eva unit zero

If Howard is a guy who can play 25 games and win 15 this year, I'll be happy. Whether that means a 2.2 GAA/.920% or a 3.2 GAA/.880%, I don't care. Granted, it will mean I would rather have him replaced in the backup role with someone better if he has the worse numbers, as long as the team wins with him in net that's the most important thing. That's why I have always been a big supporter of Ozzie. He hasn't always been the top goalie in the league, but he has always been clutch and he has always been able to play to his team's strengths, rather than needing his team to adapt to or protect him like many other goalies have had to rely on. That is a major reason Ozzie has one of the best winning percentages of all-time and has never missed the playoffs, despite playing for some teams in New York and St. Louis that were comprised largely of minor league talent.

He scored an even strength goal in a game his team lost 3-2. Each team scored one power-play goal. He was a -1 on the night. On the ice for Lebda's goal: Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Holmstrom, Kronwall, Lebda. On the ice for Prucha's goal: Williams, Cleary, Bertuzzi, Lebda, Ericsson. On the ice for Aucoin's goal (OT): Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Lebda, Ericsson. Notice a pattern here? And it's not like this was the only game where Lebda has been horrible defensively. It's kinda his trademark. I have been calling for Meech to be put in Lebda's spot for a while now, because even Meech is better than Lebda defensively.

I like Leino. I was perhaps Justin Abdelkader's only fan on this board when everyone else was blaming him for Holland not drafting Guillaume Latendresse. But I would at the very least take a good, hard look at that deal. Frolov is one of the better wingers in the league, he's still young, and that's not the kind of deal you would expect to see for a guy like Frolov. Think of the Kessel deal or other deals. Frolov is a tier above Kessel, yet you wouldn't get Kessel's return for Leino and Abdelkader. The problem is, if you trade Leino and Abdelkader for Frolov, you now have one fewer forward with an extra 1.25m on the cap. A deal like really happening this might mean Franzen is expected to be out all of the regular season, because that would open the cap space that would be needed to make the deal stick.

Yes it is. The roster maximum is 23 players. 14+7+2=23

As I have said many times and continue to say: The NHL doesn't just go and say "Let's put some teams 'here', 'here', and 'here' and then do it. They announce plans for expansion, and then potential owners submit bids, which include things such as where the team would play and the like. The NHL then picks the bids it likes, based on the number of teams it wants to increase by. The NHL expanded by 4 teams in the early 90s, and then again by 4 teams in the late 90s. Those bid processes did not include any "Hey, let's stick two teams in Florida RIGHT NOW!" or "Wow guys, Nashville and Atlanta would be great spots for teams!" but rather they included bids from owners who wanted to place teams in those cities.

Atlanta, Columbus, Florida, Nashville, Phoenix, Tampa Bay are all teams that could potentially end up moving given current financial situations and historical fan support. Furthering that, potential market locations to move to would include Houston, Kansas City, Madison/Milwaukee, Portland/Seattle, Quebec City, or Winnipeg. There is also of course the expansion issue. I have mentioned many times the number 32, which was just mentioned, as the ideal number to expand to. So we would be looking at any teams which would be moving, plus two expansion teams. Phoenix seems likely to move, and Florida has not been doing well financially. So figure those two teams move; Phoenix to Winnipeg and Florida to Quebec. Then, expand to perhaps Houston and Portland or Seattle, and we see a 32-team league. I would have included Hamilton as a destination but I wouldn't expect Balsillie to have a shot unless there were no other bids.

The NHL is better off on Versus and NBC than ESPN/ABC. Hockey is #1 on Versus, and would be like #6 on ESPN/ABC. The big problem is the DirecTV deal, and honestly once that is settled we're golden. ESPN might provide at little more exposure (by putting the Winter Classic on ESPN Ocho) but Versus is going to provide more revenue year-in and year-out. The NHL won't get much time on ABC or the flagship ESPN station, so ratings won't be much better than the Versus/NBC deals if at all. ESPN wants flat revenue sharing with the NHL, and is offering much less than Versus is willing to pay out. Versus is growing, and the NHL is its primary sport. We'll see what happens in a few years, but revenues are increasing and the cap is going up. ESPN laughed at the NHL and now are trying to get it back, again for much less than Versus... because "they're ESPN and the NHL should want to be there for their own good."

That's not exactly true. The team is allowed to exceed the cap by the player's cap hit while the player is on LTIR, but if they acquire a replacement player they do not have to get rid of that player specifically before the injured player can return. For example, Abdelkader has been in Helm's place, so if the replacement had to be removed, he would have to go. While that is the likely result, it is not the only possible result that would allow Helm to return. They could send Leino down, or waive or trade a different forward. Helm could also come off LTIR and go immediately to Grand Rapids. With Lilja, Meech started as the 7th defenseman and would thus be viewed as the 'replacement' for him. But while Meech will be an RFA at season's end and still has much improvement left in his career, the older, more expensive Lebda seems to have plateaued. Lebda will also be a UFA at the end of the year and has been outplayed by Meech so far this year. So while Meech was the roster replacement, Lebda is likely the guy who actually gets sent out.

1. Scott Niedermayer, NJD 872 (72-13-10-3-2) 2. Zdeno Chara, OTT 563 (19-36-16-11-8) 3. Chris Pronger, STL 345 (7-19-16-17-11) 4. Bryan McCabe, TOR 189 (1-12-10-10-15) 5. Adrian Aucoin, NYI 166 (2-3-12-16-17) 6. Nicklas Lidstrom, DET 165 (1-6-10-19-6) 7. Mathieu Schneider, DET 144 (1-2-17-7-14) 8. Rob Blake, COL 124 (1-8-5-9-6) 9. Sergei Gonchar, BOS 55 (0-3-4-4-2) 10. Wade Redden, OTT 31 (0-0-2-6-3) 11. Brian Leetch, TOR 19 (0-0-2-2-3) 12. Sheldon Souray, MON 12 (0-1-0-0-5) 13. Marek Malik, VAN 7 (0-1-0-0-0) 14. Mattias Ohlund, VAN 3 (0-0-0-0-3) 15. Pavel Kubina, TAM 2 (0-0-0-0-2) 15. Marek Zidlicky, NAS 2 (0-0-0-0-2) 17. Bryan Berard, CHI 1 (0-0-0-0-1) 17. Dan Boyle, TAM 1 (0-0-0-0-1) 17. Mike Rathje, SAN 1 (0-0-0-0-1) 17. Dick Tarnstrom, PIT 1 (0-0-0-0-1) 17. Sergei Zubov, DAL 1 (0-0-0-0-1)

Only twice in his career has Lidstrom not been among the top ten for the Norris: -The 1992-93 season, which saw him have a sophomore slump while being overshadowed by All-Star Steve Chiasson's best season AND the acquisition of Paul Coffey. -The 1994-95 season, which was voted on unusually and saw each conference submit three finalists, after which a panel of 15 PHWA members voted. Only four of the six defensemen submitted from the two conferences received any votes, with only the official "finalists" receiving first-place votes. Coffey received 12 of 15. Every other season of his career, Lidstrom has been top ten for the Norris. Since 95-96, he has been top-six every season, top two most years.

Maybe I'm lucky that I got to watch Swedish League games before Z was drafted, but I had him pegged as a top line forward at minimum before he was even drafted. I was shocked that he fell past the second round, and overjoyed when the Wings picked him.

I have been telling people that Komi and Beauchemin were going to be huge letdowns. They're the 4th and 5th most talented defensemen playing regular shifts for the Leafs right now. Based on all the hype about them the past couple of seasons they should be #1 and #2, even with Kaberle around.

Here's something those of you who are downing on Yzerman's 88-89 season might want to consider: Yzerman in 1988-89 is the only player to ever score 140+ points without at least one teammate clearing the 70-point mark and at least one defenseman clearing the 50-point mark. Furthermore every player other than Yzerman who scored above that mark was considered a defensive liability, except for Adam Oates, who was considered average defensively until his defensive renaissance after becoming a role player in Washington. Yzerman's season, when looked at with respect to the players who surrounded him and how essential he was to both the team's offense and defense, could be argued as one of the greatest individual performances by any player, ever, Red Wing or not.

So you don't have to go back to the OP: Sounds like a "Pick 3 guys to add to the roster who used to be Wings." to me.

Jiri Hudler.

Chris Osgood's 1996 season.

As F.Michael said... I will pull up numbers that show otherwise. Attendance since 1989-90 You'll notice that, while the Coyotes have not had stellar attendance figures, Phoenix has actually been a better market than either Winnipeg or Quebec in terms of attendance. Phoenix sold more tickets than either Canadian city, and had higher prices also. I am not doubting that people in Quebec want NHL hockey; I am stating that Quebec and Winnipeg lost their teams by failing to fill the league's smallest arenas on a nightly basis. Only twice in their final six seasons did Quebec average 14,800+ in tickets sold. Phoenix has done so each of the past five seasons and has only missed that mark twice since moving. In Winnipeg, the team's highest single-season average attendance from 89-90 to 95-96 was 13,550, which is only a couple hundred above Phoenix's worst season. Sorry guys, but the market math works like this: Colorado > Carolina > Phoenix > Quebec > Winnipeg > Hartford.

Because the players recognize that if Gretzky's number is retired League-wide, then Lemieux's should be as well.

Players who don't play defense don't get first place votes for the Selke award. Yzerman, OTOH, is the only player in league history to receive first place votes AND score 150+ points in the same season. He played a very strong two-way game his entire career; Bryan Murray actually got in a heated discussion with Yzerman during the 93 playoffs because Yzerman was playing too defensively while shadowing Gilmour, and not attacking enough.

It was mentioned in an article or two in all three years, so either it was fabricated journalism or a fact. Not saying it couldn't have been made up, but one would think an editor would catch that sort of thing.

The "Roy carried a piece of s*** nothing team" to the Cup argument is such a joke. You do realize that the 93 Habs were one of the top teams in the NHL, right? It's not like they came out of nowhere to beat all the teams they faced. They were a legitimate contender based on their regular season finish and numbers. And it wasn't Roy that got them there in the regular season, either; that was one of his worst regular seasons. The fact that he won the Conn Smythe is because he stepped up his play considerably on a team that was already very good, allowing them to pretty much walk right over whatever was standing in their way.

Ok, well let's take a look at the Wings' strengths and needs. The Wings definitely don't need offensive defensemen. Especially not one whose defensive game is not really much better than average. So that's a no to guys like Quincey and Schneider. A defensive defenseman might be a good selection, a guy such as Aaron Ward. Goaltending, a backup who is better than Howard might be a good pick, so you could bring in Conklin, MacDonald, MacIntyre or Legace. And finally, the best addition would be one or two top-six forwards who can play a two-way game, preferably guys who are big, strong, and fast. After that, guys who are highly skilled but not quite as good two way are also good selections. Sergei Fedorov, Marian Hossa, Slava Kozlov, Mike Knuble, Jiri Hudler, Mikael Samuelsson, Robert Lang, and Tomas Fleischmann are all names that come to mind. So the real question is not so much "Which are the top three players" as "What would be the biggest improvements?" Ignoring the salary cap: Replace Kirk Maltby with Marian Hossa. Replace Kris Draper with Sergei Fedorov @ 3.8m (his current KHL deal) Replace Brett Lebda with Aaron Ward Staying under the cap Replace Jimmy Howard (717k) with Joey MacDonald (650k) Replace Tomas Holmstrom (2.25m) with Sergei Fedorov @ 3.8m Replace Brad Stuart (3.75m) with Aaron Ward (2.5m)

I've made up my list to account for the parabolic increase in salaries as you get towards the top players at a position, and not just something like a goal-per-dollar ratio or something like that as some people might make up. So here it is. 1. Osgood 2. Zetterberg 3. Lidstrom 4. Datsyuk 5. Kronwall 6. Filppula 7. Cleary 8. Franzen 9. Ericsson 10. Rafalski 11. Leino 12. Abdelkader 13. Holmstrom 14. Helm 15. Lilja 16. Williams 17. Bertuzzi 18. Meech 19. Stuart 20. Draper 21. Howard 22. Maltby 23. Eaves 24. May 25. Lebda

It's not that Bettman has ever been against NHL teams in Canada. He isn't opposed to a team in Hamilton and never was. Bettman and the BoG opposed Balsillie's attempts to bypass League procedures and acquire a team and move them without the League approving either the purchase or the move. And as for when the Nordiques and Jets moved, those teams were sold and then moved, and the purchase and the new owners were approved by the League BoG. The move was also approved by the BoG. Those cases followed all league procedures, hence the League did not push against the wishes of the team's current owner and potential owner. The Phoenix situation is totally and completely dissimilar in that the current owner and Balsillie basically attempted a backdoor deal where Balsillie would have paid off Moyes' creditors in part and given Moyes a nice chunk of change for the team, and then moved the team. The continuing lack of understanding about how the League makes decisions (Board of Governors vote, not Commish totalitarianism) is getting tiresome.

So you're saying Roy's number doesn't deserve to be retired then? Because his Av numbers were comparable to his Hab numbers. Which would then suggest you don't feel he deserved to be retired as a Hab either. How do you plea?