. Just look at how he hangs his sunglasses from his banana hammock in that last pic. This guyf****** rules.

Not really the thread for that, but over the last five years there have been plenty of opportunities to acquire pieces through trade or FA in my opinion. I've discussed some trades I'd favor in other threads if you feel like digging for them lol.

My avatar was a Winger album cover for a really long time. But I changed it to Lil' Wayne because he's awesome, and obnoxious, and everyone hates him, and awesome, and sexist, and awesome. I'm a fan of all good heels. I like Rick Flair, I like Gary Bettman, and I like Lil' Wayne. I just can't help it. In the words of the immortal Razor Ramon, "bad times don't always last, but BAD GUYS do".

Is that what we're doing? I thought that I was suggesting that a strategy that they share with last years Stanley Cup finalists (acquiring important pieces of your team through trades and free agency) seems to have some merit to it. Either I wasn't being clear about that, or you're putting words in my mouth and misrepresenting my point in order to make one of your own. Which do you think is more likely based on my original post?

Drunk enough to pay a little too much attention to mustachioed Thelma, and what a dirty girl she is lol.

I saw you argument earlier in the thread about that and actually agree with you. But that hardly makes them a bad team. They're a good team, with a lot of external talent, who has nevertheless not won a Cup.

Helm needed that. Atta boy kid.

Did you expect a Florida team to have lifelong, homegrown, die hard fans of a sport played on ice? None of ice, hockey, or hockey fans naturally occurs in Florida. Bandwagon fans in Florida is a little more tolerable than they are in say...Chicago?

I wonder how long before we can put this "the only way to win in today's game is to draft and develop" argument to bed. Jason Garrison, Ben Bishop, Brendan Morrow, Anton Stralman, Matt Carle, Brian Boyle, Ryan Callahan, and Valtteri Filppula are all pretty significant contributors to this team and were drafted and developed elsewhere. Same is true of both teams in the Stanley Cup last year as well. Free agency and trades can add significantly to your team's success.

Are you mad that we got a powerplay? Your posts makes it sound like you're genuinely disappointed that something good happened to the Wings.

Touche. 1-0 Herald.

Lidstrom, Zetterberg and Datsyuk both came into the league around 175 lbs. and got up to 190-195 eventually. It's doable. I don't know if Jarnkrok will, but it's silly to think that Jarnkrok is doomed to be small because he is currently.

No doubt. I mean, it worked once before with a different coach, and different players, all of whom showed (over the course of their careers) that they were more offensively capable than the current coach and players in question. So why wouldn't it work this time? I can't imagine it's necessary to explain why just because something worked in the past under different circumstances doesn't mean it will necessarily work again. I don't think anybody would complain too much if your lines where Shanahan-Yzerman-Abby Federov-Helm-Hull/Robitaille/Kozlov Edit: Oh yeah, I forgot these forward lines would be supported by four Hall of Fame defensemen, and one (soon to be two) Hall of Fame goaltenders. I mean, those are totally comparable situations right?

No complaints from me tonight. Impressive victory against a decent team that we needed to beat. Atta boys.

Depends on who the top four d-man is. But I get your point. It's really risky trading a guy like Jurco at this age because you won't get a great return (unless packaged) and you don't know how he'll turn out. Reminds me a bit like the situation where the Islanders traded Nino Neiderreiter. Got very little and he's turning out to be a real good forward.

I mean, I don't think anybody other than Mantha (and probably Mrazek) is untouchable. But why trade Jurco? They've been saying for the last 3 or 4 drafts that they wanted to "get bigger and not lose skill". Now that they've finally got that coming to fruition, I don't see them moving it unless it's a slam dunk. I'd imagine (out of the prospects) any two of Backman, Jensen, or Ouellet plus Pulkkinen would be the ones to go first in a trade. They've got value. They can't all fit into the lineup along with everybody else. And they're on the smaller end of the prospects. Then again, a lot of that depends on who the coach is going to be next year because I get the feeling Babs and Blash wouldn't necessarily keep the same guys around given the choice. He's not going anywher unless the return is a slam dunk. Count on it. Why draft big if you're just going to trade the big players and keep the little ones?

I think they're in direct competition. But I don't think they've got the same skill set. Jurco was really drafted for his stick handling, speed, and play in tight around the net. Mantha's a pure sniper. Really the only thing similar about them is their size and speed. With regard to skill sets, Mantha is actually more like Pulkkinen. Only way bigger and faster, obviously. The competition will be good for them, but I don't know about pressure. They're both going to be part of the team for a long time to come. The guy who should feel pressure is Pulkkinen. The NHL is not a small guy's game anymore, and despite the fact that he's scoring goals he hasn't been given a look at the NHL level, nor has he really been spoken of too highly by Blashill or Babs. The refrain seems to be "can score goals, but the rest of his game isn't developed". He needs to carve out a spot for himself.

I'd like to see him and Jurco in Grand Rapids at the same time. You've got to believe the competition would be good for Jurco while at the same time giving them both a chance to shine. I imagine Jurco won't want to be outdone by a first year guy.