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Yeah, drunks on the road make me have to swerve to avoid hitting them. They should watch where they are walking.

Could always just go for the six-man, empty net game. Run it like a soccer game, with three "levels" of positions. Run it as a 1-3-2 system. Guys like Hudler, Bertuzzi, and Holmstrom would fill the front spot, as their games are more offense-oriented and they aren't the skaters that much of the rest of the team is.

In the US, a prison is a state or federal facility which holds those who have been sentenced to a term of a year or more for a felony. Jail is local to the area, where those who have sentences of less than a year are held, as well as those awaiting criminal trials.

Howard gets a big head in 12-13 and starts asking for a crazy contract that ensures, among other things, that there are whipped cream fights in the locker room. The Wings will go out and sign Kari Lehtonen to tandem with Howard if he returns, or to start if Howard jumps ship or is committed to an insane asylum.

You can go to a place like a Friday's, Applebee's, or something, sit at the bar, and order a lemonade or a Coke. Free refills, and you just spent like 2 bucks to watch the game. If you want food, there are always cheap options such as just getting an appetizer.

Terrible deal for the Wings. Williams scored well in Columbus, Chicago, and Atlanta. he didn't do very well last year in Dallas but Pittsburgh should suit him much better.

I wonder if he'll clear waivers when he doesn't make the team during training camp?

You are correct. All three were in my mind, but I was more concerned with who else would be later down the list that I forgot to put them in. List is now fixed.

1) Steve Yzerman 2) Bernie Federko... But seriously, Brian Rafalski or Chris Chelios. 3) Ryan Kesler. 4) Sergei Fedorov. Or Chris Osgood if we're counting involuntary transfer (I noticed a few McCarty mentions) 5) Todd Bertuzzi and Derian Hatcher He left a third/fourth tweener job in Detroit for a higher paying job in Chicago as a top-six forward. If your current company offered you a small raise, and a competing company offered you a much larger raise AND what would effectively be a promotion, would you take it? That's called normal. I don't know about other people, but I was always opposed to Hatcher in Detroit. I think he was vastly overrated in Dallas because of his size and hitting ability. Zubov was the best defenseman in Dallas, and I would have taken both Matvichuk and Sydor ahead of Hatcher. That bum was leading the league in scoring when the Wings picked him up. It's the first time in league history that a player has been traded while leading the league in scoring. Dallas Drake? You mean the Dallas Drake who began his career as a Wing in 1992-93? I wish he had never been traded, personally. Looking at trades made by the Wings in the past 20-25 years, I think that might be the second-worst trade. The initial offer to Fedorov was $10m/yr for 5 years. Fedorov was unavailable for a week or so, and when he returned he had been notified of his agent about the offer, but by the the Wings chose to drop the final year. It was more important to Fedorov to have the 5 years than the $10m. But the Wings had decided not to keep him around that long. Anaheim gave him an offer of $8m/yr for 5 years. Same total value, more years. So he's taking a 20% pay cut from what he "declined" by asking that the initial offer be put back on the table. Fedorov is generally cast as the badguy because of the holdout in 97, when he was a free agent and the Wings were offering him a deal well below his market value. He ultimately signed the Carolina offer because it was at/above his market value, and meant he would either be playing in Carolina or for the Wings. The offer was structured by the Hurricanes with certain playoff round bonuses to try and scare Ilitch away from matching it. I call revisionist history. Hudler had scored almost 60 points as a third-liner in 2008-09, and was expected to top that production this season as a top-sixer - which is why people call his season horrible. If Hudler had scored the 70 points Babcock expected him to, he would have tied with Joe Thornton for 24th overall. I'm sure you were not interested in having that on the team, instead hoping to have some random veteran sit in the press box every night.

Ericsson's contract is bad. Bettman was hired to increase the popularity and range of the NHL, and it has always been his job to increase profits and revenue. He has excelled at that. Have you SEEN his hairline?

My point was that you can't look at the age of a team and state that they should or should not retire his number; the Wings had a ridiculous amount of roster turnover for a period of about 40 years from 1955 to 1995. Other original six teams went through periods with far less turnover, and therefore longer terms for the key players.

Osgood was one of the top five goalies for the 90s as a whole. As for personal achievements, a large number of HHOFers are in despite never winning a trophy. Osgood is well more than worthy based on established standards. You can have the standards you believe the Hall should go by, but ultimately Ozzie belongs there because he's well above many players already in. My point with Messier and Fuhr was that the Oilers traded Gretzky and still won the Cup. That's how stacked the team in front of Fuhr's 4 Cup wins as starter were. Remove WAYNE GRETZKY, and still have a Cup winner. A further point regarding Fuhr; Osgood and Fuhr were each the best goalie in the playoffs three years during their careers. But Osgood only played eight playoff seasons. No currently retired Wing began his career with another team, or spent time outside of Detroit for any significant amount of time. So that classification in Detroit is not MY criterion. And using it disqualifies Shanahan, Draper, and Chelios. But Osgood has a Hall of Fame resume on his Wings career alone, and he spent a long time with the club in a key role. Norm Ullman is the next most recent player I can think of who matches that who is retired but does not have a banner. So disqualifying Osgood because you have to look back to Sawchuk for a retirement-worthy goaltender is a questionable practice. Jersey retirement should be based on the merit of the player, not the depth of the organization's history. Osgood's 317 wins as a Red Wing rank 4th among all single-team totals for goaltenders. Only nine goaltenders have won 300 games with one team. Only 19 have won 250, and only 35 have even won 200. most of those 35 are either active, ineligible, or in the Hall.

Anderson was at best the seventh most important Oiler during his time there. He was a second liner and a support player outside of Edmonton. Osgood was one of the three or four most important Wings during his prime. Osgood was also a very important player to his team for most of his career. The comparison isn't valid.

During Osgood's career, the top six goalies in the world were, in no order, Roy, Hasek, Brodeur, Belfour, Osgood, and Joseph. Other guys broke into that group at times and had a hot year or two, or an old vet might have a revival, but that was the top handful. If you're saying that Belfour is closer to Roy, Hasek, and Brodeur than he is to Osgood and Joseph... well, let's just say I don't agree. Hmm. Gordie Howe; he retired and then when he decided he still wanted to play, went to the WHA. I win!

The Wings lost the series against LA because of failure to score on the power play in crucial situations. Osgood was blamed for the series loss because of the team's three-goal collapse the final six minutes of game four; in those six minutes, two goals were scored after Osgood made multiple point-blank saves, and another deflected to the net but not over the line, and was counted anyway. Following a scramble in front of the net about a minute into overtime, the uncovered Bryan Smolinski was able to wrist a shot past Osgood. The Wings didn't score three goals in either of the following games, basically resulting in an "Ozzie wins the game for us if he's playing great. If he's not, we're out." This was the same Wings team that started the series with nine goals in two games.

Bolland is a very good center. The more questionable ranking is Zetterberg at #14. How they justify that one I am not sure. He was third in scoring among centers last season behind Stamkos and Sedin. Crosby and Datsyuk would have also finished ahead of him if healthy. So he's top five, just on offense. And Datsyuk and Kesler are the only guys there who can be legitimately argued as his defensive equal. Z belongs in the top three, not just the top fifteen. My list? Zetterberg Datsyuk Crosby Stamkos Getzlaf Kesler Toews H. Sedin M.Koivu B.Richards Backstrom Malkin M.Richards Briere J.Staal Kopitar Giroux Thornton E.Staal Krejci Spezza Carter Lecavalier Bergeron Bolland EDIT: Players missing from original list.

Teams will generally give their backup goaltenders starts against weaker teams. So with a good team like Detroit, unless the backup loses the game due to poor performance, that will be a win. That also goes to the point of GAA; weaker teams tend to score fewer goals. Osgood was the starter for two Cups, three finals trips and a conference finals trip in eight seasons where he was the primary goaltender during the postseason, one of those postseasons ending in large part due to Osgood being injured in the second round. That's damn good for any goaltender on any team. Better postseason winning percentage than a great number of Hall of Famers, including Terry Sawchuk. Comparable record to Patrick Roy. Grant Fuhr has a better record, from playing on Edmonton all those years. Ken Dryden from those incredible Montreal teams. As for his game 7s, one was as a rookie bailing out a floundering Bob Essensa; Osgood went 3-2 in the series and nearly won it for the Wings after the team folded up early on. Another was a Cup finals loss where the entire Wings team flopped after the first period. But as you're so concerned with numbers, why not look at the fact that his career sv% increases from .905 to .916 and his GAA drops from 2.49 to 2.09? Clutch. Incorrect. He lost starting gigs to Dominik Hasek and Jimmy Howard. Osgood was waived in favor of Legace because Legace was nearly $3m cheaper, and Hasek was the new starter. Osgood was traded by the Isles because DiPietro had come back from IR and the team decided that as Snow was playing well, the much more expensive Osgood could be dealt. As for Hall of Famers... how about Terry Sawchuk? He was traded by the Red Wings to Boston to make room for Glenn Hall. Then two seasons later, he was picked back up in return for young, up and coming Johnny Bucyk. And in 1964, he was left unprotected for the intraleague draft in order to make room for Roger Crozier. Osgood isn't so different from Sawchuk now, is he?

Osgood deserved the Vezina in 1996, but Jim Carey's high shutout number stole it. In 2008, Osgood had a very good chance at winning the Vezina if he had played 60-65 games instead of the 43 he did play. He still received Vezina consideration despite his tandem situation with Hasek, while Hasek did not receive any consideration. Osgood also was always looked at with the "Yeah, but he plays for Detroit." attitude, preventing him from getting more votes than he did. You are trying to apply the criteria for retiring numbers in Detroit to HHOF inductees. Not the same. You don't have to be one of the most all-time, epic players ever to be a HOFer. Here's a good question. It's generally agreed on these boards that Adam Oates deserves to be in the Hall. Was Osgood better compared to his contemporaries than Oates? Gretzky, Lemieux, Yzerman, Messier, Sakic, Fedorov, Forsberg, Francis, Gilmour, LaFontaine are guys Oates had to go against who were arguably better at the same position and are or will likely be in the Hall. Osgood's list includes Roy, Hasek, Brodeur, Belfour, Joseph. That puts Osgood equal with or ahead of Oates when compared to others of the era and position. Osgood also wins on accomplishments. Andreychuk I don't think belongs. Gartner has a career GPG of about .5, as does Dino Ciccarelli. That's an average of about 40 goals per season for their careers. Andreychuk's career GPG average was about .39, for about 30 goals per season. He played forever and that's how he ended up with his numbers. Outside of a couple seasons in the early 90s, Andreychuk was a mediocre scorer.

Shanny was good in his time here, but of players he has played with other than Osgood who were around for a while, the following have contributed more as Red Wings: Yzerman, Lidstrom, Fedorov, Chelios, Datsyuk, Zetterberg. I personally would include Osgood as well. So to argue Shanahan for retirement is pretty silly. Ozzie and Fedorov are deserving. Both were key players on championship caliber teams for extended periods, and were top players at their positions during that time. Shanahan was a key player for the Wings, but he was not as important to the team as the other two. He gets a lot of consideration on the retirement threads because he's considered the "missing piece" that turned the Wings into a Cup winner. One wonders whether a team with Keith Primeau and Paul Coffey would have done as well in 1997. After all, Vernon won the Conn Smythe; the team went to the conference finals the year before (without Shanahan) and would win the Cup the following year without Vernon or Konstantinov. The inclusion of McCarty in this discussion pretty much ensures retirement for Red Wing greats like Reed Larson, Ebbie Goodfellow, Marty Barry, Flash Hollett, Greg Stefan, Gerard Gallant, and Bob Probert, among others who should actually be retired like Red Kelly, Syd Howe, and Norm Ullman. That depends. Sawchuk played on one of if not the most dominant team of all-time. Osgood played on a very good team. Osgood has managed to post numbers that rival Sawchuk's, if not exceed them. So it can be argued that Osgood's performance as a Wing compared to Sawchuk's was, at worst, not far behind. The statement of Datsyuk being on his way while Zetterberg isn't is excessively ignorant. You are basically saying that because Dats is flashier, he is more deserving of retirement. Because the two have been so close in play level over the years, that is perhaps the biggest difference. Although I think retiring Datsyuk and not retiring Fedorov would be an injustice to the latter. Fedorov left because he was treated like s*** during contract negotiations. He was given an offer of $50m for 5 years, but was unavailable to respond for a few days. When he did respond, it had been reduced to $40m over 4 years. Fedorov wanted the five-year term. He was basically told "take it or leave it" by Wings management. He instead signed with Anaheim for the same $40m but over five years. He effectively took less pay to guarantee the fifth year. Shanahan, on the other hand, left because he wasn't going to have a reduced role was looking for $5.5m per team, when he had made $2.28m the previous year.

Absolutely yes. While Hasek put on an excellent goaltending performance, he had the best roster of any Wings team to visit the finals in recent history, and the only performance it could be argued as better than of the six would be Osgood's 1998 performance.

Hudler didn't score, but he definitely produced offensive chances. Sometimes they don't go in. Also, although he f***ed up on that Boyle goal (identical play to the game before, where Helm was the "victim") Hudler was pretty solid on his backchecking. Unfortunately, if he's not scoring he doesn't get credit for what he is doing. Hmm... come to think of it, has Draper EVER nailed a guy that hard? Maybe Hudler should get with Joey and he can be our enforcer since Babs likes to play him on the fourth line. You act like no players are interested in money. Good thing Datsyuk and Zetterberg are playing for $500k. Lidstrom too. That makes it a lot easier to fit under the cap with greedy players like Hudler who make salaries that fit point production for seasons that are considered "horrible". Draper is unlikely to be back. If he retires, it will be Kronwall or Cleary, but not until Lidstrom retires. Teams are only allowed two A's at a time, the Wings rotate three. Draper retires and it will be just Dats and Z. Lids retires and one of Kronner or Cleary gets it.

You're thinking of Zherdev. In fact, I think most people who voted "Draper" may have Hudler confused with Zherdev. Given that many were in the Zherdev thread asking for his addition, yet want Draper over Hudler due to hard work and defensive ability.

Hudler was the team's third or fourth best forward in the Phoenix series. You may or may not think he was hustling... but he was definitely a big part in the Wings' first round win. He wasn't productive early in the San Jose series, and was vilified for it, but he certainly was still working out there. Maybe he wasn't working as hard as Draper. I wasn't measuring with my magic wand. But the fact is this. The ONLY value Draper has to this team is his ability on faceoffs. Ask yourself: Do you want a 40 year-old faceoff specialist (who will probably spend more time in the press box than on the ice) instead of a 27 year-old top-six winger with impressive playmaking skills and offensive awareness? If you answered yes to that question, you are not concerned with whether the team wins or loses.

Very few players have played as long for the Wings as Osgood has. Even fewer have been top players for the Wings as many years as Osgood was. So the "so many guys, so few numbers" argument is invalid. With that argument, you could have two teams that are both twenty years old, both have won two Cups in that time and have had similar success. One has constantly changed its roster, six or seven new guys per year, while the other typically sticks to the sme roster, maybe one or two tweaks at most. Which team is more likely to retire a player's number?

If you put the standard as Yzerman and Lidstrom and applied it to other teams, you'd have to tear down a lot of numbers. If you put the standard as Osgood for goalies, you'd have to tear down some numbers. What is significant? You have to go back to 1973-74 season to find a player other than Yzerman, Lidstrom, or Sergei Fedorov who has played more than a decade in Detroit, started his career in Detroit, and was a key player and top player for as long as Osgood was. The player in 1973-74? Alex Delvecchio. Before that, it's 1971 and Gordie Howe. Norm Ullman in 1968 is deserving, and should have a banner - especially since his number is already retired anyway. But that probably won't happen. Osgood is definitely a Hall of Fame goalie. A 400-game winner with six 30-win seasons, two Cups, three finals appearances, one of the best winning percentages of all-time, and his only losing season was his second-to-last year, when he was fighting injuries the whole season on a team with the second-most man-games lost to injury that season. There is a major difference between the unofficial retirements of Fischer, Aurie, and Konstantinov's numbers. Fischer and Konstantinov only played here a few years. Konstantinov may have deserved retirement had he not had his accident. Fischer likely not, although he was very good and on the verge of becoming an elite defenseman. Aurie's number was retired by the club, but no banner was ever hung and it now is not considered retired; it is simply not available for use. Osgood's contributions to the team were greater than any of those three. At which point, naturally, comes the Shanahan argument. Why shouldn't Shanahan's number be retired? Shanahan wasn't as important as Yzerman or Fedorov, for one. He also didn't begin his career as a Red Wing, which does seem to have an effect on consideration. Finally, would you consider the third-best forward or the starting goaltender more important to a team, whether that team be good or bad? I vote goalie. Very few dominant teams in history, if any, have been so with a bunch of star forwards, one or two good defensemen, and a mediocre goalie. Edmonton is the closest example I can think of, and both Fuhr and Moog were among the better goalies in the league. The team was so stacked they could have kept Gretzky, and started trading some of the less important assets around him for cash, picks, and inferior players. Why not trade Messier and Fuhr instead of Gretzky? Retire #30.