eva unit zero

Why do people automatically assume Meech will be traded if the Wings sign another defenseman? Yes, he's hard pressed to make the roster in that situation. But at the same time, what do they do with Kindl/Ericsson? Lidstrom, Kronwall, Rafalski, Stuart, UFA. That's five. Only room for one. Yes, one of Kindl or Ericsson could be the #7 guy. But think about this for a second. Meech is a versatile all-around player who plays every position on the ice but goaltender and makes the league minimum. If he stays as the #7, he's probably the best #7 in the NHL. Kindl and Ericsson each make about $900k, and have much more trade value. They would also be the best #7 if sitting in that spot. If you're going to have a guy sitting in the press box on most nights (barring injuries) then why pay him $1m when you can pay him half that? Especially when the trade could net you much more in return. The Wings have a good number of offensive defensemen (such as Smith) in the system. If the Wings go UFA, why not trade Kindl/Ericsson and the rights to Larsson to a team that needs a good young defenseman and a good young goaltender in exchange for picks/prospects? Or what if Meech outplays Ericsson and Kindl, and potential UFA for the #5 spot? Will he still then be traded?

Well, let's look at the teams in the Central, and see what comes of it. Detroit: Forwards: A Defensemen: A Goaltender: B Overall: A- Chicago: Forwards: A- Defensemen: A Goaltender: B Overall: A- St. Louis: Forwards: B- Defensemen: B Goaltender: B Overall: B Nashville: Forwards: B- Defensemen: B- Goaltender: B Overall: B- Columbus: Forwards: B- Defensemen: B- Goaltender: B- Overall: B- So as it stands right now, there's your analysis of Central teams and how they will finish in the division.

If Homer ultimately can't play the second season due to injury, he'll be put down on LTIR for like the Flyers did with Mike Rathje. Rathje signed a five year deal with the Flyers and was only able to play the first two, spending the past three seasons listed on LTIR. The contract ended last season and Rathje chose to retire - had Philly won, Rathje might have gotten a ring and his name on the Cup. Plus, Homer doesn't need to play all 82 games. He can miss half the season injured as long as he's healthy for the playoffs. If Homer misses half the season injured, that's about $1m that could be used in a deadline trade, right?

To the people questioning this: Stan Smyl retired as the Canucks' all-time leader in goals (262), assists (411), and points (673). His number was retired. Trevor Linden retired as the Canucks' all-time leader in goals (318), assists (415), and points (733). His number was retired. Markus Naslund retired as the Canucks' all-time leader in goals (346), third in assists (410), and leader in points (756). His number is being retired. Henrik Sedin has since passed those three players on the assists list, and Daniel is not far behind. The Sedins can be expected to be 1-2 in all three categories within a few seasons. They will probably have their numbers retired. Pavel Bure is an interesting situation. He's easily the most talented played to ever play for Vancouver. He averaged 49 goals, 43 assists, and 92 points per 82 games as a Canuck. The problem is the number of games played; he didn't play long enough. Cliff Ronning, Alexander Mogilny and Patrik Sundstrom also fall into that category. They were great players for the Nucks, but only played a few seasons for them.

You can hate on Bettman all you want, but I'll sum up what you either didn't read, didn't comprehend, or simply ignored: Bettman does not make teams move, and Bettman does not pick the markets. It is Bettman's job to try and increase the exposure of the game to new markets and increase the revenue for the owners. The Jets leaving was not Bettman sitting on a throne saying "Move the Winnipeg Jets to Phoenix and name them the Coyotes." It was a team being sold due to the fact it was failing financially, due largely to lack of attendance. The sale was approved by the BoG, and the new ownership group wanted to move the team to Phoenix. The move was also approved by the BoG. As for "where the f*** was revenue sharing" and all that; you remember the lockout during the CBA negotiations in 1994-95, right? Do you know WHY there was a lockout? The league wanted a revenue-based salary cap that would include revenue sharing, while the NHLPA wanted a looser revenue sharing model. Had the cap and revenue sharing been put in place then, the Jets would probably still be in Winnipeg. You can argue that 'Bettman was wrong' about southern teams... but plenty of teams in the south have strong, loyal fan bases. I would bet Dallas and San Jose have better fan bases than Buffalo, Vancouver, or the Islanders. You have to remember what it takes to build a fan base. It takes some level of success by the team to build interest in the team, plus it takes time for people to become loyal to that team. A Swedish hockey fan who moves to Los Angeles won't suddenly say "I'm a Ducks" fan or "I'm a Kings" fan just because they're there. When the Devils came to New Jersey, they didn't have many hometown fans lined up right away. Most of them were Rangers fans, or Islanders fans, or Flyers fans. Of course a bigot like yourself will ignore those statements in favor of the "Canada is better, Canada owns hockey, everyone else should pay royalties to Canada to play a great game we incorrectly claim to have invented."

This trade does not make sense for Cleary or the Hawks. Cleary likely gets a better role which provides him the opportunity to get a better contract; but his contract has three years remaining so his age will prevent any kind of 'cashing in' assuming he even plays past that point. Chicago would basically be trading Sharp for Cleary. Ritola is no better than the stockpile of young forwards Chicago has, and Meech is no better than any number of veteran defensemen Chicago could pick up in his place. Sharp is, flat out, a better player than Cleary. That's not up for debate. He's also younger. So the Hawks would be making a trade with their biggest rival, and more importantly the biggest threat to them repeating as division champions, a team they play several times a year, and they would be trading the better, younger player away without getting anything specific to fill any need back. Chicago makes that trade, and it's time to fire Bowman.

Win.

Mursak and Tatar are already considered much better prospects. Ritola only has a shot at the roster because he would have to pass through waivers to go to Grand Rapids, while the others don't. Same reason Howard came up last year rather than Conklin sticking around one more year.

If Dino truly deserved to get into the Hall for playing 19 seasons, scoring 50 goals twice, 40 goals 4 more times, and only twice breaking 100 points in his entire career during the highest scoring period in NHL history...then Osgood reached Hall-worthy status at the end of 2003-04, when he cleared 300 wins and 40 shutouts. Realistically, Dino shouldn't have gotten into the Hall before Bernie Nicholls did. More points, fewer games, higher peak...Nicholls is one of only five players to score 150 points, and one of 11 to score 8 points in one game, 12 including playoffs. Before you say "Yeah, but Gretzky..." Nicholls' 8-point game happened for LA in 1988...Gretzky did it twice in his career, for Edmonton in 1983 and 1984.

Hmm.. Hudler centered the first line in Grand Rapids at 21 and carried his left winger, a 28-year old Donald MacLean to a 56 goal, 88 point season, with Tomas Kopecky's 32 goal, 72 point season on the opposite wing. Hudler posted 60 assists and 96 points that season to lead the team. MacLean retired 3 years later, having played only 41 NHL games in his career. The next season Hudler played the same number of games for the Red Wings, with 15 goals and 25 points. By comparison, Ritola was fourth in scoring on the Griffins behind Jeremy Williams, Pat Rissmiller (started season with Hartford), and Jan Mursak. Justin Abdelkader and Michael Nylander also played partial seasons in the AHL (20+ games) and had better PPG than Ritola. Kris Newbury played most of his season with Grand Rapids, finishing with Hartford and more points than Ritola. So among all of Ritola's teammates last season, he was the seventh best offensive player. Doug Janik even had a comparable PPG, as did Tomas Tatar and Brad May. So yes, Ritola would likely perform better with better teammates, Abdelkader's AHL offense projects to 28 goals and 60 points over 82 games, while his NHL offense from the same season projects to 5 goals and 10 points over 82 games. You can say all you want about "Ritola's the next Filppula!" and "He'll do better with better teammates!" but you have to realize something; Filppula put up 70 points as the second line center in Grand Rapids at age 21; the same year Hudler posted his 96; and was in the NHL at 22. It was his first season in Grand Rapids, and he played 74 of the 77 games he played there, playing 3 the next year. Filppula put up 17 in his rookie season at age 22, and 36 the next year. If Ritola is "the next Filppula" he's either going to suddenly have an explosion in development, or he's a few years behind Flip's development age-wise. Ritola is a good prospect, but Filppula is a 26 year-old top-six forward. Ritola has a lot of work to do if he wants to be more than a role-player at the NHL level, and it's unlikely he'll be a Red Wing a year from now given his size, style, and the forward prospects in the Wings' system. So now that we've analyzed Ritola far more in depth than was necessary, let's look at the rest of this trade. Dan Cleary. Useful all-around winger, makes almost $3m. Contract ends in 2013. Can play all forward positions if needed. Chicago may or may not even be interested in him if offered because of his contract. They've already traded away two wingers who made $3m, why would they then take one on? We'll assume that Bowman realizes that they have to take some salary back to make the trade work, and as Cleary can be fit into several spots they now have holes, it's not such a bad idea if he would waive his NTC. Derek Meech. Meech can play forward and defense, which would be useful if the Hawks are forced to play a 21-man roster due to the cap. He provides speed and a good outlet pass, but he is capable defensively. The only question is...how much is he going to sign for? Assuming he signs for $650k, the Hawks actually increase their cap hit ever so slightly. Taking the existing roster after the trade, and adding Beach, Kruger, Dowell, Cullimore, and Toivonen to fill a 13-7-2 roster gives the Hawks about $2.29m in cap space. So with this trade, the Hawks would have about $2.8m to sign Niemi. Without it, a maximum of about $1.8m left. So this trade really doesn't help the Hawks at all with their cap issues as much as they need it to if they are trading Sharp. They are basically getting Cleary and two cheap depth players for Sharp. They can get comparable players by trading Sharp for a forward who is as good or better than Cleary and makes less, plus picks and/or prospects, and then signing two cheap UFAs or bringing guys like Bickell onto the roster full-time.

Phoenix has never been great for attendance nor have they had great success. But this season is only the third time in the Coyotes' 13-season history that the team has averaged below 13,500 in attendance. Sure, that's not a terribly high number compared to teams like the Wings, Rangers, Canadiens, or Leafs. But for comparison? The Jets played 17 NHL seasons and only averaged ABOVE 13,500 in attendance twice. So overall, the franchise has played 30 NHL seasons, averaging above 13,500 in attendance 12 times. Ten of those times were after the team relocated to Phoenix. Before the 1979 merger, the Jets never cleared 9,500. So the Coyotes have had significantly more success drawing fans. As far as success, the Jets made the playoffs eleven times in 17 seasons. The Coyotes have made the playoffs six times in 13 seasons. Total playoff record for the teams is Jets 19-42 (.311), Coyotes 13-24 (.351) so as you can see, the Coyotes have also been more successful in the postseason. The Jets' regular season winning percentage is .442, which is pretty terrible. The Coyotes, OTOH, come out at .485, if you factor all shootouts as ties, and take away the extra point for non-shootout OTLs. They haven't had a great team, but they have still provided better support than Winnipeg. Canadians like to push the "Put a team anywhere in Canada and it will be sold out every night." line. The Jets never managed that. They probably would the first couple seasons if they got a team back, but who knows what happens after that? Ottawa? Winnipeg? Vancouver? Quebec? Montreal and Toronto, sure. They've been around for 100 years and have fan bases that have been passed down through generations. The Nucks, Sens, Jets, and Nords aren't/weren't even as old as a large number, if not majority when the Nords and Jets moved, of fans of the Leafs and Habs. The Sens haven't even been around as long as 75-80% or more of Leafs or Habs fans. And I will say it again: relocating a team is not Bettman saying "You know what, let's take this team and move it." It is the owner of the team deciding to move the team to another location. This is usually the result of a sale. The Jets, Nordiques, and Whalers were sold because they were hemorrhaging money worse than the Coyotes are. The new owners already had destinations in mind, and because they followed the proper procedures for purchasing and relocating a team, there were no problems with the sales or the relocating. Expansion is a similar process. Bettman does not decide "Let's place teams in these cities" but rather the league decides to expand by a number of teams, and seeks bidders for those teams. They decide based on financial stability of the market and the bidder, proximity to other markets, and how well the bidder would serve the BoG, among other things. Of course then there is the unusual situation which happened in 1991. The Gund brothers had owned the California Seals, which eventually moved to Cleveland. The Cleveland franchise was failing financially, as were the North Stars, due to both teams having little on-ice success. As the North Stars were put up for sale, the league allowed the Gunds to purchase the North Stars and merge the two clubs in 1979, forming a much deeper and more successful franchise, which would reach the Finals in 1981. In 1991, a group led by Howard Baldwin was seeking an expansion franchise in the Bay Area. After again suffering financial difficulty, the Gunds asked the league for permission to transfer the team to the Bay Area. The league sought a compromise; the Gunds would receive the Bay Area expansion team, in exchange for selling the Stars to Baldwin's group, which in the final moments of the negotiations would see a 51% majority share bought out by Norm Green. A dispersal draft between the two clubs was held, followed by an expansion draft in which both teams would select players from other teams around the league to fill out their rosters. To my knowledge, this is the only situation of this sort where two teams merged and then split apart again; as the Sharks are basically the successors to the California Seals. /random rambling

Yeah, him too.

The lines would more likely be one of the following four setups: Hudler/Zetterberg/Franzen Sharp/Datsyuk/Holmstrom Bertuzzi/Filppula/Eaves Abdelkader/Helm/Miller Datsyuk/Zetterberg/Holmstrom Hudler/Sharp/Franzen Bertuzzi/Filppula/Eaves Abdelkader/Helm/Miller Hudler/Zetterberg/Sharp Filppula/Datsyuk/Franzen Bertuzzi/Abdelkader/Holmstrom Miller/Helm/Eaves Hudler/Zetterberg/Franzen Bertuzzi/Datsyuk/Holmstrom Filppula/Sharp/Eaves Abdelkader/Helm/Miller

What's also forgotten in discussions about Osgood? Only 8 goalies have played more playoff games, and only 7 have won more. Of the seven goalies who have won more, there are 25 Cup rings, 24 earned as starter of the last 30 Cups, and 5 Conn Smythe trophies of the 9 awarded to goalies in that time frame. No other goaltender during that time frame has come even close to those kinds of numbers. If Osgood plays a couple more seasons and gets playoff time, he passes Vernon (77), Dryden (80), perhaps even Belfour (88), Smith (88), and Fuhr (92) in playoff wins. The active top-10 list? Osgood (74) Nabokov (40) Khabibulin (39) Fleury (38) Giguere (33) Kiprusoff (25) Ward (23) Miller (22) Lalime (21) Turco (21) Fleury, Ward, and Miller are the only ones with a realistic chance of matching Osgood by the same age. Osgood has 74 wins at 37. Fleury, 25, would have to average 3 wins per postseason. Ward, 26, would have to average 4.5 wins per postseason. Miller, 29, would have to average 6.5 wins per postseason. Khabibulin, 37, would have to win 35 games this postseason... Those three and Khabibulin are the only starters on the list, and Khabi is as old as Ozzie and playing for a non-playoff team. And it's likely that none of them will do it. Fleury has the best chance; he might do it or come close. The other two have to average a second round appearance over the remaining time.

After Helm and Abdelkader, the Wings do not "need" to sign any forwards. Counting Ritola, Hudler, and all returning forwards who are currently signed, the Wings have 12 forwards NOW. That means Helm and Abby push it to 14. As far as defense, the Wings have five returning defensemen signed plus Kindl. Janik is also signed and Meech will be signed soon. The longer this goes, the less likely it is Modano will be a Wing. As for the defense, unless the Wings can find a good physical, defensive type who can play well and is cheaper than Lilja was, the Wings will be going into the season with the current group.

Datsyuk/Zetterberg/Holmstrom Franzen/Filppula/Hudler Cleary/Abdelkader/Bertuzzi Miller/Helm/Eaves Draper/Ritola Lidstrom/Ericsson Kronwall/Rafalski Kindl/Stuart Meech Howard Osgood Fixed.

Chicago can send him to the KHL; it would be a loan to the team that he would be sent to and he would still be paid by the Hawks. The Hudler drama was due to the fact that he had agreed to the arbitration, and then signed the KHL contract. If Chicago chooses to loan him to a KHL team it would be no different than Michael Nylander, who is under contract to and being paid by the Capitals through the end of this coming season, but is loaned out to and playing for Jokerit of SM-Liiga. But most likely Huet would go to the AHL, unless he requested another destination. As far as Hjalmarsson, this might be a situation where the Hawks should trade his rights to a team that can afford him for something better than the picks they would receive. Perhaps they could deal him to Phoenix for Adrian Aucoin, Taylor Pyatt, and a mid round pick? Save $500k on matching the offer sheet, and spend it on two players instead of one.

Stuart is arguably the second best defensive defenseman on the Wings. Second best overall? I don't think so. Second best on his pairing? That sounds much more accurate. He's also the only defenseman in the Wings' top four who can be traded; Rafalski has a NTC, Kronwall is our best defenseman after Nick and the core of our defense going forward, and Nick is, well...Nick. As for the trade...Wisniewski would make a good depth defenseman on the Wings, but I wouldn't trade Stuart for him given the fact he made $2.75m last season and will be looking for a nice raise. He'll be more expensive than Stuart, but would likely still score around 25-30 points as Detroit's 4th defenseman. Ericsson, Kindl, and Smith provide enough high-end defensive youth that Detroit doesn't need to trade Stuart for a guy like Wisniewski. Fold the prospects we have into the big club before trading off reliable top-four vets in favor of a younger guy who might not even beat out the prospects on the depth chart. So basically, it goes down like this: Stuart ($3.75) for Marchant ($1.125) The Wings also get the rights to RFA Wisniewski. Sorry, that's not anywhere near a fair deal. The Wings get an aging depth forward who costs more than a million, plus the rights to a decent young defenseman, in exchange for a bona-fide top-four defenseman. The Wings have enough speedy defensive forwards, all younger and cheaper than Marchant. Drop Marchant in favor of a 2nd round pick, and maybe then we'll talk trade.

Would you send Mursak or Tatar through waivers? Kindl is considered the Wings' top defensive prospect, rated to be a top-pairing defenseman. At the very least he deserves a shot. Maybe he doesn't make it. But you don't drop your top prospect at a position just because. Look at Howard.

Ok, your options are: 1) Bury Huet in the minors and keep Niemi and Hjalmarsson. 2) Lose Niemi AND Hjalmarsson. I'll take option 1, thank you. The "they'll never be a free agent destination again" is overstated, if not complete BS. Plus, it's Huet's own fault he lost his starting job to a rookie. If Huet had played like a starter, they wouldn't be paying out to Niemi would they? Huet played himself into a situation where his cap hit is a liability for the team. If that drives off other FAs, they're probably not the ones the Hawks are interested in anyway because the Hawks don't want anymore big contracts who play themselves down the depth chart.

It should be Meech or Kindl with Stuart. Doubt it will be though.

Not gonna happen. If he doesn't make the Wings' roster, he's traded. Period. End of story. He can't go back without going through waivers. The Wings lost Quincey, who showed nothing for years, to waivers, and he's become a top-four defenseman. Do you think they'll just hand over Kindl for free?

I have trouble seeing where you are getting your numbers. I know which 8 forwards you mean, but Stalberg and Dowell will also likely be on the roster and are signed and likely to play on the regular roster. Keith, Seabrook, Campbell, Scott are all signed. You could also toss Cullimore in there if you like because he's signed too. So going based on those ten forwards and five defensemen, plus Huet, they have $3.01 in cap space with 10 forwards, 5 defensemen, and 1 goalie. Now let's swap out Huet for Crawford, burying Huet in the minors. Now the Hawks have $7.9m in cap space to fill out those remaining six spots. Hendry, Bickell, Kruger, and Skille plus Hjalmarsson and Niemi. It could get close depending on what they sign for but those are the guys who will likely end up on the roster if they can afford to sign them.

Your numbers are salaries, not cap hits. Here is what the current roster looks like based on players who would likely make the roster if the only further signings were RFAs, and there were no trades: 2010-11 DETROIT RED WINGS CAPGEEK.COM CAP CALCULATOR FORWARDS Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Tomas Holmstrom ($1.875m) Jiri Hudler ($2.875m) / Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Johan Franzen ($3.955m) Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) / Mattias Ritola ($0.517m) / Todd Bertuzzi ($1.938m) Drew Miller ($0.650m) / Kris Draper ($1.583m) / Patrick Eaves ($0.750m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.200m) / Jonathan Ericsson ($0.900m) Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) / Brian Rafalski ($6.000m) Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) / Brad Stuart ($3.750m) GOALTENDERS Jimmy Howard ($0.717m) / Chris Osgood ($1.417m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (these totals are compiled using the bonus cushion) ROSTER: 20; CAP:$59.4m; CARRY-OVER PENALTY: $0.050m; PAYROLL: $55.642m; CAP ROOM: $3.758m; BONUSES: $0.000m RFAs left to sign: Justin Abdelkader © Darren Helm © Derek Meech (D) So the Wings are likely to deal Ritola, given the number of prospects who can do what he does better than he does coming up behind him, unless he really proves he belongs on the roster ahead of guys who have shown they can contribute in multiple ways. Meech is also potentially at risk depending on further defense moves made by Holland. If Smith earns a spot in the top five, then Meech is probably gone, but that's likely the only way he's out with no FA signing.

People on this board constantly ***** about Kyle Quincey being let go, yet when talking about who the bottom three defensemen will be in this thread it's Ericsson, who already has a spot, a free agent, which is possible, and then Kindl and Smith. What about Meech? If you're going off on guys who might/will have one of those spots, Meech has to be listed, especially if you are one of the ones complaining about Quincey; Meech outplayed Quincey their entire time together in the Wings' system.