YoungGuns1340

Honestly, this is the type of thing I'd want to see from Downey in training camp. The guys playing with fire. Isn't that what you want from a 4th liner/extra type? Hes just trying to show he can bring it to the game. The fact that he got a little carried away is a good thing in my eyes. If this were the regular season, its not Filppula but Toews or Huselius or Kane or Arnott. If he can rough 'em up a bit, why not?

Man thats huge. They were counting on him to step up a lot. Even moreso now that Cole is gone.

Its not just the NHL. Its the NHLPA as well. As we know, the NHLPA wants players to be signed to lucrative contracts, as it sets the market standards higher and all players pocketbooks benefit. That kind of contract doesn't bode well for the older players who still have strong legs and are worth their pay of several million dollars at age 38 or older. I don't suppose a guy like Brendan Shanahan would like this too much. IF Selanne signs for 500k, what does that make Shanny worth? 300?

DG, are you saying "minimum" as in around 500k? Selanne had 23 points in 26 games and 4 points in 6 games. Thats a good 72 points over a regular season. How on earth do you think the NHL and NHLPA is going to approve that kind of a contract for Selanne? Especially when he can't have any bonuses attached to his contract to inflate the price, because if he does, they count against the cap too.

O'Donnell and Marchant are NOT comparable to Draper. O'Donnell and Marchant may embody the type of team Anaheim ices, but they are far from cornerstones of the Ducks franchise. Both have only been with the team for 3 years, and Marchant in particular has been on the trade block repeatedly, but his trade value has been in the red basically since joining the Ducks. Theres a difference between not being traded and not being able to be traded. O'Donnell is somewhat of a different story, as he has actually performed quite admirably in a Ducks uniform - perhaps some of his best hockey in their cup winning year. But you can bet Burke would prefer to go the route of shipping off O'Donnell for a reasonable return as opposed to waiving a recently signed UFA if he could. Not only is the precedent terrible for future signings, but the other negatives have been detailed in this thread already. The problem with shipping off O'Donnell is that its pointless if he isn't going in a package with a much bigger salary from a forward, as he wouldn't clear even close to the amount of cap space to begin with and on top of that, he's a great value himself at 1.25M, and is likely a piece that Burke can get under contract fairly easily and reasonably in the coming off-season. It has nothing to do with his sentimental value to the squad, a la Draper, but rather the fact that he is a good value who Burke would likely prefer to retain the following season than Schneider which, in essence, makes the entire idea of shipping off O'Donnell and Marchant useless past the current season. Not that Burke apparently thinks that far in advance...

QFT. From what I've read, the safest bet is that Leino won't make the grade. His own former (and most recent) coach was skeptical about Leino making the Red Wings, due to his skating. This seems to me to be much ado about nothing. I'd love to be caught by surprise by Leino, but at this point I regard him as a Finnish Grigorenko in terms of his tenure with the Wings.

I doubt thats the case. Teams will do anything to improve their team, given the asking price is reasonable. Either the asking price was too high for their tastes or there wasn't anyone who so desperately needed Schneider that they'd trade for him. Of the teams that were rumored to be interested, none of them actually confirmed that they were interested.

It makes more sense that the Thrashers would want Lilja. Their PK was atrocious last year and guys like Bogosian and Hainsey aren't going to help that much. Not to mention their defense is fairly young with 6 of their 8 signed Dmen younger than 28.

Since we're looking at scoring, if Hossa and Datsyuk are kept together, its easily them. Datsyuk and Zetterberg are equal on offense, with any dissent from that opinion likely being that Datsyuk is the better of the two, and Hossa blows Franzen out of the water. If they do stay together, they dominate. Datsyuk has done wonders for Hull, Shanny, and even Draper. Imagine what he can do with a guy that can keep up with him.

You honestly think if Franzen has a comparable season to last year in any way shape or form that hes going to sign for 3M? Right. Thats just like the Free Press saying Stuart is going to have to sign for around 3M if he wants to stay with the Wings. Holland may be a great GM, but hes not that great. And Franzen is not going to take 3M when he could be making some 5M on the open market, especially with another productive playoffs. He was the talk of the league for a while, and with anything in the realm of 30 goals, 60 points, he'll be heralded as the newest Ryan Smyth and possibly paid like it from a desperate team under a ~60M cap. As for Hudler, you're way off on the 2M mark as well, under your conditions. Hudler already had a good year. And it equated to 42 points with limited ice time and a great post-season performance. If he were to have a great season, he'd easily nab upwards of 50 points, at the age of 25. You think players like that are going to settle for 2M? Hudler will be off to the races at arbitration with at least 3M in his pocket, as hes arbitration eligible.

I'm pretty sure the only reason they brought Lang in was to replace Ryder as the Habs whipping boy...

Boom. Thats the kicker here. 8.25 is Crosby/Malkin territory. I like Staal much more than I like Crosby and Malkin, but its easy to say that Staal isn't in the same realm as those two guys are. Like you said, I could see Staal signing this contract if July 1st was fast approaching, but there is PLENTY of time for JR to play a little hard ball and shave a little bit of the cream off the top of that fat contract. Would 7.75M not have been enough for Staal on a 7 year contract? That 500k could be the difference between retaining another player, or signing a key player off the market. Its not a bad deal per se, but one would think you'd get a better deal for both sides if youre signing that early.

Unless Franzen is really willing to give the Wings a gem of a deal thats gonna be great whether he proves to be a fluke or a force (and the likelihood of that happening might as well be nil), then he won't get signed before Hank. I wonder why you don't apply the same logic with Hudler to Franzen. Franzen is actually the lesser known of the two. Any player whos greatest productivity has come in the form of half of season at the age of 28 isn't a player you should jump into contract negotiations with before you see if he can continue at his pace.

Chelios' role was already reduced. And it had no ill effects on our PK. If Chelis role on the PK was that crucial to its success, he wouldn't have been a healthy scratch. Also, Liljas importance in regards to hitting and shot-blocking are not nearly as crucial as they were pre-Brad Stuart and now with the emergence of Kronwall. Lilja may be #1 on the team in both categories, but the #2 on the team is Stuart. And Kronwall is not far behind at #3. What is particular to note is that on the Red Wings, Lilja is specifically asked to use the body, because the lack of hard-hitting players Detroit has. If Stuart were asked to do the same, he'd likely have bigger hitting stats as well. But undoubtedly with Dustin Brown setting the tone, few Kings players were specifically asked to pick up their hitting game. You might illustrate this by taking a look at Brad Stuart's integration into the Red Wings. While Lilja may have lead during the regular season, Brad Stuart lead during the playoffs in both categories. Lilja averaged 2.4 hits per game to Stuarts 2.8. Lilja averaged 1.1 blocked shots per game to Stuarts 1.3. Whats also interesting is that in 05-06, Stuart averaged slightly more hits per game than Lilja did, both getting a little over 100 hits for the season. In 06-07, however, Lilja was frequently benched by Babcock. You'll also remember that at this time, the Wings wanted more out of Lilja. He wasn't performing up to his expectations and Babcock and Holland both went to the media voicing their opinions about how Lilja needed to play up to his size, and play with more of an edge. Hence, this season, Lilja had over 130 hits. In short, a lot can be said for the demands a coach makes on his players. Lilja when asked to do so can offer up 130+ hits. When he plays for a guy like Lewis however, he gives less. Nearly 25% less to be exact. Therefore, it should be the general expectation that Stuart, knowing his role with the Red Wings, will perform accordingly, possibly even wiping out the highest season total in hits that Lilja has ever had as a Red Wing. Keep in mind that through 21 games, Stuart was able to put forth nearly 60 hits. That pace, through 82 games, is nearly 230 hits in one season. Do I expect Stuart to put up that many hits? No. Not at all. But to be worried about Liljas loss of 130 hits when we're effectively replacing him with a guy who is only 2 seasons removed from a 165 hit campaign should be the last thing keeping you up at night.

1. Reading comprehension is key. 2. Why all the Lilja hate? Read where I state "I think Lilja gets more flack than he should..." 3. An article ran in the Free Press October 10th, 2006 (full article is only available if you pay for it, so I dont have a direct link) about how unhappy Lilja was with being scratched. In the article he states how if he gets benched repeatedly, he'll have to ask for a trade. Hence, Lilja doesn't understand that his role on this team is not for him to get ice time, but rather for him do what hes asked to when called upon. And with the depth that the Wings currently have on defense, its not out of the question that Lilja will be riding the pine at some point this season. We saw it in the playoffs.

Hossa could score 50 goals and 120 points this year and he still wouldn't be re-signed over Zetterberg if it came down to choosing between them. To answer the question at hand, I have no problem with it. He made his intentions known when signing here. Hes not necessarily looking for a home, hes looking for a Cup. And I think it would be selfish to be upset with him if he does win the cup and then bolts for a bigger contract. Its not like Hossa is the only one benefitting from coming to the Wings. The Wings are benefitting just as much in return - more entertainment for their fans, more talent, more depth, a better chance to win the cup, and all at a discounted price. Basically if Hossa isnt willing to take significantly less time and money to come here, we arent even having this conversation..

Not only that, but Mitchell is better than a bottom-pairing Dman, and many would take him over Brad Stuart be it because of personal preference or otherwise.

The Cup Hangover thing is interesting to me. For whatever reason, I'm not jumping on the repeat bandwagon just yet, but I do think the Wings are a bit different than your traditional Post-Stanley Cup winners. The team is littered with, if not entirely made up of, competitors and winners. Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Lidstrom, Cleary, Holmstrom, Filppula, Raffi, etc. These guys compete. They don't slack off. This isn't a group of Brett Hulls or Mathieu Schneiders or Robert Lang. This isn't a group of guys who got away with floating or inflated offensive stats or past accomplishments. And this isn't a team thats run by a coaches coach or a "play your stars" guy. On this team, hard work is rewarded. Winning battles is rewarded. And perhaps most importantly, defense from every player is rewarded.

Your punctuation in that sentence isn't correct, Mr. Self-Righteous.

I think Lilja gets more flack than he should, but I do hope Lilja is the one to be traded. Of all 5 of our bottom-pairing guys in Quincey, Meech, Chelios, Lilja, and Lebda, Lilja is the one who, to me, least understands his role on the team. If you bench Lilja, he'll become restless. He did exactly that 2 years ago when he was benched for a bit. He even threatened at one point to ask for a trade. Even Chelios, at this point, understands his role. The way I see it, if you let Lilja go, not only do we gain the cap space we would if we were to trade BOTH Quincey and Meech, but it opens up a bit of a revolving door for the last spot on the team. Holland has said Detroit will carry 8 defenseman, and with Quincey and Meech still both being somewhat of unknown commodities, it allows them to BOTH get time in that #6 position, which might allow the Wings to make more of an informed choice about who to keep in the following off-season when its Ericssons time to shine and Holland may want to scale back to 7 defenseman.

Rafalski has a NTC. I can't imagine he'd be too quick to waive it, nor would I expect the Wings Brass to ask him to. They honor those commitments.

No its not just you. Paul is the walrus. The Walrus was Paul!!!

And to think there was talk of Ottawa challenging Detroits 62 win season last year. They're only substantial addition came in the form of a trade which proved an even swap at best. They gain Isbister, Kuba, Smith, and Ruutu, at the price of Meszaros, Redden, Stillman, Lapointe and Commodore. Or depending on how you want to look at it, at the price of Meszaros, Redden, Lapointe, Eaves, and Corvo. Either way, they've downgraded in every possible arena. Theres talk of them adding Schneider, which would soften the blow as he'd surprisingly be an equal replacement, perhaps even an upgrade, for Redden, but then cap space is still an issue. IMO, they missed the boat on a couple of seasons where they could've brought home the cup..

As much as it may have helped to have Kopecky on the team, I have a feeling that Hossa was going to sign with the Wings no matter what, considering the terms of his contract. You don't turn down guaranteed millions over what youre making simply to play on the same team with a guy who you likely won't even see ice time with.

I'm gonna dissent here from the common theory, and suggest that Filppula is the number one guy that should be following Datsyuk around. Of all our offensive players, hes the one whos lived up to his billing the least.