chaps80

I dunno, when that Mrazek kid is on his game, he's a top goalie as well, better than Howard i'd say. But yes, if Howard had the confidence and kept his game solid, he'd still be the uncontested #1. There would have been no need to even put Mrazek in the mix, except as a backup, no matter how well he played. Howard was given many many chances to get his s*** in order, but didn't. There was no choice but to play Mrazek.

And here's why Bert got the call over Mantha, from Blashill: The slumping Red Wings have cited the need to shoot more pucks and get more traffic in front. There are few things – if any – that Tyler Bertuzzi does better. The 21-year-old forward was called up to Detroit on Tuesday from the AHL Grand Rapids Griffins after the Wings placed Thomas Vanek on long-term injured reserve. Bertuzzi will make his NHL debut Tuesday night against the Philadelphia Flyers. “When he’s playing well he’s a guy who’s on the puck a lot,” said coach Jeff Blashill after practice on Monday morning. “He’s got a good reach and stick on pucks so he creates turnovers. He finds a way to hard areas of the ice. He can shoot the puck from in-tight areas, finds a way to score in those tight areas and gets to the net hard. “As a team, the one thing we’ve talked about is we need to do a better job of getting to the net front, we need to do a better job of shooting the puck and I think he does those two things.” The Red Wings have lost five straight games, scoring just nine goals over that stretch. On the season, they’ve averaged just 28.1 shots per game, the third-lowest mark in the league. To create more offense and snap out of their funk, numerous players have stressed the importance of scoring “dirty” goals. Bertuzzi is more than capable of filling that need. “Again, when he’s playing really well – and he’s done this for me, he’s done it for Nelly (Griffins coach Todd Nelson) – he’s a guy who finds a way to greasy-type goals,” Blashill said. “Sometimes it doesn’t look pretty but he’s got that in him. We need more of that and we’re hoping he can bring that tomorrow night.” In choosing between Bertuzzi and the highly-regraded Anthony Mantha to take Vanek’s place on the roster, the Wings felt Bertuzzi’s hard-nosed style of play was what they needed most. Mantha has seven goals and an assist in nine games with the Griffins this season, including a four-game goal-scoring streak to start the year. Bertuzzi had two goals and two assists in the same amount of action. At the time of his call-up, he and Mantha were tied for the team lead with 28 shots a piece. “I’ve had conversations with everybody involved that’s watched the team and they’re both playing excellent, they’re both playing really good hockey,” Blashill said. “We think they’re both real good prospects. As we talked about it, we debated it a little bit last night – ‘debated’ isn’t the right word – we discussed it last night, and we just decided this time we’re going to go with Bert.”

Haha I didn't say Bert should be up instead of Mantha. I'd like to see Mantha up. I was just going by what Blashill said about him and Bert respectively after camp. I figured Bert would get first call and he did. Wasn't comparing the two. Was talking about goal scoring. Pulks won the AHL scoring title, then couldn't do much of anything in the NHL. Mantha is obv the better player, but just cause he's doing well in GR, doesn't mean he'll come up and make a huge impact. He's a better player than Bert too, but they wanted Bert first for some reason. Mantha will be up eventually i'm sure. Blash isn't completely retarded, he knows what he has.

Yeah I know. Howard is in the zone right now, but there's a fine line between him being stellar and horrible..there's never really a middle ground. If he continues playing well, Holland might start getting some calls about a trade. I think Mrazek should get the next start too. No need to overwork either goalie, and hopefully Howard stepping up has lit a fire under his ass.

He's played below average for most of the past three seasons. That's where he hasn't earned his contract. Do you think a goalie who plays 14-14-5 over a season deserves $5.3 million for it? Come on... He is talented, but his mental game hasn't been on. This season though, he seems to have put the mental demons aside. 3-2-0 with 7 goals against and like a 1.20 GAA. 1 shutout and even a shootout win tonight, which he's usually horrible at. Hopefully he can keep it up when called upon.

Missed the game, just checked the boxscore. Jimmy with a SO win??? I'm impressed, especially since we all know he usually sucks in them. Good job...startin to actually think he's for real this year now. AA with the tying goal..sweet, that's what we need. Let's keep the W's comin boys!!

Blash said Mantha did not impress during camp. And scoring in the AHL is nothing like the NHL. Pulks proved that tenfold.

This is exactly why the goal of making the playoffs just to lose in the first round needs to stop. Not having a top 5 pick for decades is having real repercussions now with the salary cap and not being able to find the next Zetterberg in the 7th round. Many teams have great young competitive rosters with some great players they can afford to move because they've finished in the bottom 5 and/or missed the playoffs a few times. Highest pick the Wings have had was what? 15th once or twice? That's not gonna cut it. Having a GM that's still stuck in the pre salary cap era doesn't help either. He just can't deal without illitch's open checkbook anymore.

He's not coming to Detroit either way though. Winnipeg already asked for our most valuable asset with him unsigned. What they'd want for him now with that cap hit...forget it.

Sure, but he would take real assets that can't be given up at this point. Every damn team wants Larkin or Mantha because they know Holland is in a bad spot and that's not happening.

He's really the 17th highest paid? Wow, I thought he was closer to the top than that. I don't think anyone expected too much out of him. When he signed that long term contract he was playing like a $5.2 million goalie. Then he went out with injury in the middle of the 2014 season, and for the most part since then he's never been the same. He's had flashes of the old Howard here and there, but he hasn't played well or consistent enough to earn the kind of money he's paid. I thought you meant management screwed him or something. Lol

Never for a second. Wings didn't have the assets to get him, besides ones that would screw us in other areas in the future. Cheveldayoff may never have wanted to trade him, hence his asking price. There was no pressure to get a deal done on his side, so he was just gonna wait Trouba out. And it worked. If someone bit on his high trade demands, then fine, but he wasn't going to make any deals unless got exactly the player(s) he wanted.

How was Howard given a raw deal? I agree with everything else you said, but that part caught my eye. Joseph had a raw deal when Hasek was brought back and he was waived and sent to GR for a bit. I don't recall anything happening to Howard that he didn't bring on himself by not earning his contract.

Good to see someone brought up. Would have liked to see Mantha, but I expected Bert was going to be the first call up regardless of how Mantha is doing in the AHL at the moment because of the camp he had. He narrowly missed making the big team, while Mantha apparantly did not impress. It's not that "slap in the face" to Mantha. Bert earned this call up and should get it before him. Mantha will be along eventually, considering how this team looks.

I'll be the first to say Mrazek hasn't been as good as he can be. His numbers show it. Maybe he's starting to get complacent and slacking a bit because he's been named starter and needs to sit a few and get a kick in the ass to see that he can lose the job as fast as he got it. If Howard can provide that kick then so be it, but it would suck if he relapsed into Jittery Jimmy mode again with a bigger workload. Gotta see how it plays out I guess.

Yes he did play well, but a loss is a loss. It doesn't matter who is in net if the D sucks and there's no offence. It's not as if Mrazek is getting lit up every night. In the games he has allowed a few, alot of those were from defensive errors, or total lack of defence like the fourth goal in the WPG game. Zero defence on the play besides Errorsson who was looking in the opposite direction. Howard is playing better numbers wise than Mrazek right now, but we all know that situation can easily be reversed. I'm happy he's playing well, but i know better than to trust in him to stay at those numbers, especially if he plays alot of games. I honestly don't get the trust some posters here have in him..what is it based off? How he played early in his career and four games this season? Nope. Even when you score two and suck defensively you can't. Who said he was losing the team games? I said he didn't get the win tonight.

Yep, same here. I don't think signing Nielson was a bad move, but how Holland opened up the cap space for it was, and the contract length is too long. There HAD to be another way. He just waited too long, got screwed on a pick dumping the ghost contract, then had to rush to grab Nielson, giving him the advantage to demand the term and NTC he wanted.

Yeah Howard really stepped in today and got us the win. Lol

Exactly. Any goalie can have one great season, but there's only a handful every generation that can keep playing at top form for pretty much their entire careers. Highly doubt we'll ever see another Hasek or Brodeur.

Nah i'm sure he wanted Stamkos above all, just like any team with cap room did. When he didn't get a meeting and Stamkos stayed in Tampa, he targeted Nielson once July 1 hit. I think that was a panic reflex move though. Some fans were already questioning the move that sent Dat's ghost contract to Arizona and cost them Chychrun, and he felt pressure to make that open cap room turn into something that would help the loss of Dats' goal scoring. He ended up giving Nielson too long a contract and a NMC because he wanted him signed quickly so he'd look like that was his backup target all along and he didn't come out of free agency without one of the high profile players locked up.

Dallas just got robbed of the tying goal. Crawford never had it covered..too quick a whistle. f***in refs.

That can happen sometimes. When Mrazek was climbing the ladder from the Ottawa 67's in the OHL to the starting goaltender of the Detroit Red Wings (and did it quickly compared to past drafted goaltenders) he was fighting for it and playing hard to get it. Maybe now that he's reached the top he's let off the gas and relaxed too much. Time for a wake up call that starting NHL goaltenders can be out of the league very quickly if they don't play well, ala Bryzgalov after signing with Philly.

Yeah. I guess until the Wings actually do miss the playoffs, Illitch's mandate won't change. Even then I doubt he'd want to commit to a full rebuild. Maybe Holland should have a talk with him and try to convince him to. The only fans that may complain would probably be the younger ones who have only known wins, playoffs, cups, and hall of fame players. It's pretty much agreed by most fans that this team needs a real rebuild. Rebuilding on the fly just leaves the organization spinning their wheels and bogging down early in the first round.

While i've been a fan of the Vanek signing from the start (former 30 goal scorer, contract just bought out, wants to show he still has it, picked up for 2.6 million for one season) and it has worked out well so far..even if it didn't, it wasn't much of a gamble for potential huge rewards. Nielson on the other hand is a big risk at 6 million for what is it? 6-7 years? I know he wanted long term and probably wouldn't have signed if he was only offered 2 years, but at this point it wasn't the best move with Dats' cap hit coming off the books at the end of this season. Holland could have waited to sign Dats' "replacement". Well put. Makes sense. Sucks that Yzerman's team has been the source of alot of troubles for the Wings the past couple years though. If only Holland had taken his promotion....

Damn the Blues haven't left the BJ's zone all OT. Can we get Tarasenko please Kenny? And Tarasenko ends it. What a player.