betterREDthandead

OK, great. I don't read those, and neither do most of us. So if Legionnaire's reading those sources and filtering through the crap to point out the important stuff to us, we should thank him for it instead of telling him to go away. I can either go out of my way to read the Nashville sources, or I can come to LGW which I do all the time anyway and read the posts. I think I know what I'd rather do, and it makes this site that much better IMO.

It would probably take way more research than I have patience for, but I wonder if that's ever been done like that - one goal, two records. Congrats to Sundin though. Definitely one of the steadiest, most consistent, and underappreciated players in the game. Plus, I drafted him in 2001 in my keeper fantasy league and I've kept him ever since. Good value out of a fourth round pick, I'd say

That's exactly the point!! Not a single soul in Nashville, Tampa, Miami, Atlanta, Columbus, Dallas, Raleigh, Denver, Phoenix, or San Jose care what "old time hockey" looked like or how "watered down" the league might be because they didn't have NHL hockey. Those are some huge markets (most of them anyway) that the league either totally ignored or botched the management of. So when we in Detroit or Toronto or Montreal whine that the league is watered down, nobody cares. We're still fans, and except in rare cases, we're going to be fans whether or not the fourth-liners on those expansion teams would have been able to play in yesterday's NHL. And for that matter, when it comes to the "watered down" argument, I would argue that expanding the league has greatly improved the quality of play in the area where it matters most - the playoffs. When the sixth-worst team in the league makes the playoffs year after year, that makes for some crappy hockey at what's supposed to be the most exciting time of the year. The GD forum is for "the Detroit Red Wings, the NHL, or hockey in general". As the Nashville Predators are a hockey team, in the NHL no less, it's a perfectly valid topic. Besides, Legionnaire didn't even start the topic. A Wings fan did. And Legionnaire is sort of one of our resident Predators representatives, so why shouldn't he pipe up when his team is discussed?

Friday: Washington @ NY Rangers Chicago @ Detroit Colorado @ St Louis Calgary @ Dallas Vancouver @ Edmonton Boston @ Los Angeles Saturday: Washington @ Buffalo Pittsburgh @ Toronto Carolina @ Montreal Ottawa @ NY Rangers NY Islanders @ Philadelphia New Jersey @ Atlanta Tampa Bay @ Florida Calgary @ Nashville Dallas @ Chicago Columbus @ Colorado Edmonton @ Vancouver Minnesota @ Phoenix Boston @ San Jose Sunday: Minnesota @ Anaheim Detroit @ Los Angeles

I agree with this 100%. The biggest reason hockey is behind the other sports is because the NHL had six teams when the others were carrying around 16. The NHL had 12 teams when the other leagues had 24. The NHL had 21 teams when the other leagues had 28. The NHL had 26 teams when the other leagues had 30. It took until 2000 for the NHL to finally catch up to everyone else. And not only that, but the NHL never had a presence in the same places the other leagues have had. Everywhere there's a hockey team, save those places that have nothing but a hockey team, there's been another team entrenched in place for at least a full generation prior. Philadelphia had the Phillies for over 80 years before the Flyers showed up and the Eagles for over thirty years, and we think of the Flyers as a very old team rich in tradition. While the NHL was dicking around and screwing up the management of the Seals, the San Francisco Giants and Oakland A's were winning the hearts of Bay Area fans. While the Raiders and Niners were dominating the NFL, the closest hockey team was the Kings in LA. When the Capitals arrived on the scene, the Senators and Redskins had been around for two generations. By the time the Stars moved to Dallas, the Cowboys and Rangers were already well in place. See where I'm going? The NHL needs to be in a place for a good 20 years. Long enough for kids to grow up with the team. The NHL didn't get on the expansion train until almost the 1970's, and has been catching up ever since. This crap about getting rid of teams because the league is too "watered down".....boo-hoo. It's a joke and it's dead wrong. People in Nashville aren't saying, "oh, the quality of play just isn't what it was in the 80's, I'm not going any more."

Yeah, looked pretty bad on that play. Bad giveway on his part.

So if Osgood is an oddball up next to other goalies, does that mean he's normal? Ozzie being the only goalie in the league that I can think of off the top of my head that wears that mask, he's instantly recognizable, so I like it. I know Cloutier wears the same one, but he's easily distinguished by the ever-present red glow somewhere behind him.

This is the first year I've ever rooted for Michigan football and gone into games hoping to win them, rather than expecting to.

In response to your first point, I can understand why expansion is not looked at too kindly, but I think the expansion train has already left the station, and we'll see new teams announced before Rafalski's contract with the Wings is up. I like the idea of a 32-team league, that seems to be just the right number. But more than that I think of expansion as something inevitable. Ilitch believes, based on his talks with the league, that Vegas will soon have a team, and once you add a 31st team, a 32nd team only makes sense. And the idea of contracting a few teams is, to me, one of the most absurd things I've ever heard. For the second point, it would definitely take some getting used to. But it's actually quite simple, I think. The only complexities are the schedule format, and hell, most people, including myself, don't always have a 100% grasp on the way the schedule is now. The playoff format is different, but I don't think different necessarily means complex.

Any setup with unbalanced divisions is really inequitable. Not fair to the teams in larger divisions, IMO. I'll throw my idea onto the pile here..... First, expand the league to Las Vegas and Seattle and move the Florida Panthers to Houston. I just don't think Miami is a good sports town, and especially not for hockey. Then set up the divisions as follows: NORTHEAST (Adams) (1) Boston, Montreal, New York, New York ATLANTIC (Patrick) (1) Ottawa, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Washington SOUTHEAST (Bettman) (ok not really. Calder) (2) Carolina, Atlanta, Tampa Bay, Nashville NORTHERN (Norris) (3) Detroit, Toronto, Buffalo, Pittsburgh CENTRAL (Hart) (3) Columbus, Chicago, St. Louis, Minnesota NORTHWEST (Smythe) (4) Vancouver, Seattle, Calgary, Edmonton WESTERN (Byng) (2) Houston, Dallas, Colorado, San Jose SOUTHWEST (Ross) (4) Las Vegas, Anaheim, Phoenix, Los Angeles Notice I've put numbers 1-4 by the divisions - this indicates the "rival" divisions. Northeast and Atlantic are rival divisions and so on. There are no conferences. Schedule as follows. Each team plays: 4 games against each division opponent (12) 4 games against each team in the rival division (16) 2 games against each other team in the league (48) 2 games against each opponent in a non-rival division on a rotating basis (8) Total is 84 games. Award double points for every intradivisional game. Playoffs: Top two teams in each division make it and start off playing each other in a best of seven. Re-seed the remaining 8 teams 1-8 based on regular season points. Re-seed again after the next round. I believe this is the best of all worlds: Equal travel time? Check. No matter what, the eastern teams will always have better travel because the cities are closer together, but this guarantees a home-and-home against every team in the league. The New Yorks of the world still have to go to the West Coast every year. Geographic rivalries? Check. You will always play the teams closest to you most often. Divisional rivalries? Check. If you make the playoffs, you're guaranteed a matchup with a division opponent. Plus, there are only 12 chances to earn those double points. Create a little excitement in the regular season - you think a Detroit-Toronto matchup wouldn't generate real buzz with 6 points on the line? Think the game would be a little more heated? Even Detroit-Columbus would. This double points for division games is something I think the league ought to do regardless. Original 6 matchups? Check. O6 teams will always play every other O6 team 8 times a year. Variety? Check. Every team comes to the building and you go to everyone else's. Money in the owner's pocket? Check. They'll love the extra home game, and no doubt they'll love the expansion fees, too. The schedule can be flexible. For example, in Olympic years, it would make good sense to eliminate the extra 8 games against a rotating division, to bring it down to 76 games. The owners might swallow that since they'd have the extra home game the rest of the time and it really comes out just about even, and the players have their concerns about fatigue addressed. The question it leaves is, what to do with the Campbell and Prince of Wales trophies? I'd suggest this: Say we were doing that format this year. Currently Anaheim holds the Campbell. Say they advance out of the divisional round of the playoffs, but are beaten by Ottawa in the second round, who are beaten by the Wings to advance to the SCF. Wings then get the Campbell Bowl. Anyone care to punch holes in my idea? One thing I say a lot is that no idea along the lines of scheduling and such can possibly please everyone, so have at it.

Here's a funny question. OK, say Chris Chelios got down to the business of actually playing hockey instead of purposely firing pucks into the bench and over the glass, and cutting himself in the face. Couldn't he score a goal or two that way?

No, the cost for Western Conference teams would go way up. Not decrease. How would costs go down if teams like Vancouver and San Jose have to visit Boston and New York and Atlanta more often every year? The only teams for whom travel would drop is the current Central Division. Everyone else would see a big jump. Unfortunately for you, the Eastern Conference teams get a say in this too. "f*** them" is a poor campaign strategy when you're trying to gather votes to approve this. Bettman cannot simply raise his scepter and call it done. He works for the owners and they can fire his ass if he pulls something they don't like. No, I think teams would rebel very strongly at that too. The Wings kind of like having a charter jet that allows them to set their own travel schedule. We all know how much fun it is trying to book airline tickets - imagine the conspiracy theories flying about when some team has a red-eye flight when they don't have to have one. The best answer to distributing travel costs more equitably, IMO, is to expand the league to 32 and shrink the divisions to four teams each. Smaller divisions mean closer geographic relationships.

Ottawa also is further east than any of those teams in the Central. You might be better off moving Columbus south, replacing them with Colorado, placing Colorado in the West, and rejiggering the divisions accordingly. But honestly - North and South conferences don't make much sense due to the increased travel costs. You'd never get the owners to agree to that.

I rarely ever bother going to the Wings' official site. You're never going to get much info out of them. I dunno about that Topix thing, it doesn't look like you can get anything there that you can't get anywhere else. Same goes for the myway site. I'd ditch those three. Definitely keep the News and the Freep, they have dedicated writers for the Wings that will churn out plenty of good info.

Bjorn Johansson.

Petr Svoboda.

Don't take this the wrong way, but.....who are you to declare exactly what the code is? Who is anybody on this board to call it? I for example, take issue with #3.....if a guy challenges you to a fight, then dammit he better be ready to fight, he didn't issue the challenge for a minute from now. But I'm sure 5,000 of us on this board would have 5,000 different opinions on what "the code" ought to be.

First off, I think Lappy belongs on the shelf with Huddles as nicknames completely unbefitting a hockey player. Second, I think the "code" is not so strict as to make hockey players do the equivalent of lining up like redcoats and trading volleys. We saw Drake pause to take off his helmet, and now - what - we think all hockey players should remove chin straps, remove gloves, tie down fight strap, touch fists like this is Golden Gloves fighting, and then have at it like gentlemen? I got news, at least when it comes to the helmet.... http://www.redwingsrule1.homestead.com/fil...CARTY-hatch.jpg http://www.theslot.com.br/2003/029/pix/mccarty1.jpg http://blog.michaelzhang.com/archives/05/0...yfightthrow.jpg http://pittsford.monroe.edu/pittsfordmiddl...key%20fight.jpg http://www.jesseshunting.com/photopost/dat...on-brashear.jpg

Yow! That's some startling news. Best of luck to Blake - I'm glad to see the prognosis is good.

I am in awe. Put a fridge and a microwave in there and you never have to leave.

Well.....I'm glad I made sure to outbid my competition for Stastny in my fantasy league at least. His hat trick the other night and monster night tonight have come in handy.

So close......UVA got 26th most votes in the coaches poll. A win next week and another bad loss by a couple of those ranked teams and we could be back up in the rankings. Thing is though, I think we're not quite ready....that near-debacle against MTSU was pretty bad. I really want to get back into the ACC schedule and start playing some games that matter.

Pretty close. Actually I believe the whistle came a split second after the shot, if I remember right from the slo-mo replay. Either way, we wuz robbed. I normally am very slow to blame the refs for a loss. 99% of the time, you can point to a million things the team could have done better that would have overcome whatever complaint we have about the refs. This one directly cost us the game-winning goal. Still a lot of things the Wings could have done to prevent the loss, but in this case the ref's mistake looms large above them all.

Too bad we don't know if the Blackhawks could be a good playoff team. It's always a good laugh when fans of a bad regular-season club make fun of a team for being a good regular-season club. Besides, you seem to have slept through the first two rounds last year. Yes, it does. All what crap? I'd say there isn't a soul in the hockey world - fans, media, players, coaches, GMs, scouts, and all the rest - who think the Wings won't make the playoffs. Surely you think the Wings will probably make the playoffs. There's no reason not to believe that. So why should Wings fans pretend like we don't believe it'll happen?

Well, they have a lot to cheer about....they were finally able to drown out the Lets Go Red Wings chants in their building.