gcom007

True and true. It's very odd to look at the standings right now, but I still have no doubt we'll see a near-reversal before the end of November.

This was a stupid loss no doubt, but remember, we didn't have Datsyuk or Franzen and we played solid for about 50 minutes. We made a real sloppy line change and had Lebda as one of our, well, like one and a half guys back and we unraveled. Yeah, it sucks. It's also the 7th game of the season. I'm not going to sweat it. Plenty of time to work out a complete game once we get Datsyuk back and by the time Franzen's back, well, you know. I still am taking a lot of positives from this game and I'm still not worried about Osgood. 3 goals on 29 shots for .896. This isn't exactly horrendous. Sure, he definitely wanted at least one of those back pretty bad, but eh, again, this wasn't even that ugly for a meltdown and it's the 7th game of the season. We'll be fine. P.S. There's no shootouts in the playoffs. Only real hockey. Osgood will be fine.

<-Told ya so...

I've said it many times, I'll say it again. Maltby can score goals. He's been underrated and poorly used under Babcock, but the guy can contribute far more than he has if given the opportunity. It's good to see him getting off to a quick start this year. If Drapes finishes out his contract which he probably will, you can be sure Maltby will re-up for one more year if he can put up 10-15 goals this year. Holmstrom: I love the guy and wish him the best, but I can't help but think we're seeing his season peak right now. He always starts off great, then gets injured, comes back slow, gets injured again, comes back slower, gets injured again, and so on...then the playoffs start and he's still beat up and basically is useless out there. If I had a say, Holmstrom would be taking a LOT of nights off this season...

I'm not worried. I think we'll see a better team at 10 games, but at 20 we definitely should see some things starting to gel up better.

No joke, you can smell the funk from miles away...

You know, in the 62 win season, we started out at like 5-5-2 or something...y'alls have gots to chiiiiiilllllllllll out for at least awhile with this stuff. But you won't...

The benches tend to smell like puke on those days.......hmmmmmmm.......

Whew! 6-2! Here we come! I'm still not going to worry until we're about ten games in or so, but we need some guys to really step up quick...no doubt about that especially now with Franzen gone.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, with more minutes and better offensive players around him, Maltby will rack up more points than people like to think. It'll definitely be interesting to see if he actually gets scoring line minutes.

Once again, we are so quick to want to assume the worst and tear somebody down. Man, I love American culture...filled with lawsuits, hatred, mudslinging, slander and absolutely no critical thought whatsoever. You all should know better that Shanahan of all people would know what he was getting into. You know, because he's actually one of those people that thinks.

For once I totally agree with you.

I could've just thumbed-up this and saved myself a minute of writing. Oh well. Well said though...

The difference between Lang and Bertuzzi is expectation. When Lang came to the Wings he was leading the league in goals and generally speaking a full-blown star. He was making good money too. He also took a lot more of a beating around here than he really deserved. Bertuzzi's coming in at what, $1.5 million? He's pretty old, been through injuries, etc. Everyone knows it's a gamble and everyone knows what we're getting into with him. All things considered, I'm not upset with him at all at this point. He'll probably get better especially if he stays healthy and he's had some really good moments none the less. Meanwhile, I've been fairly happy with Williams in general. I wasn't thrilled to sign him, but again, all things considered, so far he's looked great.

While simple and obvious, this still brought me much humor.

Hmmmmmm........ Red Wings 3, Blackhawks 2 Associated Press THREE STAR SELECTIONS 1st Chris Osgood Goalie - DET SAVE PCTG: 0.941

And Ken Holland nervously giggles while screaming in thought, "DODGED!!! A!!! BULLET!!!!!!!!!"

I love how my thread gets merged but all of these RIDICULOUS threads go untouched.

And to touch on everything else... Besides the fact that it's been two damn games taking place on the other side of the world in a totally different timezone.............. We haven't had a lot of time to gel as these are really the first games being played with the full team. On top of that, we've got a lot of new guys coming into the system who will take a good 10-20 games to really get comfortable and find their place. Z's been injured and doesn't have his legs. Lilja is still out and he's immensely important to our defense. Helm's out and I think we all got a nice little taste of what he can do on the PK. Like I said before, Osgood hasn't played a lot yet and this is Howard's first real spin with the NHL. I'm sure there's more that I'm forgetting, but the bottom line is that getting too worked up about anything right now is not worth the time. It's one thing to speculate. I'm all for that and I do plenty of that in other places, but this isn't about speculation anymore. This just boils down to knee-jerk reactions at this point that don't mean a thing in the context of a season. We have nothing of substance to really go on at this point and we won't for a good while. We can start making reasonable cases for some of this stuff in December MAYBE, but right now, this team's still missing some key guys and learning to gel with some new skaters. Getting too worked up over anything is just a waste of time. It's fine to discuss the games, but you've got to discuss it in the context of a long season and pay mind to things we've learned in the past and things we generally (should...) know about hockey and the Detroit Red Wings. And many people just need to relax in general and find some solid ground to stand on. What does it say about a person when one is so quick to let knee-jerk reactions dominate one's thought process? Relax. Slow down. Think. It helps. You might even come up with something constructive to add for a change as well which I can assure you many of us will appreciate far more than yet another "PANIC!!!!!!!!!!!!" thread...

Oh fun, I was merged with "What needs to be improved..." Now I'm paired with an original post that's fairly contradictory to the essence of my point..... Anyways, I was just covering both goalies on that one. We played two games in Sweden. They mean less to me than exhibition games. I'm not surprised we lost because St. Louis has a lot more to play for and prove right now. They're younger and they're hungry and they're bound to start out harder, plus they got Kariya back who's gotta be even more hungry after missing most of last season. So the last thing I'm going to worry about is the first two games of the season played in Sweden no less after we made it to game 7 of the Finals last year. I'm not sold on Howard but it's WAY TOO EARLY to throw in the towel. We can start talking about it in December MAYBE if it's really dreadful at that point. And Osgood? If you're really about to start ripping on this guy, you might as well follow it up by declaring that you're also an idiot. For example: "Hey guys, we need to get rid of Osgood fast or we're not going to make the playoffs. Let's trade Franzen or Rafalski for Giguere! By the way, did you know that I happen to be a colossal idiot? Let me know what you think..." And if not for Jedi holding things down pretty tight, I would then reply, "Well, your first statement does substantiate that you are indeed an idiot..." It's just ridiculous. You'd think after last year people would finally give the goalie thing a rest but NO! All it takes is the first damn game and people are calling for heads to roll. It's nothing short of pathetic.

Stop with the goalie bulls***. Seriously people. 2 games. In Sweden. 2 games!!! Osgood didn't play much in the pre-season and it's Howard's first real season in the NHL. Just stop. For once in your lives, just chill and let things be for awhile. Just relax, for once... That's all.

I don't think Snazzy is serious. I think he incessantly just bulls***s trying to get a rise out of people. If he's serious, he doesn't understand hockey at all. You've got to take anything he says with a grain of salt one way or the other. And I can't wait to see how he replies to this.

I think this thread's going to give me a UTI...

Oops...hadn't read the "PM" thing on the next page. Oh well... Umm... Contribution: it would be insane to think the Wings won't make the playoffs.

They didn't have Kariya either. Barring injuries, they're going to be a much better team this year. They've got two goalies who can win games and they work hard. Confidence and swagger will help this young bunch out a great deal and the more they keep winning, the more they'll have. Like I've said many times, I think any team heading into the playoffs from the West is going to have a reasonable shot at the Cup if only due to the way seeding might end up working out. I certainly think some will have a better shot than others, but I think St. Louis has the potential to become as much or more of a threat than Chicago. Below is my total longshot prediction for what the playoffs could look like. San Jose and Calgary will likely win their divisions and I expect them to get more points than any central team simply because they're in far easier divisions. The Central teams are going to beat the hell out of each other, but they'll beat a lot of other teams too. So let's say we get 3, 4, 5 slots filled by central teams. You see how it starts to get interesting? I think the point spread/seeding will be far more important this year than any other year. If a team from the Central doesn't win the conference and I don't think they will, it's going to make for some beefy first round match-ups with built in upsets. Could you imagine Detroit or Chicago losing in the first round because of odd seeding? Say Detroit and St. Louis then meet in the 2nd round. Another beatdown later, one will go to the semi's, but in what shape? Could a lesser team from the top brackets sneak through and seize an opportunity because the ultimately better teams are tired or beat up? It's going to be interesting... 1 - San Jose 8 - Edmonton 2 - Calgary 7 - Anaheim 3 - St. Louis 6 - Vancouver 4 - Detroit 5 - Chicago