MUDSHARK

I doubt Kopecky gets moved unless it's as part of a package for somebody like Marian Hossa- which, frankly, I don't expect to see. I'd like to see him pick it up in the playoffs with some "Secondary Scoring" like Filppula did last year... ... But since that's likely to require Kirk Maltby showing some game, I guess that's unlikely, too. Geez, we win 4-0 tonight and I still feel crappy.

I agree- hope it's not too serious, and I'd like to see Ericsson for a little bit. The upside of Kronwall being out longer- assuming it's not too long- is that we might have a chance to see more than one of the kids- Ericsson, Kindl, and Quincey could all see time, theoretically. Doesn't mean they'll do it, of course, especially considering management's conservative approach to bringing prospects along, but if Kronner is out for an extended period of time, perhaps more than one of the kids can see NHL time. Heal quick Nik.

Everyone is forgetting the wonderous defensive liability that is Mathieu Schneider. As much as I love Schneids, appreciate his offensive talents, and realize Rafalski's d-skills are marginally better, if not roughly equal or even worse, Schneids always had an annoying talent of coughing the puck up in the defensive zone, or making a bonehead up-ice pass leading to a turnover, or getting beat on the offensive blueline leading to an odd man rush. I agree the Ducks have some pretty damn good parts to utilize, especially on the back end, but I don't necessarily agree their D outclasses ours. Their D didnt save them last year- our D collapsing at the most inopportune moment- roughly nineteen minutes into the third period of Game 5 until the middle of the third period of Game 6- let them get back into the game and the series with their offense. That game-tying goal in Game 5 killed us, IMO, not Niedermayer and Pronger's stellar defensive play. We beat them 5-0 in their building, remember? Obviously, the Ducks wanted it more, and came back to smoke us, but the fact remains we blew em out. This signals defensive liabilities, at least vs, our team, IMO. Beauchemin, IMO, is something of a Lilja clone, only with more offensive upside and without the PK prowess. Schneider is serviceable defensively, but his real value is on the PP- and having him on a second unit will be huge, if the Ducks can get production from their second unit forwards. Anaheim's other D are pedestrian. Methinks the Ducks could have problems with the second PP unit. Last week, their first unit included Getzlaf, Perry, and Weight, if I recall correctly, and you have to think Selanne might see first unit time, which would drop Weight back to a second unit including Kunitz and Bertuzzi. Thrown in Beauchemin and Schneider, and the occasional Rob Niedermayer/Bobby Ryan/Todd Marchant shift, and this is hardly the kind of second PP unit that strikes fear in the hearts of opponents. I'd take a second unit of Cleary, Flip, Franzen/Sammy/Hudler, Kronwall, etc., any day of the week. I'd have to say the same thing about our forward lines, assuming we can stay healthy. At this point, I think the best move to make at the deadline would be a defenseman- and we could use either a physical d or an offensive, PP-worthy player to supplement the second PP unit. PK has been in a swoon, but I think the slump is temporary. Assuming Zetterberg stays healthy, and our two-headed goaltending monster doesnt devour itself, I like our chances against Anaheim or anybody else in the league...

Anybody hear a prognosis on Cleary?

Blake isn't the answer, people. Just bring up the kids for the end of the year and the playoffs, and let em play. I want to see Meech, Quincy, and Ericsson get some serious looks before we start giving away picks and prospects again. And while a tough, scoring winger would be nice, it ain't gonna happen. I'd settle for a tough winger who is sound defensively. Drake, Downey, and Kopy are serviceable, but I'd rather see somebody like Mac circa 1997-98. s***, I'd take Mac circa 2002!!! But I don't see any drastic changes to the roster we got now. OTOH, and it's just my two cents, I wouldn't be too upset to see a few players as trade bait. Kopy for one, Lebda for two. I would hang on to Lilja before Lebda- at least Lilja is big, and mean (for a Swede), while Meech is essentially a Lebda clone with better offensive upside. Lebda has good skating ability but his offensive abilities are overrated and he is every bit the defensive liability Lilja is, IMO. So trade Lebs and let Meech earn his lumps the last few months of the regular season. Kopy just doesnt seem to have the fire for playing competitively night-in night-out, and is pretty easily replaced by either an off-season signing or a draft pick. Trade him before he's worthless and give Ellis his minutes- that guy's a workhorse... In all, though, I like our current roster's chances in the postseason either way.

Luongo just owned Sid the Kid...

It's weird, but watching Pittsburgh in the third period and overtime, they kind of reminded me of a less talented version of the Wings. I mean, they seem to be trying to play the same puck possession game the Wings play. It was strange watching them break up the ice as a unit, methodically- it was like watching the Wings. Anyway...

I'm on the verge of being right there with ya...

So I'm guessing Mac users are screwed on the SopCast thing, eh?

10. Selanne 9. Forsberg 8. Fedorov 7. Salming 6. Hasek 5. Peter Stasny 4. Kurri 3. Mikita (honorary Euro) 2. Jagr... (drumroll) 1. Lidstrom

Actually, now that McIntyre got traded, MacDonald got picked up on waivers, Liv bolted back to Sweden, and Koopmans is probably retiring, Howieboy is the only goalie in the Wings' farm system. Larsson will stay in Sweden for at least another year I think. We just signed some QMJHL goalie (Gilbert somethingorother) to replace Koopmans in Toledo (or Shawn Burr's new team in Port Huron, is it?), and Berkhoel would be a pretty decent pickup for 2nd string in GR or starter in the ECHL. Pretty sure that's where Berkhoel comes in. After Howard, our goalie depth is pretty much non-existent at this point, so this signing fits a need.

Spam, spam, spam, spam, Spam, spam, spam, spam etc. Pleez don't purge me now. go wingz

Yeah, that cuts both ways, though. Nick didn't look too good a few times this postseason, either. Plus, he's a Swede, and all those Canadian press boys are eatin up the Canadian boy done good thing with Niedermayer- unfortunately, I think Nick's gonna get screwed again. Based on the regular season, there's no way Niedermayer deserves this award- but he's gonna get it, I bet.

I've had the same experience- I probably saw the Wings 30 or 40 times at JLA from the early 1980s until 1997 when I moved to Colorado, and I'd say they weren't better than .500 in the games I saw. I swear, I've seen them lose to the Stars like 6 times at the Joe. OTOH, I've been to maybe ten games at McNichols and the Can in Denver, and we only lost once- in the preseason. But, I lived in SoCal since last August- before coming back to Colorado a month ago- and the Wings went 0-3 in two games at Anaheim (sux) and one in LA. Freakin' LA, fer chrissakes!!!! Weird. Hope the good mojo continues now that I'm back here in Dive-land. I hit Lee Norwood in the ankle with a fairway shot when I was about 12. It was sweet. His illustrious career went straight into the s***ter after that.

It was 1982 or 83 I think. It was a year or two before Stevie Y. joined the team, I remember. My dad took me- I was pretty young, not even ten years old- and it was a game against Vancouver. The old, ugly-ass jerseys with the brown, orange, and yellow V! Our seats were toward the bottom of the upper bowl, in one of the corners- pretty good seats, as I recall. We took a one goal lead, maybe twice, but wound up losing 4-3 or 5-4 or something. Like I said, I was pretty young, and it was a long time ago. but that was all it took for me. Of course, my dad was a hockey player when he was younger, and my grandpa and great-uncles all used to work at Olympia, so Wings hockey was pretty much a family tradition I latched onto once I got old enough... Funny story, kinda related, knida not: so my Dad, who grew up around the old Corktown neighborhood, and his buddies, used to hang out at the Olympia parking lot back in the day- this would've been the early to mid 1950s- and offer to "watch" the cars of people going to the game "in exchange for a nominal fee." I've always pictured my dad and his other 10-yr. old buddies extorting spare change from fans going to Olympia, afraid these punks would mess with their cars! Pretty funny (unless you parked in the lot, I guess).

Ditto. I'm pretty sure the Ducks as SC Champs is one of the signs of the Apocalypse. Time to invest in that beachfront property in Utah.

In the immediate aftermath of the Kick to the Groin, I gotta admit I was sold on Dom coming back- not "sold," like I needed convincing, but sold as in if Dom came back, we'd be as much a lock for the finals next year as any team could be. And if we do get our Insane Czech Goaltender back next year, great. We could obviously do a lot worse. But after watching this soon-to-be-over SCF series, and with news the cap might be up to 52mil next year, I'm wondering if it might not be worth it to make a serious pitch for Jiggy. As in, a maximum salary pitch. It'll make the cap a pain in a couple years, and require jettisonning some payroll along the way- e.g., trade Kronwall and his 3mil sometime over the next two years, bye-bye Schneider, Draper, etc., in two years, in order to clear cap space for Hank- but it just might be worth it in the long run. Jiggy is a lock for another Conn Smythe, and we've finally got the organizational depth to absorb losses on our blue line and our third and fourth lines. And Lidstrom isn't going to play until he's 45, IMO... It would be a bold move, for sure, and might be useless, as some think Giguere won''t leave SoCal due to family issues, but our team is changing, either way. Why try to sign Smyth to a big deal when we could have the chance to lock in perhaps the best goaltender of his generation, who's just 30 years old? Howard's supposed to be the real deal, but goaltending prospects are notoriously unpredictable, and it's very tough to bring along a truly great, as opposed to serviceable, number one through player development (see, Dominik Hasek!). Maybe Howard gets us more mileage as trade bait in a year or two... If the choice is try to sign a Smyth or a Giguere, who do you go with? Obviously, either one is a long shot in a salary cap world, and getting Hasek back is great in itself if he decides to return for a decent price, but I was wondering about this, watching Jiggy singlehandedly steal a berth in the finals from our boys, and dismantle the Number One Offence in the NHL in the SCF... Thoughts?

Zett- A/A- Dats-A-/A+ Homer- A/A+ Lang- B-/D- Sammy- C/B- Cleary- B+/A Drapes- B/C+ Malts- C/C- Hudler- B/Inc. Franzen- B+/A- Flip- B-/B+ Kopecky- Inc. Calder- C/F Bert- C/B- Lids- A/B+ Schneids- B/A- Cheli- A/A Lilja- B/A- Lebda- A-/B- Kronwall- B-/Inc. Markov- B+/A Quincy- C/B Meech- B-/Inc. Dom- A/A- Ozzie- B/Inc. Babs- A/A Kenny Boy- B+

While the composition of the above post could use a little work, there's a good point lurking here... Our D really did wear down in the end. Nick seemed strangely mortal over the last three, Lebda was scary with the puck (and not in a good way)- can't really single any one guy out (and putting this on Lilja is really unfair- he had a great playoffs for us, the G5OT blunder aside), but when it came down to it, our D wasn't as solid as it looked all year- puck possession was weak for this team, their forwards were able to cycle and cycle over the last three games, etc. I'll put some of this on Lang, who thank GOD has played his last game in the Winged Wheel, but the defense, from the blueline forward, didnt do it like we could have and should have and obviously needed to. How bout Kyle Quincey, though, huh? A couple more years and we might be looking at Son of the Fish! Go Sens, Go Die Pronger- yr a bum

Too bad we're gonna have to wait till the Finals to hear Cherry talk about how badass the Swede is.

Couldn't resist this little stroll down memory lane for good luck:

Guerin didn't return after the puck to the face. Might not be a broken jaw, could be a concussion or something. Pavelski probaly replaces him, which is interesting. He's been in for the two Wings losses, and out for the two victories. Hopefully we can put an end to that little streak Saturday afternoon.

What he said.

If Calgary is ever going to bring their grinding, beat the Wings into submission game it's going to happen Tuesday night. Bert may be a tad rusty, but he brings a physical component up front that the team is probably going to need. I think sitting him, if he's available (which may or may not be the case), is a mistake. Game 3 is a big one, and making the adjustment is both necessary and correct at this point. It's not like we skated Calgary out of the building today like the other night, and they are the best home team in the NHL this year. Bert brings size, a nasty demeanour, and some scoring ability, which I think would go well on Lang's line. Unfortunately, Hudler is probably the one who sits, but after today's game, I would say that snowball in hell at least has a chance, whereas it had no chance after Game 1. Sammy hardly played during the third, and might get the shaft instead of Hudler. That Flip-Huds-Franzen line is looking pretty good at the moment, and maybe Babs decides to keep them together. Maybe not. But Sammy didn't get the same PP time today as usual, and was basically benched during the third after taking a stupid penalty in the second. If he's healthy, I say throw Bert on with Lang and Calder and let Sammy sit. Or move Hudler up with Lang and stick Bert with Flip and Franzen. but Sammy's really not helping us much at this point, IMO.