haroldsnepsts

I'm one who thinks Kronwall has been guilty of leaving his feet and not keeping his elbows tucked on a fair amount of his hits in the past, but this looks legal to me. Brutal, but legal. His skates are down, he didn't leap. He hits the head but he also catches him full on in the body. Shanny specifically showed videos of how there can be legal hits that contact the head.

Keep your comments about the game please. Bickering posts will be deleted. And it's really annoying to have to go through and delete a bunch of crap. Thanks.

It's understandable that people would be excited about Kronwall and Smith. They were both first round picks that showed a lot of potential very early on. For whatever reason Ericsson became the scapegoat here. I guess one decent playoff performance as a Black Ace made people forget he was last overall in the draft and a converted defenseman at that. There's kids in high school who've been playing D longer than Ericsson. Kindl should consider himself lucky for all the goodwill he gets here in spite of his slow development. He's the highest draft pick the Wings have had in 20 years. Hopefully Smith will get the same kind of benefit as he turns into an NHL player.

Given that he's played a total of 6 games in the NHL, there's not a lot to fawn over. I think people are mostly just excited at the potential there is in him as a young prospect. Especially offensively, considering we no longer have a guy like Rafalski on the PP and could use one to get Hudler off the point.

I wonder how you felt when Kenny brought back Osgood? I'm sure you were fully supporting this move, even before Osgood bailed out Dom and helped the Wings win the Cup in 08? I dont' even remember the Hemsky thread you're talking about, but are you suggesting that Ken Holland, General Manager of the Red Wings who spends all day every day thinking and working on the present and future of this team actually knows more than a bunch of fans on a website? Shocking! Of course Holland knows more than we do. That's part of being a fan is sitting back and wondering and overanalyzing and nitpicking all these moves because we love the Wings. We're fans, not cheerleaders. If all we did was agree with Kenny and think everyone was awesome, then Matt may as well shut down the site. As for Datsyuk, i echo the sentiments of several other people here. It's great to see him making progress, but don't rush it. The key is to be completely healthy for the playoffs.

Because he's a Hawks fan I'm guessing? Just like Wings fans do in Phoenix, and pretty much every other arena in Canada and the U.S. Who's getting emotional about it? Talking about how unfortunate it is doesn't mean we're curled up in bed in the fetal position whimpering about it.

True. I guess it's just really that time span where they had Lebda, Meech, Ericsson and Quincey that things got a little goofy. And yeah, overall the Wings have done a great job considering what a crapshoot draft picks are. And none of theirs are high picks.

That's kind of what I meant. Not that it was the over-ripening them that ruined them. But even given that extra time to evaluate them, the Wings seemed to have overestimated their potential. Don't get me wrong, I think they actually made a good find in someone like Ericsson. Dead last in the draft and they've got a #5 defenseman out of it. My point was mainly that their assessment of D-men the last few seasons hasn't been as strong as in the past, not that the over-ripening damaged their prospects.

Exactly. It's hard to take time to get your helmet off when the guy your fighting goes Tootoo on you and is swinging away. As for Holland's track record with D-men, it's been impressive in years past but is falling off a bit lately when you consider the Wings track record with Meech, Quincey, Lebda, Ericsson, and Kindl. Even letting their players over-ripen, they've not turned into the players they seemed to think. To be clear I'm not saying it's awful--prospects are always a bit of a crapshoot--but their development and evaluation of D-men the past few seasons has not been as stellar as they usually are at everything else, especially considering that they let their guys stay in the minors longer than most teams. It's not like we're talking about 19 year olds.

Hossa actually logs more shorthanded TOI per game than any other forward on the Hawks.

I do remember his salary getting adjusted under the cap. Wow, how unreasonable of a defenseman of NIck's caliber being the highest paid player on the team. Then he took discounts every contract after that. We've beat this topic sufficiently to death. you apparently have some weird beef against how much Lidstrom is being paid, but most GM's in the league would've happily given him millions more. The topic at hand is Stuart's family issue.

Right. but you were basing your argument on words. Speculation about him going back to Sweden and that being purely a negotiating tactic. His actions are that he has played for the Wings for 19 seasons now, and taken a hometown discount for multiple contract signings.

I agree. Kind seems to be taking step backwards the second half of the season and I'm not sure why. when given the opportunity, he's had some brutal gaffe's like turning the puck over on the blueline for a clean breakaway. And Ericsson has steadily improved this season. He's stepped up his physical play and has had fewer brainfarts. In general looking fairly poised. As I said in the GDT, you'd never guess that Kindl is actually 10 lbs heavier and an inch taller than Quincey because he plays so soft. Hopefully E and Kindl will get healthy and can learn some things from Quincey. Smith has looked very good so far. It was unfortunate to lose him for 5 minutes when the D was already shorthanded, but he really didn't have a choice since Shaw jumped him. And he handled himself well. I can't wait until he's a regular in the lineup. He should leapfrog right over Kindl and Ericsson. Here's the fight.

His career as an nhl coach is 405-203. He was third fastest to the 400 win mark of any NHL coach. He has a playoff record of 63-39. In his 8 seasons as an NHL coach, he's gotten his team to the Stanley Cup finals three times, won once. Conference finals once.

They didn't have them on the ropes, but I think the Wings were dictating play through much of the game. They may not have been lighting Emery up, but they were definitely limiting the scoring chances by the Hawks and rang multiple shots of the posts. That started to fall apart a bit in the third, but I'm sure the shorthanded defense had something to do with that.

I don't know that it was lazy. They were outplaying the Hawks soundly throughout most of the game, but got nothing to show for it. Their PP is definitely uninspired. And I'm sure being shorthanded on D didn't help. Kronner playing over 27 minutes. White playing more than 26. Quincey with almost 24 mins.

Posts. Flaccid powerplay. Friggin gift from Stuart.

They can act tougher than they are because the Wings dont have a lot of guys to call them on it.

The Nucks?

ok, it apparently isn't satisfying enough for you since you were whining about it.

so they beat them twice actually playing hockey and not in a spectacle event like the shootout. But that doesn't count to you for some reason?

The Wings won twice in OT, not a shootout. Because that never actually happens. Maaaaybe he'd get two for roughing, but you never get 5 for fighting when the other guy doesn't drop the gloves too. Plus then you'd probably just complain about Smith turtling.

The posts will be black by the end of the game at this rate.

tough guy duncan keith throwing punches at the back of Flips head after slashing him on the back of the leg.

If they get healthy and actually get a chance to play with him, Quincey could be a great influence on both Ericsson and Kindl. He plays the kind of game they both should be playing. You'd never know it by his play, but Kindl is actually bigger than Q by an inch and 10 lbs. Hopefully he gets healthy and gets some time alongside him. Any word on exactly what the injury was?