kipwinger

You're not wrong, I was. I was reading bad info. He was bought out, so his big salary is gone. He's 900,000. Both he and Boyes are making about a million a piece and are producing well. Which will only increase their value on the trade market considering how tight to the cap everyone is.

Well played.

This was hard because it's significantly better than what we've got now, and because it would probably make the playoffs. But I don't think it would win the Cup and I want one more of those before Datsyuk and Zetterberg decline. As such, any lineup that doesn't compete for a Cup is wasting another year of their careers and the lineup above needs a power forward and a better puck mover than Smith to make that happen.

Dave Tippett consistently produces playoff quality teams with almost nothing to work with. Look at my post above. The VAST majority of Mike Babcock's success came with that kind of talent. Babs came to Detroit in 2005 and walked onto a team that had four 80 point players. He coached that team to a first round loss by the way. Edit: For accuracy, Mike Modano had 85 pts. in 2003, and Mike Ribiero had 83 in 2008. That's it. Twice in his coaching career has Tippett had that kind of player and he still takes his teams to the playoffs consistently. Edit Edit: Both Babs and Tippett became head coaches during the 2002-2003 season. Since then Babs has 445 regular season wins. Tippett has 427. Not too shabby with a tenth the talent level, budget, or free agent allure.

I think the love for Babs gets a little overblown sometimes. Is he one of the better coaches in the league? Yes. But it's crazy how Iron Mike has hoodwinked everyone. He put a good year together with Anaheim and there really wasn't much to work with...so kudos to him for that. Then he came to Detroit and walked onto a team with talent like Yzerman, Shanahan, Osgood, Hasek, Draper, Maltby, Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Franzen, Lidstrom, Rafalski, Kronwall, and eventually Hossa. If he didn't have a Cup and a bunch of wins with that kind of talent he'd be the worst coach in the history of professional coaching. It's not unlike what Quenneville adopted, except maybe his team was a little less proven. Many deride Q for adopting his team, but conveniently overlook the fact that

I honestly have never really seen Gilbert play too much. I looked at his stat line, which was impressive, and his salary (which seems high at 5 mil) but I'll gladly defer to someone who's seen more of him than I have. I also noticed he doesn't score on the PP alot, which either means he doesn't play on it...or shouldn't play on it. In an ideal situation I'd prefer a puck mover who can play the point on the PP and let Alfie do what he ought to be doing (halfboards). As for Boyes, he's scored a ton of goals in his career but I don't really see how he fits. We've already got third line wingers and I don't see him in our top six. Also, while being a quality goal scorer, he's incredibly week on the puck and I'd prefer someone who's hard to play against. Then again, it's a ton of production for almost no money so I can see the allure.

When asked to comment on his first start in Boston since his puzzling departure, Tim Thomas had this to say... "I'm really just focused on getting ready for tomorrow's game," he said. "You know me, I don't try to overblow things." Ha. I sure hope that was Timbo being cheeky, because if he really feels that way he's delusional...er...more so than usual.

Fair enough, all good points.

The Fourth Period is rumoring that the Wings are now interested in Brad Boyes AND Tom Gilbert of the Panthers. Boyes has 14 goals and Gilbert 24 pts. this season. There's one way to get Weiss' offense going...bring his entire team up from Florida. Unfortunately, while Weiss' game will pick up, our team will only be as good as the Florida panthers.

I mean, I can't objectively back it up. There are guys with more wins, guys with more Cups, guys with loads of international accolades. But nobody has won as often as Tippett with less talent than Tippett. That, to me, is the best in the biz. Can't argue there. Hitch is a real good coach.

For me it has nothing to do with politics. Guys screw their careers up all the time. Wade Redden did it by signing for too much money, Jeff Finger did it for (being no good) and going to Toronto, Dipietro did it by not committing (even a little bit) to good training habits. Every one of them got made fun of relentlessly on this forum and every other forum. Timmy is not exempt from being clowned on just because he was better than they were.

I think if we had Hudler back Babcock's head might explode. He'd stick Huds on the third line with Tatar and some center, and they'd be the highest scoring 3rd in the league and Babs would be sooooooooooo pissssssssssssssssed.

Who: Dave Tippett Why: He's the best coach in hockey.

If he was the best lawyer at the best law firm in the country, and then one year later he was at one of the worst law firms making half as much money, EVERYBODY would agree that he had mismanaged his career. Whether it was worth it or not, to become a better father, is between God and Timmy. But the career implications of it are pretty much not debatable. As for the delusional comment, that was in reference to Timmy saying he "doesn't like to overblow things", or whatever. Which couldn't be further from the truth. He overblows tons of things, all the time. I gave allowance for the fact that he could just be joking around, but if not, he's being delusional. Again, not really sure how this is debatable...unless, of course, someone perhaps just wants to be argumentative.

When did we start talking about Tim Thomas the husband and father? This is a hockey forum fellas, try to stay on topic. I honestly don't care if he's got ten or twelve of those "World's Greatest Dad" coffee mugs. I said he mismanaged his HOCKEY career, and he did. He currently plays for a garbage team for half the money he did in his last full NHL season.

Where's Cleary? Hopefully he got lost on his way to the rest of the season.

Yeah, if they're relocated they can change the name to whatever they want. Just like Colorado, Carolina, and Dallas did.

Agreed, it's obviously easier to play with Tavares and your numbers will inflate a bit. But Moulson is the real deal. Guy can flat out score. Still don't want him though...the price is wrong.

Sure, but you're talking about a different kind of "nuts". And really, when you boil it down it's all shades of gray anyway. Both Tim Thomas and Ilya Bryzgalov are absolutely, positively, 100% wackadoodle.

I read an interview a couple of months back where the new owner was talking about renaming the team with the Arizona moniker. It wasn't so much about "rebranding" them as much as it was about making the Coyotes similar in name to the Arizona Diamondbacks and Arizona Cardinals. Kind of a solidarity move, similar to how all the Pittsburgh teams have the same color scheme for their uniforms. I actually think it's pretty cool. A little state pride never hurt anyone.

Lefty, you're reaching. Lidstrom, Fetisov, Murphy, and Chelios are all Hall of Famers. Konstantinov would have been. In the 1997-1998 season Fetisov played 18:00 minutes a night and Murphy 25:00 minutes. I can't find numbers for the year before but logic dictates it was probably not less icetime given that they were a year younger. In 2001-2002 Chelios played 25 minutes a night. In 1997-1998 Lidstrom played 27:00 minutes a night, in 2001-2002 he played 28:00, and in 2007-2008 he played 26:00...again, no stats for 1996-1997 but there's no reason to assume a huge change one way or another. Finally, because he was only on the first Cup team there's no stats for Konstantinov, but considering he was considered the better of the two (at the time) between he and Lidstrom, you have to assume it was a lot for him as well. It's not like they were a bunch of young kids who hadn't reached their potential, or else old guys who were past it. They were Hall of Fame players logging HUGE minutes. You've got a moderately valid point for 2008...maybe...but that was post cap and our defense was about as good as it could be given those constraints.

I don't. It was more a joke about Torts than about Hegelin, who's really quite good...supposed powerplay difficulties aside. You'd need Ovie AND Stamkos to make up for all the goals that a combination of Smith and Mike Green would let in. They would arguably be the worst defensive pairing in the history of the league. I'm wondering which of the two would actually stay back on defense...breakaways and odd man rushes galore. Nevermind all the blown zone coverage. Yeesh.

I blame Bettman...and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

"Hagelin's a jitterbug and he stinks..." - John Tortorella

Yep sure is. Ok, I'm with you now. I appreciate your patience while I (slowly) figured out where you were coming from.