eva unit zero

Since it looks like the Wings are basically done signing and the roster is pretty much set for this season, I thought I would start a thread for predictions of what you think the players on the Wings will put up on the scoresheet. Here's mine: Zetterberg 41-62-103 Datsyuk 30-56-86 Lidstrom 15-50-65 Holmstrom 30-28-58 Rafalski 9-46-55 Hudler 22-31-53 Filppula 18-32-50 Samuelsson 20-28-48 Cleary 20-22-42 Grigorenko 16-24-40 Kronwall 7-26-33 Draper 12-19-31 Franzen 12-14-26 Lebda 5-15-20 Drake 8-9-17 Maltby 5-5-10 Kopecky 5-4-9 Chelios 1-10-11 Lilja 1-4-5 Quincey 1-1-2

Lilja has already met my projection for assists and exceeded for goals and points. Filppula so far has been the offensively disappointing ones, while Grigorenko and Quincey obviously have not played any games this season. Along with Lilja, Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Lidstrom, Rafalski, Lebda, Kronwall, Draper, Cleary, Kopecky, Maltby all are on pace to meet or exceed my projections. Franzen, Drake and Samuelsson are below pace, but all three have missed time with injury so they haven't been performing at their top level.

So if Ozzie wins ten more games this season, and then averages 25 the rest of his career, he'll be at around 435 wins career-wise and about 350 in a Wings uniform. It's very possible that Osgood is the All-Time leader in victories for the Detroit Red Wings when he retires...something I was basically alone in thinking possible just six years ago.

I hear Manny also made the comment "My knee really hurts...I feel like if it doesn't get better, I'll have to go hang myself."

A 3 year deal makes Ozzie a Hall of Famer if he starts, which he would.

Which is why Dipietro's deal, if he remains healthy, is the best deal in the league. A top young goalie signed for a fair amount NOW, will be a steal down the road if he keeps playing the way he is now. Datsyuk's deal is good if he plays the rest of the years the way he has played this season with no improvement. If he improves, it gets that much better.

Because the Europeans in question are white people, so it's impossible for them to be discriminated against. It goes against the laws of physics, or something.

Yes, it had nothing to do with the fact that the average attendance per game for the North Stars was often in the 7000-11000 range. The Wings are still averaging better than 18,000 per game...it's far from a half empty arena.

If only we had a highly talented, homegrown star player who played an exciting game. Maybe someone like Brian Rafalski.

More like 95%. But it has to be taken in context...players aren't usually named captain until they've been in the league several years and established themselves. We'll assume an average of ten seasons of experience before a player is named captain. That would suggest a seven year window in which there has really even been an opportunity for a European to be a captain of a Cup-winning team. When you consider it's more likely for a native English-speaker to be named captain in a predominately North American league where more than half of al players speak English as their first and in many cases only language. There have been about 1000 seasons' worth of captaincy (teams multiplied by years) and it's reasonable to expect that more than 80% of that total is Canadians. The 'which country's captains have won Cups' argument is a poor one at best...after all, a Swedish captain has won Olympic gold twice in the past four Olympics. Doesn't that suggest that Swedes are better leaders than anyone else?

The commissioner is not an autonomous executive who can do whatever he pleases. He has to do what the owners want him to do, or he gets fired. When there is disagreement between th eowners, it's his job to mediate and figure out what the best solution is, but it's not his job to singlehandedly go against what the owners say "for the greater good."

Fedorov left because he was offered a five year deal, and when he showed up to sign it there was a four year deal presented to him. The offers Holland made for Fedorov got progressively smaller as the negotiation went on, and nothing past the first offer had a fifth year until Fedorov was offered a deal by Anaheim. Who did Fedorov play with that set him up? Slava Kozlov? Doug Brown? Igor Larionov? Martin Lapointe? None of those guys were even remotely as good as Fedorov.

Osgood won 31 games and led the Blues to the playoffs in 03-04...despite only giving up 198 goals, one of the best marks in team history, the Blues actually allowed MORE goals than they scored. The 191 goals in 82 games is the worst offensive performance EVER by the St.Louis Blues. They have had better offenses the past two seasons and did not even come close to the postseason due to lack of quality goaltending.

Burke is absolutely the wrong choise, and I'll tell you why: People often say 'replace Bettman with a hockey guy to fix the on-ice game' without realizing one important fact. The on-ice game is the responsibility of the Director of Hockey Operations, the position currently held by Colin Campbell. People generally agree hockey is better now in most ways than it was from 93-98. Guess who had Campbell's job from 93-98? Yep...Brian Burke. I support the idea of Dryden. Yes, he's anti-fighting...but he's also a very smart hockey guy and a lawyer.

Because his backup played a much higher perctage of games against equal and lesser opponents, while Oz saw the games against the league's best teams. In 2003-04: Reinhard Divis won four games, none against a team that finished in the top three in their division. Johnson won four games, Nashville being the only top-three division team he beat. Osgood won 31 games, 19 of which were against teams that finished top-three in their division. So the Blues beat top-three division teams 20 of 39 wins....Osgood had 19 of those, but only 12 of the 19 victories over bad teams. In fact, the only situation Osgood's backup had a better record on either of those two teams was 2001-02...when Garth Snow went 10-7-2 to Ozzie's 32-25-6. The two records are very similar (Osgood's record projects to 21 points and a 10-8-1 record over 19 decisions, Snow's projects to 33-23-7 over 63 decisions), and Osgood faced more shots per game, posted a better save percentage, and a better GAA than Snow. The fact that Ozzie was named his team's MVP in 2001-02 and 2003-04 also helps.

I'd like to see a solid OL taken in the first round. I also would like to see Henne taken in the second or third; I think he has the same kind of toughness as Kitna has displayed that has really made him a leader, except that Henne has much more raw talent than Kitna has ever had. We don't need a superstar QB...just a capable one who has protection.

That's Agalloch's av.

If Ozzie plays three seasons after this one, and wins at the rate he has been since the lockout from now until then, and gets 53% of the decisions as he has so far this season...his stats would look like this after the 2010-11 season: 447 W-215 L-66 T-45 OTL, 52 SO If he achieves those numbers....he's in the Hall...there's not even a question of it at that point.

I always thought Auld was a god goalie; he should have been the starter over Cloutier in Vancouver, but Crawford would have none of it; he loved his Danny.

Thought I would update my list and give the topic a bump. Guys in bold were not named in my original post. WEST: F: Zetterberg, Iginla, Stastny, Holmstrom, Datsyuk, Kane, Nash, Kopitar, Getzlaf, Thornton, Horcoff, Morrow D: Lidstrom, Rafalski, Phaneuf, Zubov, Pronger, Visnovsky G: Osgood, LeClaire, Luongo EAST: F: Sundin, Stillman, Alfredsson, Ovechkin, Crosby, Malkin, Antropov, Heatley, Lecavalier, Kovalchuk, St. Louis, Savard D: Campbell, Markov, Kaberle, Ranger, Gonchar, Chara G: Thomas, Biron, Lundqvist Playrs removed from teams are as follows; guys in bold are 'on the bubble' and very nearly achieved a return to the team: WEST: F: Langkow, Sakic, Cammalleri, Kariya D: Aucoin, Backman G: Backstrom EAST: F: Brind'Amour, Richards, Briere, Spezza D: Kubina, Meszaros G: Gerber So ultimately, 28 of 42 guys I named in my original post still deserve to be named, with six more still in contention for a spot.

I know it's early, but I felt like it. Here are my picks for who deserves to play in the All-Star game this season based on performance so far this season, in no order. I anticipate somewhere between half and 3/4 of these guys will be on the actual All-Star teams. WEST: F: Zetterberg, Iginla, Langkow, Stastny, Holmstrom, Datsyuk, Kane, Nash, Sakic, Kopitar, Cammalleri, Kariya D: Lidstrom, Rafalski, Phaneuf, Aucoin, Zubov, Backman G: Osgood, Backstrom, LeClaire EAST: F: Sundin, Brind'Amour, Stillman, Alfredsson, Richards, Ovechkin, Crosby, Briere, Malkin, Spezza, Antropov, Heatley D: Campbell, Markov, Kaberle, Kubina, Meszaros, Ranger G: Thomas, Biron, Gerber

Correct link is here. Also the password is 'bowling' and not 'Bowling' as it's case sensitive.

Rafalski, like all defensemen not named Lidstrom, makes errors every now and then. That said, he is one of the better defensive defensemen in the league, and one of only a handful of guys who can be considered a top 30 defenseman both offensively and defensively.

Shanahan was the more necessary player to add to the roster because we already had Fedorov. It's like the argument that we won the Cup in 2002 because of Hasek. Being the biggest name acquired in a Cup season doesn't make you the most important part of the team. Certainly those players helped...but they were not the most important players on the team.

Osgood won 30 games on a horrendous Isles team and also did it on a bad Blues team. Only fifteen other goaltenders have won as many games as Ozzie...Many played for great teams much of ther careers.