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Snow is such a terrible GM. He has a bunch of skilled young forwards locked up for relatively cheap deals with good term. He also has one of the league's best defensemen locked up for a few more years. You have to think one of the forwards will be traded for a defenseman of similar skill and age.

Not just US Hockey... Rafalski, Weight, Modano. All from Metro Detroit.

Franzen brings size, which he doesn't really utilize, and a good shot. Filppula is very good all-around, and Hudler is a great playmaker with a wicked shot. The fact of the matter is, if I had to fill out my team with one of the three, and then a bunch of Drew Miller clones, I would pick Flip. Franzen needs a playmaker. He can be a great goal scorer, but he needs a playmaker. That's his big weakness; he has to have someone to feed him. I would argue that is at least as big a weakness as Hudler's skating. And defensively Franzen has given up that edge he had in his own zone, so there's no advantage for Franzen over Hudler. We're basically talking do we want someone who can pass really well and shoot, or someone who can shoot really well but needs a passer? And Flip's defense is why he doesn't belong in this conversation; he's close to that level offensively, and provides excellent defense.

Hudler spent most of this past season on the third or fourth line. When he was on one of the top two lines he was scoring. There's no "Consistently Inconsistent" about it. He was consistently scoring when he was in the top six. He scored 26 points in 28 games playing in the top six. Included in there was a six-game point streak. Maybe he's not irreplaceable. Neither is Flip. Neither is Franzen. Doesn't mean they aren't top-six forwards. How about put Hudler back in the top six, don't just kill a great line because one player isn't playing well. I still don't understand that move. Hudler is doing horribly to start the year, Hudler gets shuffled around, 4th line, scratched. Franzen is doing equally horribly later in the season, so he is immediately slotted with Datsyuk, breaking up the line that was winning the team games. It makes very little sense. One player is punished for failure, another is rewarded.

No, that's Theo Fleury.

A playmaker is a player who initiates a play designed to create a scoring opportunity. That pretty much describes Hudler word for word. Think about the many times you've seen Hudler behind the net or off to the side, and set up a play and get the puck to Filppula, or Franzen, or perhaps Drew Miller or Justin Abdelkader? I've seen Hudler create goals from nothing in that situation, I've also seen-many times-guys take a good feed and fire it wide of the net, or into the logo, or whatever. Scoring chances don't always end up as goals. And as for the numbers... Hudler's assist numbers rank him tied for 129th in the league. But everyone else near him or above him is a defenseman or plays top-six forward time. If Hudler were to get that kind of time, he'd see his assists creep north of the 40 mark based on assists-per-minute. And that doesn't even factor in the time he played on the fourth line, with guys like Miller and Helm instead of playing with guys like Franzen and Datsyuk like most of the assist leaders.

Smith won't be the 7th defenseman. If he's up it's because he's going to play full-time. So replace him with Janik, and that gives you another $363k to your cap space, bumping it to about $1.15m. Add Emmerton/Miller/Draper and you lose half to all of that.

I never claimed him to be a superstar, and the 105 points was the pace he scored at over an 11-game period. It's good that I keep track of this because you guys sure get lost. The line was broken up because Franzen was playing like s*** so Babcock was putting Franzen back with Datsyuk. Didn't produce any results, though. Franzen continued to not score goals.

Ok, let's look this over. 1. If a player is really good at one thing, does that make him a superstar? No. 2. There are only a handful of players who are as good or better playmakers than Hudler. Perhaps Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Crosby, Thornton, D.Sedin, H.Sedin, Savard, Getzlaf, Toews, Kopitar, Koivu, Gomez, Spezza, Malkin, St.Louis, Backstrom. There might be one or two more I can't think of offhand, but that list should be pretty close. That's among forwards. In other words; Hudler is not a superstar, he's just a very good playmaker. Just as Franzen is not a superstar, he is just a very good sniper.

Toronto will sign Meech and play him with Phaneuf. Bring back some memories.

Chicago not keeping Niemi wasn't stupid; he isn't even as good as Crawford. He wasn't better than Crawford last season either; the difference is that Crawford could be sent to the minors. I'm interested in what happens with Derek Meech. He was above Kyle Quincey on the depth chart their entire time together with the Wings, and Quincey managed to turn up as a decent top-four defenseman when he left. Meech played better than Brett Lebda, who signed a deal in Toronto after he was pushed out of Detroit's defense. So what is Meech's fate?

Z, Dats, and Flip are all better than Franzen. Hudler and Cleary are basically even with Franzen. Cleary and Franzen are both very average at passing and playmaking, while Hudler is among the best in the league in that regard. Cleary is easily the best skater and defensive forward of the three, and Franzen has the most monstrous goal-scoring ability. But overall, the three of them are on basically the same level.

The Wings only have Kronwall, Stuart, and Kindl signed for next season from this year's team. Assuming Lidstrom comes back, we have a hole in our top four from Raffi, and questions about Ericsson and Salei. Ericsson seems to want way more than he's worth, and Salei was losing his spot to Kindl at the end of the year. So the Wings go out and sign a guy like Ehrhoff/Pitkanen/Wisniewski/Bieksa to replace Rafalski. Kindl moves into the top six. Now we have to add one more defenseman to the top six-probably a stay-at-home type, and add a spare. I don't think either of those guys will be Smith. Smith comes in the year after when he has no more waiver options, and the team either lets the new stay at home guy go or lets Stuart go.

Who deserves top six ice time ahead of him? Todd Bertuzzi, who had it all season, largely with Datsyuk or Zetterberg, and scored only a couple more points? Hudler belongs in the top six, whether you think he's one of the top six forwards on the team or not. He may be streaky, but so is Franzen and people here seem to think Franzen is one of the league's top forwards, when Franzen isn't even one of the three best forwards on the Wings.

Lupul/Pronger, but more direct?

One of the league's best defensemen. Would love to have him. He is about as close to Lidstrom as you'll find in the NHL. Excellent two-way defenseman who plays positional defense rather than physical defense. If we can get him, he'd be about the perfect replacement for Nick because he's basically a copy of Nick, only not quite as good.

Green is a very good offensive defenseman. Not sure he'd be worth what he would cost in a trade though. Especially with Wisniewski, Ehrhoff, and Bieksa as UFA who can fill the same slot.

It's easy to not have a long pointless streak playing with Datsyuk. What would March and April have looked like if the Hudler/Datsyuk/Cleary line hadn't been broken up for those last 15 games? If Hudler scores at the same pace he did while it was together, he's around 50 points on the season. Yes, Hudler wasn't scoring early on. I wonder how "elite scorer" Franzen would have done without Dats or Z to feed him?

I love how I am accused of not being objective about Hudler because I don't get irrationally angry about how small he is, or the fact he isn't a speedster. I have never claimed Hudler to be a superstar, I don't act like he's some kind of hero, but I get s*** on because I don't s*** on him. That's what's unwarranted.

Hudler was just as effective offensively as Franzen in those two games, he just played about half the time Franzen did. And Hudler didn't make a huge defensive mistake that cost the team a goal right off the bat. Or do you only remember massive defensive mistakes when Hudler makes them? Hudler may not have had a great playoffs overall, but he was better than Franzen when healthy, and better than Franzen overall.

Hudler was one of the team's most effective players from Christmas until the end of the Phoenix series. It wasn't just a few games. And my point was that Hudler outplayed Franzen during the portion of the playoffs Franzen was healthy for. And in case you didn't notice, this is a Hudler thread. Don't want to discuss Hudler, don't come into this thread. It's easy.

Franzen looked like s*** before his injury. For almost 30 games before he was injured. But it was ok, because "he'll show up in the playoffs" and then he didn't, even before he was injured. Forwards who played better than Franzen IN THE PLAYOFFS BEFORE HIS INJURY? Datsyuk, Helm, Filppula, and HUDLER. Yep, Hudler. Maybe you don't remember because his San Jose series was so much worse, but Hudler was a force in the Phoenix series. Franzen was effective in one game, and even in that game he made a defensive mistake just as bad as the one Hudler made against San Jose. B-B-B-But Franzen was injured! Please, explain it away some other way.

If not for his medical issues, Fischer would have been a legit star defenseman by now. He was faster than any current Wing except maybe Helm, he could shoot harder, he could hit as hard as anyone, he was a smart passer, good defensively, he could scrap... he was like a European Chris Pronger but with rocket skates. And it was all coming together and then boom, it all fell apart.

Trading Hudler for Nabokov is stupid, let's get that out of the way. We would be trading a top-six forward in his 20s who is simply held down by the depth of the Wings' system for a good backup. And then you replace Hudler with Sturm, who isn't even as good. How about just signing Brian Boucher? Then, EVERYONE involved is younger on the Wings. You've also replaced Filppula with Laich, which isn't going to happen. And your additions on defense are not thought out well. By adding Wisniewski and Green, you've added two defensemen who are one-dimensional offensive players. And then you've placed them on the same pairing; hello goals against. Green also isn't a free agent until after next season, and he is an RFA then. Beyond that, you've erased Jakub Kindl from the lineup to sit Brendan Smith in the press box when he could be getting top-pairing minutes in Grand Rapids. If that's supposed to be a trade, it isn't even close to happening. So let's retool here. Replace Green with Joni Pitkanen. Kindl is the 7th, not Smith. As for goaltending, Osgood may be coming back, so that's easy. If not, Brian Boucher. That's easy too. Both are proven vets in the regular season and playoffs. Or there are guys like Theodore, Auld, or Hedberg. Now what do we have? Hudler/Zetterberg/Cleary Filppula/Datsyuk/Holmstrom Franzen/Abdelkader/Bertuzzi Mursak/Helm/Eaves Miller/Emmerton Lidstrom/Wisniewski Kronwall/Stuart Ehrhoff/Pitkanen Kindl Howard Osgood (Boucher) That roster is a bit better, don't you think?

Let's look at three big defensive mistakes from the postseason. Franzen, Helm, and Hudler all let a guy walk in and receive a one-timer pass. I rank Franzen's the worst of the three, and Helm's the most forgivable. Why? Hudler experienced the exact same play as Helm, but the Wings were now ready for it. No excuse. Franzen was the only one of the three who was close to the scorer, he could see him and the passer, yet he did nothing to prevent the goal.