YoungGuns1340

Haha what? Man the bounces are going our way tonight.

and THATS why Sammy shouldnt be the one taking the shots.

Sammy from Meech. Meech has already done more than Lebda haha..

I was actually just gonna ask you that same question, but I think you're missing the point D#1F was making. Hossa has looked good at times, and hes done a good job of back-checking and staying with his man, but theres so much more to this guy than whats been realized on the ice. Battling along the boards, protecting the puck, using his speed on a consistent basis, basically exterting more energy is what appears to be the problem here. Maybe hes used to leaving the dirty stuff to his linemates on the offense, but I've seen much more pure domination from this guy in other jerseys than hes offered with the Winged Wheel on his chest. In terms of what we've all seen first-hand against the Wings - both with his regular season hattrick and his playoff performance - he's nowhere near that.

Theres no reason why Babs can't try Hossa out on every centers Wing. If he hasn't clicked with Dats in a few games, stick him with Hank. If that doesnt work, try him with Flip. Stranger things have happened. Draper turned out to be a good fit for Datsyuk and Shanahan in 06...

Hudler - Datsyuk - Holmstrom Franzen - Zetterberg - Hossa Leino - Helm - Cleary Maltby - Draper - Samuelsson

Huh? I said a "homestand playoff berth." In case you couldn't figure it out, thats a top 4 seed. Ideally, I'd like to see the Wings get a top 4 seed, and in this day and age, a few points here and there could set you back a bit. So yeah, if the Wings don't pull things together soon, we could be looking back on this as the 4th, 5th, 6th seed thinking "man, if only we had gotten it together a few games sooner." Contrary to your injection of doom and gloom, mine was an assertion about their PLAYOFF BERTH which, as you might know, means you actually have to make the playoffs first, something I'm going to go ahead and assume they'll do. Edit: Not to mention, if you actually read my entire post, you'd see where I said this adversity would be useful to us in the playoffs. Again, that would be my natural assumption that we're a playoff-worthy team yet again. But go on ahead with your anti-panic committe, Mr. McCarthy..

Regardless of the debate, Dan Cleary was a lot better once that visor came off in the playoffs and if hes only been wearing it for a few days, it could pose a problem yet again.

Right now, the Wings can't bring up anyone who makes more than 650k or itll put them over the cap. Lets just all hope that once Chelios returns, the Wings can ship Lebda off to god knows where, bump Meech up to #6, and ride out.

Haha. Not only is Brunnstrom looking better than Leino, but he now has as many goals as anyone else on our team in half the time! Priceless.

Thats exactly what Im hoping for. I wouldnt be surprised to see Babs doing lots of line juggling tonight if we aren't getting things rolling. At any rate, assuming the Wings can take their heads out of their asses in time to secure a home-stand palyoff berth in the playoffs, then I'm beginning to appreciate the injuries and losses. I guess I'd rather it be this than have the Wings coast through the regular season only to get walloped by an underling in the first or second round of the playoffs. Hossa gets his first tonight. And I'm going to keep predicting that until he does. Law of attraction...

or Hossa...or Flip...or Franzen...or pretty much any other forward on this team not named Holmstrom, Helm, or Cleary.

*sigh* Zetterberg's injury history should definitely be taken into account on his next contract..

Theres no reason to worry over this. The Wings have plenty of options.

I love the kid, and hes always the guy giving it his all game in and game out, but part of me wonders if things would change once he got a permanent spot on the squad...

Well, it may not be the most eloquent way of putting things, but it does say a lot about Sid's character. Now, within the context of trading, and outside of it are two different things. RIGHT NOW - as of this season - each of Zetterberg and Datsyuk are better than Crosby. While their offense may not be as dazzling as Sid's, their overall game makes up for that. The difference between Crosby and Datsyuk/Zetterbgs defense is much bigger than the difference between Crosby and Datsyuk/Zetterbergs offense, while everything else is pretty much a wash. Now WITHIN the context of trading, yes anyone in their right mind would trade one of Zetterberg or Datsyuk for Crosby as age immediately becomes a factor and once Zetterberg is re-signed, all players will be operating under long-term contracts. Assuming Sid takes the Steve Yzerman approach to his game and sacrifices the statistical padding for a broader game, then within a year or two he could easily be better than either of Datsyuk and Zetterberg. But of course, for the statistical fanboys, the logic is quite different... As for Crosby "playing on the PK", if you want to call his 12th ranked position for PK time on the Pens this season - a Pens team that has a very shallow offering of defensively capable players in general, then yay for literalism. Otherwise, he was 17th in ShTOI per game for the Pens last season overall and was scrapped to the bench in the playoffs averaging a whopping 10 seconds of short handed ice time per game throughout.

How come people are saying this thread came up much too soon? The Lilja thread came up after only one game 1! And hes actually looked better than usual... At any rate, you can talk about points all you want. 3 points in 4 games is nothing to scoff at, and I would be ecstatic if he were Kyle Calder or Todd Bertuzzi and had put up those points already. But this is Marian Freaking Hossa. This is a guy that scored a hattrick on us in the regular season less than a year ago. This is a guy that scored 12 playoff goals and 25+ playoff points. This is a guy who outplayed Crosby AND Malkin in the playoffs. This is a guy who has dominated not just on the scoresheet but ON THE ICE with three different teams and a variety of talents centering him. And lastly, this is a guy who is playing with our best puck distributor, yet his overall performance has made him look remarkably comparable to Samuelsson. After 4 games, none of our offensive lines are clicking outside of a few short spells here and there (and apparently whoevers playing with Darren Helm at the time). One thing thats particularly interesting is that brcause Homer knows Datsyuks game much better than Hossa does, it has made Homer lookl like the better of Datsyuks wingers. Hossa, after at least 2 weeks of practice and games with Datsyuk, looks like a rookie trying to cope not only with Datsyuks level of play, but the NHLs as well. Now before the Hossa apologists come out in droves, lets remember that this guy is coming to this team as what most of us consider to be a top 10 winger. Those are huge expectations of him, but nothing he hasnt proved capable of throughout his entire career. Therefore, anything short of top line material is going to come with heavy criticism. And rightfully so. On the bright side, this guy has definitely held up his end of the bargain defensively. Whoever suggested the revamped lines, I entirely agree. Keep Datsyuk and Homer together, and set up Hank and Hossa together. Yes, they are both shooters first, but Hank's distribution game is also more simplistic or mainstream than Datsyuks, and its worth it to see if Hossa fits in better in that role.

Would you want to pay to go watch that performance?

At this point, I wouldnt mind a drubbing that put the Wings in their place. They've managed to pull out 5 points in 4 games despite playing below their potential and inconsistently throughout each game, and against average opponents no less. If they come across a team that will hand them their lunch and show them what happens when you actually play a decent team, then maybe it'll wake the Wings up. If, on the other hand, we win in a convincing fashion, then hopefully itll be a sign that we can forget these last 4 games and get on with our dominating ways.

It bounced straight out to Burrows who was in key shooting position. Osgood was set at the side of the net in case someone was to come out of the corner, but it bounced off the boards past the goal line right onto the stick of Burrows who was past the blue and at a perfect scoring angle. Osgood would've had to move to get square to Burrows in the time it took for that puck to bounce to Burrows, which is easy for you to crticize on your sofa, but a lot harder to do when you're the one who has to move your body towards in the shooter quicker than it takes you to realize that the puck has already bounced by you.

Haha it totally would have.

Haha me too. When you are the best, you expect to see the best. And from the Wings we haven't seen that. I almost wish we would just get our asses kicked to the high heavens like the Caps did to the Canucks and maybe that would wake us up a bit. The fact that we can play like s*** and still win games or only lose by a goal says a lot about this teams talent. Now if they were to actually play to their potential, or even half their potential, we'd have domianted these past four games.

Not ready for the shot? It bounced off the board in such a fortunate fashion for the Canucks that Burows was able to bury it without even having to take the time to look where he was shooting. Theres not a goalie in the league that could stop that shot without some serious, serious luck of throwing his body at the net and getting a fortunate break.

Its Crymsons specialty...

Hudler is the far down on the list of problems at this point.