kipwinger

I like the idea of trying Smith on the PP point (I mean, what could it hurt) but it's not going to work unless Babs' is going to let him use his wheels to make plays. Utilized in that way Smith could be dangerous. Utilized in the traditional "point shot-rebound-goal" strategy I think he's not much of an improvement because he's got a decent wrister, but not a noteworthy one timer. But again, Babs would have to let him wheel and deal to be effective, which I can't see happening. I also agree with you that there's not really a problem with trying him on the PP despite his defensive gaffs. Subban and Wisniewski are two players who come to mind who are awesome on the PP despite being shaky defensively (at times). I'm not sure why we can only use guys who are defensive studs...though I suppose that's not too different than the rest of our game. At times I think we're so petrified by the thought that the other team might get a scoring chance that creating any of our own becomes a secondary priority.

I think the reason he failed to capitalize on those chances is because he can't take a pass that's got any kind of zip on it. The kinds of passes that wingers have to deal with. The kinds of passes centers usually make. I hope we don't try him there again and again. He made it to the NHL as a center, not winger, for a reason. It's pretty rare that a guy makes it to the NHL at his second best position (maybe Byfuglien or Burns but that's about it). Everybody else is doing what they probably should be given how high the attrition rate for professional athletes is. So I guess my question is, if we need a winger, why are we trying him there at all? Let's just go get a winger. I don't understand the logic of turning a good center into an average winger (if you're lucky) just because you need a winger. If you've got so many centers running around trade one for a winger who can handle a pass or score on a breakaway.

How many points does Helm have to not score on the wing before everybody realizes he's not good on the wing? If the fact that he blew about six scoring chances last night doesn't convince people that he can't take a pass, I don't know what will. To reiterate. Helm. Is. f******. Terrible. On. The. Wing. Terrible.

Sooo...no good reason then?

Z and Franzen are first rate players. They produced when we had a horrible fourth line. I see no reason to believe that the new fourth line is somehow "freeing them up to produce more scoring". Z was over a point a game last year with a terrible fourth line, and Franzen kept his normal pace last year as well. That they're doing the same this year seems to suggest that their scoring pace will not change much regardless of the content of the fourth line. I'm not arguing that these guys are playing well. I'm arguing that they're not playing any better as a result of our fourth line's play. That said, it was a bit of hyperbole to say they're "not producing s***". The team as a whole isn't producing (in part because our fourth line is playing so much). Nevertheless, our regulars are playing like they regularly do.

It does? When? They haven't been producing s***.

God I hope they don't demote Jurco. Nestrasil is ******* garbage. I have no idea why anybody thinks he'd get claimed off waivers (not that you're saying this, but I've had the 'don't want to lose Nesty for nothing' discussion about 200 times this week). They need to get that kid out of the lineup. He's clearly not ready to play in the NHL and is just another one of Babcock's pet projects.

Rumor out of Buffalo has Detroit in on Chris Stewart. Babs would hate him I'm sure. But I'd love him in Nestrasil's spot provided we're moving equal salary out. http://www.thefourthperiod.com/news/buf141023.html

Not necessarily, a faster team will generally have better possession stats than a slow one (us a year ago) because your forecheck creates more turnovers and you get to more loose pucks. It's basically a team wide version of the same theory that has Helm on the powerplay right now. He's faster than everyone else so he gets to more loose pucks (i.e. keeps possession for the Wings). Babs was commenting on how much faster our team is this year. My guess is this attributes MUCH more to those possession stats than defense to offense transitions. Against Montreal it was really obvious. ALL our decent scoring chances came as a result of the forwards mixing it up and making it hard for Montreal to get through the neutral zone. Even Datsyuk's "goal" (which came from deep in our d-zone) was passed up by Zetterberg and not a dman. Our defense is terrible at gaining possession in our zone, and getting the puck to the forwards competently (the aforementioned "turnover problem").

Our zone coverage has been really good. Our passing and transition game from the back end has been horrible, to the extent that our beat writers were discussing our "turnover problem" by about game 3 of the season. Two of our loses are directly attributable to massive defenseman turnovers that led to goals. Also our defense has produced a combined 7 points, so anybody ready to pat them on the back for "creating offense" should think again. So let's not sing kumbaya just yet eh boys?

You're right. We are stupid. I've changed my tune; from now on I'll form my impressions based on what should have happened.

Sure, the kids are playing mediocre right now, but that doesn't mean they're not skilled. Guys like Nyquist, Tatar, Jurco, Smith, and to a lesser extent Dekeyser were drafted (or signed) because of their speed and skill with the puck. They certainly weren't brought on board to be bangers and grinders. The fact that they're not creating offense is a symptom, not a cause.

Lol. So your posting strategy is to say demonstrably false statements, but preface them with the word "maybe" in order to make it seem like you're not being intentionally misleading? That's a good way to add to the discussion. There is literally NOTHING to indicate that the "coaching staff expects more out of him" or that Babcock isn't playing him because he's "not performing". There's every reason to believe that Babcock is impressed with his work ethic and attitude. You know why we have every reason to believe that? Because Babcock said it. And I don't have to preface any of that with "maybe".

What the hell's wrong with our powerplay anyway? I mean, we've got more skilled players than we've had for 4-5 years and we're somehow worse on the PP. I don't get it.

Is that what's going on? Because Babcock and Holland's own comments suggest that he's not playing because they want to bring him along slowly, but that they've impressed by his attitude and hard work. This seems like another installment of "Frank speculates on something but plays it off like fact".

I think you're on shaky ground here. You're saying get a goal or two at even strength and another goal or two on the PP is "winning hockey"...which it is. But now you're talking about 3-4 goals per game rather than 2 or less...which isn't "winning" hockey. A year ago, 8 of the 10 teams with the lowest "goals for" average in the league didn't make the playoffs. ALL of the top ten did. Granted, one of the teams on the low end (Los Angeles) won the Stanley Cup. Now you can decide all on your own whether we're more like Los Angeles or more like the other 8 teams on the low end of the "goals for" spectrum, but we both know what their roster looks like compared to ours. As such, unless Holland can find us a prime Jeff Carter, Drew Doughty, Jonathan Quick, Anze Kopitar, Dustin Brown, etc. lying around, it's probably not a good idea to model our game after theirs.

I understand the point you're making, but lets not get carried away. I don't want to win or lose by 4 goals a night. That's not going to get you into the playoffs. But 50% of the 10 games last night were decided by two or more goals. So it's not like offense and defense are mutually exclusive. I'd just like to be reasonably sure that if we're down by a goal we've at least got a chance to come back, and if we're up by a goal we've at least got a shot at being able to score again. As it is, I have no faith in either of these things. And the only way anybody seems to be able to justify our current approach is by pretending we live in a fantasy world were refs don't occasionally make bad calls. Was I the only one last night that KNEW Montreal was going to get the next goal and tie the game? I would have bet anybody on LGW if they had waged Detroit would score again before Montreal scored to tie it.

What's the over/under on "healthy, productive, season"? Because I'll take your bet.

No we didn't win anything. Hypothetically we would have won if there were no such thing as bad calls. Which there are. If a team finds themselves saying "we'd have won if not for that call" too often then they're doing something wrong. So far, this season, it's happened twice in five games. Bad calls aren't going anywhere. They'll be around as long as there are sports. Good teams don't live and die by bad calls. Teams that are barely scraping by do though.

We'll I'll agree that our coach advocates it. But we don't have the personnel to control the puck. By my count we had about four forwards, and two defensemen skilled enough to regularly control play and dominate possession tonight. Part of that is on Holland's head for not acquiring good possession players (as an example, look how good Radim Vrbata is playing in Vancouver). Part of it is on Bab's head for playing guys like Andersson, Glendening, Nestrasil, Abby, etc. the way that he does. Those guys aren't great possession guys because they're not big enough, skilled enough, fast enough, etc. to maintain control of the puck for long. Babs' idea of puck possession (at this point) seems to be "track down the puck as often as you lose it". But you can't get around the fact that you lose the puck an awful lot when you play guys with no hands as often as he does.

Fair enough, but my point's still the same. Regardless of whether he was advocating more scoring (as he was), or less puck possession (as you originally thought he was), I still don't think it's cool to respond the way you did because it makes it seem like he had chosen (from a wide variety of possible alternatives) the one "that never wins cups". Which he didn't do at all. In short, it trivializes his position before he can even give his position. Which sucks for him, but also for you because your posts are typically better than that. You could have had an interesting conversation on it rather than a derailment. And isn't interesting conversation the whole reason we're here?

You're talking in circles. All those teams create more offense than Detroit and still play good defense. You were the one who brought up "run and gun" and how it didn't work. All he did was criticize Babs' preference for low scoring games. You were trying to make his argument appear wrong headed without coming out and saying it straight up. Now you're trying to obscure that fact by changing the subject. The next time someone criticizes Babcock's "soccer" strategy, the correct response should be something along the lines of "what alternative do you propose" and not "So you'd rather we be a run and gun team? The type that never wins cups?". Then you could have a conversation about offensive vs. defensive strategies without all the not so subtle "your position is wrong" inferences.

You didn't say that at all. You insinuated that he must prefer "run and gun" if he doesn't like Babcock's low scoring approach. You also insinuated that he would be wrong for preferring this, since it never works. But I don't see why he couldn't prefer the styles of any number of teams which are as good as we are defensively, and yet much better offensively. Teams like Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Tampa, Montreal, St. Louis, San Jose, Anaheim, or perhaps even Dallas? We're all adults here and we know how to both articulate, and understand, insinuation. No matter how much you deny doing it after the fact. But there really can't be too much positive discourse on any subject if the second he criticizes the coach, you not so subtly pretend as if he's advocating for the dumbest, and least effective, of many possible alternatives.

Right because those are the only two options. EITHER be the Capitals OR score a goal a game. C'mon.

I agree with your point, but disagree with your premise. Our defense isn't fine, and that's partially why our offense isn't fine. Our transition game isf****** terrible. The defensemen can't get the puck up to the forwards consistently, so we never attack the offensive zone with speed (supposedly the big advantage our current team has). They've been fine defensively, but in today's game that's not enough. You need offense from the back end. But I'd love a scoring winger. And to get rid of some of these centers. And to get dopes like Abby off the top six forever. And a GM that would overpay on players that deserve it once in a while. And a coach who didn't act like scoring goals is only an incidental part of the sport of hockey. Those would all be nice too.