betterREDthandead

Agreed.....this will be an offseason of locking up the core. There won't be any Rafalski-type moves. Forget about how far under the cap we were this season - next season, with the raises already signed for and the ones yet to be addressed, even with the cap going up the Wings will be much closer to it. If Kenny could find a way to keep this team intact and still add Sundin.....god, I'd probably slobber all over myself and make a fool of myself in a computer lab the way I did when he signed Brett Hull. It'd be a dream. But it's too unlikely to be worth anticipating.

Both the Lakers and Celtics piss me off. But since I'm living in Celtics territory, and Boston fans are the most obnoxious of any in pro sports, I'm pulling for the Lakers just so I don't have to be surrounded by Celtics snobbery any more than I have to.

You'd think Wings fans, of all people, would be the last to jump to the conclusion that since he's getting older, his game must be "on the decline." It is not. Just imagine what Franzen could do with Sundin's playmaking skills centering his line.

Only because there was no Game 6 in 2002.

Like I really care what Blues fans have to say. For the most part, that is one of the most bitter, spite-filled, worthless fanbases in all of sports. Bottom five, IMO, right there with the Boston Red Sox and Maryland Terrapins. 90% of them have this deep-seated hatred of everything Wingish and Detroity, because they had a really good contending team in the late '90s and early '00s and got smacked down by the Wings something like 5 separate times. I like comments like this better: Here's a knowledgeable guy who isn't afraid to admit he was overconfident before and that the Wings showed him different. More than a touch of class there.

Headline ticker...... Steve Yzerman Is Class Act In other news: Pope Found To Be Catholic

No, 41 is correct because that is half the regular season.

1. 1997: First time I ever saw any of my teams win a championship. Can't beat that. 2. 2002: I don't care if it was completely expected - the 2002 Red Wings were the greatest collection of name-brand talent ever to grace NHL ice. Ever. What a privilege it was to watch that. 3. 2008: Helps that it's fresh in my mind. But a LOT of vindication comes out of this Cup. Can't win with a Euro captain or a Euro team; can't win with a new generation of Wings and no Stevie, etc. etc. 4. 1998: Other than an interesting Game 2 comeback, the '98 Finals were the most anticlimactic, and least dramatic of the four. At least in '97, the Flyers were expected to put up a fight, and in '02, we had one of the greatest 5 Wings games of the era in Game 3. The Caps were expected mainly to roll over and die, and they did.

Zetterberg will almost assuredly sign an extension this summer. No way Kenny lets other teams even get a sniff of a chance at talking to him.

I would be more impressed if that weren't the case with half of NHLers. Actually with Malkin though, I have to tip my hat. The guy was clearly exhausted. Just gassed. He kept going out there shift after shift though, even for three overtimes, even though you could tell he was sucking wind by the second period. And he took a beating in the press.

The 1997 Cup was the first time I'd ever seen any team of mine win a championship. Nothing beats that.

Flip is pure hustle. He MUST be a Red Wing lifer.

Sundin is the Lidstrom of forwards. Extremely consistent. I'd LOVE to put him in the Winged Wheel. But with the pay raises already signed for several players, and the upcoming ones to Z and Flip, I doubt there'll be the cap room for it.

even Doc Emrick last night....he goes "did you notice? Holmstrom's taking the Cup over by the crease."

Since we constantly ***** about the refs but rarely notice when they do things right, it's only right to acknowledge when we're the beneficiary of good and proper refereeing. Hats off to Marc Joannette for not blowing a premature whistle, and for being the only person in the entire arena who knew exactly where the puck was between the time Hank shot it and the time it went in. I'll never forget the emphatic goal indication in the midst of the chaos that was going on. One of the hugest moments of the series.

I'm with Hank and BlueMonk 110%. Were the refs "rooting" for the Pens or told by the league to make sure Sidney Crosby got to hoist the Cup? No. I don't buy conspiracy theories. But the penalty calls this series were unbelievably inconsistent, in both teams' favor at different times. They'd let so much go and then call some chintzy hook that by the book was the right call, but you couldn't believe they'd call that after letting everything else slide. The Wings got a power play that way in the second overtime Monday. The Pens certainly benefited from this too. Somebody literally grabbed Zetterberg around the shoulders on Monday and yanked him backwards - no call, except for a phantom offsides. The way they were calling goalie interference, a goalie could come out of his crease with the sole purpose of getting run over and drawing a call. Forget the puck - the goal will be waved off anyway. No need to re-hash the complete injustices done to Holmstrom both against Dallas and Pitt. I wouldn't mind if they consistently let stuff slide, or if they consistently called a tight game. Either one is fine, though I do prefer a tightly-called game that lets skaters skate. But for the love of Christ don't let Lilja or Orpik bowl somebody over when the puck is 20 yards away and then call Datsyuk for a hook when his stick was up for one second. What really pissed me off but good was the 6-on-4 that the Pens scored on, and about 5 seconds before the goal, Malone slashed Lilja's stick out of his hands. Blatant. Worse than the crap they called Hudler for earlier in the game. And it led straight to a possibly series-changing goal. My solution remains the same: Make it 100% illegal to use the blade of your stick on an opponent or his stick above the knees. As soon as you touch the other guy with the blade, 2 minutes. 4 if blood is drawn. There's no reason the stick should be used as a defensive tool on anything other than the puck. Lifting another players stick OK....you don't ever need to do that above the knees anyway. If called with consistency, it would probably result in a record number of power plays for a season but long-term, MUCH freer ice to skate on, and fewer accidents where someone takes a stick to the eye because they were being hooked and the defender "slipped". It would take all the ambiguity out of "should that have been a hook or not?"

Just wanted to say.....thanks to most of you, who represented your team very well indeed. TRF, Pens66, LetsGoPens, and many others. Pass on my appreciation for those Pens fans at Mellon standing and cheering the Cup, those who gave Ozzie a cheer as he hoisted the grail, and also a quick f*** you to anyone responsible for the smattering of boos not related to Gary Bettman. I say this with absolute certainty - one day, sooner rather than later, it'll be the Pens celebrating this. Sidney Crosby is that kind of player. The rest of the league can't keep Stanley out of his hands forever. Might be as soon as next year, might be 10 years down the road, but that day is coming. I'll be happy to see that day, as long as it doesn't come at our expense - now that the series is over, the Penguins can go back to being my second favorite team. (By a LONG shot, but still.)

Was thinking back to the memorable moments, and when I got to the Franzen Game 5 winner against Nashville, that's the one that gave me the chills. That's the winner right there, other than actually hoisting the Cup. That goal was what really launched the Cup run. Before that the Wings were muddling along. Afterwards the Wings never trailed and were never tied in a series except for 0-0. For non-Wings moments....Malkin's 8 foot slapshot was the most memorable to me. Hell of an exclamation point.

Hall of Famer for sure. I felt like the Conn Smythe would have been an absolute clincher. But not winning it doesn't change what he did.

Sometimes it's pretty hard for them to do the job correctly, especially in an uncertain situation like that. We'd be blasting the s*** outta Joannette if he screwed it up. I would be. So why not the opposite when he gets it right? Amusing, by the way - did anyone see, during the little montage at the very end of the NBC broadcast, the pump-me-up circle and the fist/chest bumps the refs did? I thought that was damn funny. Oh, and yes: Every single goal the Wings scored this game, I checked the refs before I celebrated, same as Homer. Especially the Flip one. When the Wings are going hard at the net, you never know any more.

Stuart was in the Raffy-Mule-Train area somewhere. Before the Train, I think. When I get a chance I'll go back and look at it again for ya if someone doesn't beat me to it.

Agreed. I think time expired as the puck hopped next to Ozzie's glove. But still. Too close! (Should have been a penalty for tripping Datsyuk though. Of course, Datsyuk should have airmailed the puck into the Pens' zone right about then to kill the rest of the time.) But who cares? We won!

2nd. Thanks a mil, Matt!

Thanks much As you should be. I'm glad to notch a Cup with a series against a team like the Pens. Because they are who they are it feels better somehow than beating Carolina. Any time!

You can probably get it changed to XI if you want