kipwinger

I'm not buying it. The team won the President's trophy, pretty solidly coasted through the playoffs (after netting Hasek out of the next), and was never in any real trouble at any point in the season. There's also a little bit of a logical fallacy involved in generalizing from two extreme points of view. Basically you're saying Holland was criticized heavily in 2008, but your proof is 1) People were ok with the Stuart trade after temporarily being worried, and B) Two dummies with dummy points of view. I'm not convinced.

Well I wasn't on the forum in 08, but I suspect that there weren't too many people complaining about anything that season. So I'd be really shocked if there were a bunch of Holland bashing threads back then. In general my guess is that when the team is bad, people complain. And when the team is good, they praise...Mike Babcock.

I doubt very seriously everyone would be so lackadaisical about it if Holland traded Nick Jensen for a two month rental, just to barely scrape into the playoffs before getting manhandled.

Just like demoting Weiss after not registering a point while given third line minutes with Kevin ******* Porter on his wing. How is it that he didn't lead the team in points with opportunities like that?

I'm not really sure what's bothering you guys about it. People are discussing the last trade Holland made, in a thread about the next trade Holland will make. Seems pretty relevant to me. Here, I'll fix it so that everybody around here is happy... Durr...Cleary...Quincey...Durr Hurr...Kindl sux...Durr Hurr Hurr.

You mean fourth line winger. Babs actually had him playing on Glendening's wing lol.

I agree with your conclusion, but for all the wrong reasons. I thought this "going back to Sweden" thing had been put to bed. He was never going back to Sweden. Nobody relevant said he was. And nobody in the organization thought he was. Ryan Martin explicitly stated that this was false. As did Jarnkrok. Can we please stop repeating conjectures over and over again if they've already been debunked?

I actually feel a little bit for Brunner. He's obviously not a fourth line player, but the Devils have acquired a ton of top 9 wingers, so it's probably a struggle to get ice time. Between Ryder, Ruutu, Jagr, Clowe, Cammalleri, Havlat, there probably isn't a lot of ice time for Damien. Hence he's rumored to be on the block. The kid's made a bad decision or two in his time in North America, but he does have the talent to score goals if put in the right situation. I'd like to see him land on his feet.

You're creating a little bit of a false dichotomy here. That he may or may not be better than Quincey is still not a reason to acquire him. "Better than Quincey-ness" isn't a good way to evaluate whether a player would help you much. Where's he going to play (3rd pair at 3.3 million)? What is his skill set (he's a less effective puck mover than Quincey)? Also, I see no reason to believe that Philly would trade a marginal defenseman for a more expensive marginal defenseman. It seems like you're saying that in a vacuum you'd rather have Schenn than Quincey, which I suppose isn't too unreasonable. But that wouldn't address any of the problems with our back end, since the problem is that we can't move the puck, so why bother?

Because we don't need a stay at home defenseman with Ericsson and Dekeyser in the lineup? Because he's not a puckmover or powerplay specialist? Because there's no reason to take a flier on a young kid with upside when we've got an organization full of young kids with upside?

How else would you describe Marc Crawford?

When was he "in-dated"? His points of view got him exactly one NHL game as a player, and one trip to the finals as a coach. That's not exactly a validation of his hockey smarts when you consider the kind of goobers who have been much more successful than that.

Ok gotcha. For some reason I interpreted Dickie's post as implying that Shanny had hooked up with one of his Red Wing teammates' wives. I couldn't care less about Craig Janney's wife, but I'd be furious if he did it to Igor Larionov lol.

Agreed. Here's the article. There's a lot of Babcockisms, which generally don't mean much at all, and Khan interpreted things in the most definite way possible. I'll be amazed if Kindl (and to a lesser degree Lashoff) aren't on a VERY short leash this season. http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2014/09/mike_babcock_brian_lashoffs_jo.html

Wait, have I been missing something for the last 15 years?

Hopefully this doesn't derail the thread too much, but you hit on something that I've thought about for years. Why does anybody care about Don Cherry's thoughts on hockey. He wasn't a successful player, and he wasn't a successful coach. He's not Scotty Bowman or Pat Quinn; he's John Tortorella without the accomplishments. Why would anybody listen to this blowhard clown and think, "now here's a subject matter expert"? Ugh, I frickin' hate Don Cherry.

What about Callahanahan?

But he's big. I mean, look at the size of him. Who cares if he's any good or not? He's big. That's all that matters. We could pair him up with Mike Mckee and teams would be scared to death. Because NHL coaches, the league over, are bewildered by club footed meatheads. You know, cuz they're big.

Which Schenn did Paul Holmgren trade James Van Riemsdyk for? (It's so hard for me to say that with a straight face)

No doubt. After that sloppy loss last night he'll be lucky to last the season.

I'll believe it when I see it. Holland's been saying that for about 5 years now. Once the trade deadline passes then he'll start telling everyone how's he's going to be a big player in free agency. Ho hum.

You've got to assume after the way they played two nights ago, and Babs' post game comments that he's going to play with Sheahan and Tatar. But where the hell does that leave Alfie should he decide to return (which I think is probably unlikely at this point)? If you slot him with Datsyuk and Z, then Helm has to go somewhere else. But does Babs really want Helm, Abby, and Miller one the fourth? I mean, I do, but it's hard telling what Babs wants sometimes.

Not to mention Nosek and Athanasiou.

Of course it is. Go back to the game thread from two nights ago and look at page after page about how well Smith played. I even said he played well. Where are you getting this? You act like there's some bias against the guy. Nobody is treating him like Cleary or Quincey, who (by the way) I'd agree people need to chill out on.

I ***** about Smith when he f***s up, which he's done (a lot) in his short career. Just like I do with every other player. When he screws up and turns the puck over to I have to temper my frustration because one day he might be better? Also teams trade guys with potential ALL THE TIME. If they were destined to be terrible nobody would want to trade for them. I've advocated trading Nyquist, doesn't mean he's bad. Just the opposite. And nothing that you just said takes away from that fact that he's been pedestrian so far in his career...which is all I've ever said. Dig through any old discussion of Brendan Smith and you see me saying, over and over, that he'll get better and that he has potential. That's obvious. But saying that he's (paraphrasing) "as good offensively as Kronwall back when Kronwall wasn't great offensively, or as good defensively as Ericsson back when Ericsson wasn't great defensively" all adds up to him being average now. Which I said...yesterday. So here, I'll throw you a bone. One day Brendan Smith could be as good as Kronwall. He's got the tools. So far he's been average...and sometime disappointing. Can you live with that characterization, or do I need to follow up any criticism of Smith with an immediate disclaimer? "Smith had a terrible turnover last night (but don't let that distract anyone from that fact that his size and skating could surely put him solidly on the top pair should his developmental trajectory look something like Kronwall's did). Seems a little excessive.