kipwinger

First of all, none of them put up "much better" totals than Callahan in the AHL. Callahan's career high 44 pts. is better than anything Asham or Tootoo ever did in the AHL and is only 2 pts. shy of Torres' AHL highs. So who gives a damn about juniors? But, as I've tried to make clear already...who cares about their offense? Nobody is expecting these guys to produce offense in the NHL, they're fourth liners. However, unlike those other guys, Callahan is better defensively, has better mobility, and can play special teams. None of those other guys can say that. So in addition to having all their agitating qualities, offensive productivity (for what that's worth), and occasional fighting, he can also be relied upon to be on the ice without being a liability...kinda like...Prust or Maltby. Which was what I said to begin with.

Nobody's talking about his offense translating. I don't think it will either. Drew Miller doesn't produce points in the NHL either but that hardly means he's one dimensional. Like Miller (or Prust, or Maltby) Callahan can skate, play special teams, and is defensively responsible. So he's already miles ahead of the bozos you seem intent on comparing him to. I'm also curious to know why you'd think he's similar at all. He's not used in any way like those guys are. The only thing similar is that they'll fight once in a while. Other than that Mitch Callahan is nothing like those guys. When a coach as good as Blashill is using you on the PP, PK, and giving you top six minutes, and leaving you on the ice at the end of games you're surely a better player than some fourth line agitator...regardless of how often you do or don't score.

I think perhaps I'm not being as clear as I intend to be. I'm not talking about how effective he'll be in the NHL. I don't know. What I do know is that Callahan isn't considered a one trick pony. He can skate, play special teams, and is pretty solid defensively. All while chipping in a little offense. Kinda like Prust does and Maltby used to do (at the NHL level). Nobody in the NHL has ever relied on Tootoo, Torres, or Asham for anything other than being a hard hitting instigator. Will Callahan do that in the NHL? I have no idea. But up to this point he's been a lot more versatile in the AHL then you're suggesting.

I was talking about style of play...not effectiveness. Prust is a tough, agitating, bottom sixer who actually has hockey skills (defense, pk, and some offense). Callahan's style of play is closer to that than an enforcer, or pure agitator (e.g. Tootoo, Torres, Asham). If you look back at the post I was responding to, someone called Callahan a "Maltby that can fight". Which pretty much desribes Brandon Prust exactly.

Or like a Tootoo that can play hockey? (So basically Brandon Prust)

It's a figure of speech. The point is that for whatever reason, they were scoring more goals on fewer shots. Call it luck. But the point is they can't keep up that pace. Their percentage was artificially high. Better? And as we saw last year, pretty soon they stopped getting those breaks, and their goals (as well as their shooting percentage) came back to earth. But you'd be an absolute fool to think that Darren Helm is now a top-six offensive threat because a year ago he had 12 goals in 40 odd games. That'll never happen again. It's a fluke...just like his shooting percentage.

What's Callahan going to do, bleed on him? He's 6ft. and 195 lbs. There's no honor or virtue in getting mauled by a giant.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the best coach in the NHL. Lol.

If you're looking for an "elite winger" why would you look to an average center? And if we've got so many high end prospects and middling centers, why don't we package a few of them up for an "elite winger". Putting Helm on Datsyuk's wing isn't going to give Helm hands all of a sudden. It will just take the spot away from someone who does have hands...like Jurco, or Mantha, or Tatar. As for your Filppula comparison. I agree, his best year came on the wing with Zetterberg. Now go look at his career numbers. His goal scoring didn't improve much that year on the wing. His assists, on the other hand, went WAY up. So while he did have better number on the wing, it's not because he was scoring many more goals. It's because he was passing to better finishers (notably Zetterberg). Edit: I get your point, "it's worth a shot". But this is a professional sports team. I would hope we'd have a better strategy for improving our team than "it's worth a shot", or "it couldn't hurt", or "meh, what the hell". The fact that we've got the wrong personnel to address our needs, and keep trying to put bandaids over bullet holes may contribute largely to the dismal result our team has seen since 2009. Sure, it probably wouldn't kill us to try Helm there. But isn't there at least one or two other options with a higher probability of success?

36 year old Pavel Datsyuk is not some magic cure all for bad talent. If that was the case, we wouldn't be in this mess. Darren Helm isn't a top six winger. He's never been a winger, and until a year ago he's never been a top sixer. Why would you think he'd have a career year immediately after being moved to a new position? If anything, it'll be a wash. I wish this team would stop screwing around trying to jam square pegs into round holes just because Holland, or Babcock, or both have a boner for this player or that one and can't make hard decisions.

Helm rode an unsustainably high shooting percentage to the best numbers of his career and then fell off completely. He'll never post numbers like that again in his career. Take it to the bank.

Like I said, fortunately we've got a lot of the answers in the organization already. Any of Jurco, Tatar, or Mantha are more suited to top six work than Abby or Helm. Promote Jurco to the top line, Mantha to the third (once he's healthy) and get Helm and Abby on the fourth. Jurco showed a year ago that even as a rookie he's more offensively competent than those other two, and that would free up Babs to put them on the fourth where they should be. Doesn't have to be a 40 goal scorer. A 15-20 goal scorer is still an upgrade over Helm or Abby.

The Red Wings have signed defenseman Joe Hicketts to a three-year entry-level contract. Per Wings' Press Release: "The Detroit Red Wings today announced that they have agreed to terms with defenseman Joe Hicketts on a three-year, entry-level contract. In accordance with club policy, additional details will not be disclosed. Hicketts, 18, signs his first NHL contract after attending Detroit’s development camp in July and playing for the club last week at the 2014 NHL Prospects Tournament in Traverse City, Mich. In 2013-14, Hicketts skated in 36 games for the Western Hockey League’s Victoria Royals, ranking second among the team’s defensemen with 24 points (6-18-24) despite missing nearly half the season due to injury. The 5-foot-8, 186-lb., blueliner has played 103 WHL games for the Royals since 2012-13, totaling 48 points (12-36-48), a plus-14 rating and 57 penalty minutes over two seasons. He has also appeared in 13 playoff games for the club, registering three assists and 11 penalty minutes. A native of Kamloops, British Columbia, Hicketts has represented Canada twice on the international stage. He captained Team Pacific at the World Under-17 Hockey Challenge in Drummondville and Victoriaville, Quebec, in 2013 and won a bronze medal with Canada at the Under-18 World Championships in Lappeenranta and Imatra, Finland, in April 2014. Hicketts picked up a combined 10 points (2-8-10) and 12 penalty minutes over the two tournaments." If enough users commented on it, do you all think we could get Ansar Khan to do an investigatory article on the exact heights and weights of Joe Hicketts parents? It's the only info I really care about with regard to this story.

I think you and Mike Babcock have fundamentally different views on what the fourth line and bottom defensive pairings are supposed to be doing. Seems like you think their role is to hit, fight, be abrasive, and generally a pain the ass to play against. Mike seems to think bottom end players are supposed to kill penalties, play defense, eat up minutes in games that are out of reach, and not take penalties. So rather than crossing our fingers and hoping Mike Babcock changes his mind, why not just find guys who are better able to execute his game plan...like I dunno, Abby and Helm. Couldn't they get put on the fourth line, since that's where they should be anyway? And once there, wouldn't they be (along with Miller, or Callahan, or Cleary, or whomever) the best fourth line in hockey?

If it's "more of the same" with Cleary and he's still on the ice then it's not his fault. It's Babcock's.

I completely agree. What gets me is that everyone ALREADY knows they're going to make mistakes. That's what bottom end talent does...league wide. Every single team in the league has bottoms end talent making mistakes, and yet when our guys do it there's a huge "I told you so" uproar. It's dumb. If these guys didn't make mistakes, they'd be top end talent.

How exactly are you going to upgrade your special teams, puck movement from the back end, scoring depth, or shoddy goaltending with "toughness"? The kinds of guys that Ryan Barnes is arguing for (e.g. goons) don't play special teams, don't move the puck well, don't limit shots on the goalie, and don't provide scoring depth. They maybe...maybe...could help keep other guys healthy...maybe. But that's it. This whole argument that we've been bad because we're not "tough enough" completely overlooks the fact that there are a lot of SERIOUS problems with our team that have nothing to do "toughness". Fortunately many of the problems outlined above are resolved by adding Nyquist, Jurco, Tatar, Mantha, Ouellet, Sproul, and Marchenko (none of whom are goons, but all of whom are skilled) and removing/demoting Kindl, Lashoff, Quincey, Cleary, Bertuzzi, Sammy, etc (some of whom are tough, none of whom are skilled). By adding more skill, our real problems are likely to get solved. By adding goons you solve zero real problems and only address this "toughness" deficiency which isn't really tied to anything tangible anyway.

What a creep lol.

I'd argue that we've got plenty of toughness and not enough skill. For the last several years we've had awful special teams, defensemen that can't pass the puck without turning it over, marginal goaltending, injuries, and ZERO scoring depth. More skill will help ALL of those things, more toughness will help exactly ONE of those things.

Didn't you know..."OMG Cleary does suxs"! For the remainder of the season, whenever possible, Cleary, Quincey, and Kindl will be ragged on and denigrated to the absolute maximum. Because, ya know, a bottom six forward at the end of his career and tweener defensemen make all the difference in the world to the teams success.

They haven't won a Cup in the Holland era without Lidstrom either. And I don't think he ever had a fight, or led the team in hits either. The softest of the soft, the skilled of the skilled. So what? You could just as easily argue, based on this fact, that we should go MORE toward "skill" because after losing Lids we're not skilled enough. You keep saying this like it means something. He didn't even play in the 08 finals. Mike Babcock thought him so irrelevant that he scratched him, and yet here you are making it seem like he's not only important but vital to win. He's not. Get over it. Edit: Also, McCarty played exactly 3 regular season games that year too. So it's not like he was out there night after night protecting Datsyuk, Zetterberg, and Lidstrom. He played 17 playoff games as the Wings steamrolled Nashville, Colorado, and Dallas, and then rode the pine once we had to play an actual team.

And I'm not saying we need a team full of sissies either. But the Shanahan/Lapointe type guys just aren't available anymore. And when they are, the price is so high that nobody wants to move what it takes to get them. Anybody want to trade Nyquist right now for Evander Kane? He's tough, and skilled, and all that. But that's what he'd cost. If Holland pulled the trigger on that trade people would ******* riot. Let's see, who else is tough and skilled? Kesler? Yeah, everybody said he was too expensive as well. So if you want toughness you end up taking bottom six toughness because its cheap and available. And that ends up looking a lot like Aaron Downey, Brad May, or Jordin Tootoo...and Babs doesn't want guys like that.

He's getting off to a slow start. I wonder what's going on with him?

I'd agree that in general you'd want a big guy paired with a little guy to help out in the d-zone. But the broader point would be that regardless of his partner, Hicketts (like Torey Krug) is too small to defend against NHL forwards and would have to be EXTREMELY sheltered. Krug, for instance, only played around 14:30 minutes per game at even strength. He just got a TON of icetime on the powerplay (led their team). So in a role like that, I could see Hicketts being viable. But at his size, unless he turns out to have Rafalski like passing, he should never be allowed to sniff top four minutes.

True, but I think that inflates his value a little too much in 2008. That year he played one game in the finals, had 6:00 minutes of icetime, 11 shifts, and no fights. He didn't do anything that Abdelkader and Helm don't do better. For all intents and purposes that was a pure skill team with a pure skill win. However, your point is taken for 97, 98, and 02. Those were tougher teams than our current bunch, but still near the bottom of the league in all major "tough guy" categories. Making comparisons against ones' self is always precarious because it tends to skew all relative contextual information. By comparing the 97 Wings to the 08 Wings you'd conclude that one was "tough" and one wasn't. But once you factor in the rest of the league you realize that neither were tough. In 97 our less tough team absolutely obliterated the tough guys from Philadephia who were supposed to be so much and powerful and scary. So while I agree that our older teams were tougher than current ones, they were still by no means "tough" teams by NHL standards. Also, in neither case are those Wings' team indicative of whether or not "tough" vs. "skill" philosophies are better, they just happened to be better that year.