Dabura

Gah, as I was typing that, I said to myself, "Oh man, y'know who's gonna have a problem with this? Son of a Wing. That son of a...Wing." No, but you're right - it's always about having just the right mix. Still, if you look at, say, the Blackhawks and Penguins, how do they hurt? Generally, with great speed, skill, puck-possession, lots of young talent. Or even the Kings. I know - they're big and physical and grinding, but they're also really fast, and pretty young...and skilled.... The main point is, what we seem to be going for is doomed to fail. And it boggles my mind that Mike Babcock - of all people - seems to be getting off on it.

Remember when rooting for the Wings was a blast? Lately it feels like masochism. Which can, I guess, be a blast...but you know what I'm saying. CLEARY ME HARDER, BABY OHHH YEAH, RIGHT IN THE QUINCEY

That third line (Cleary - Andersson - Sammy) makes me want to puke. Did the Jason Allison era Leafs teach the hockey world nothing? Big and old and slow doesn't win in the cap era. Young and speedy and skilled does. Pretty soon I'm going to be consciously, actively hoping this team plummets to the bottom of the standings. And that's terrible.

In retrospect, I made this sound way more complicated than it would really be.

I'm not saying I believe my rationalization. It's just, this is too easy. I feel like it's a trap. Like, if I say what you'd expect me to say, the world will implode, or something.

Or maybe Tatar's been traded. And/Or maybe Babs just really doesn't like him.

I see this as Babs giving Cleary "one last shot." Cleary's been scratched, and now he gets to respond, and show that he's more valuable than Tatar (and Nyquist), or, at the very least, that Holland wasn't a fool for re-signing him. If he doesn't impress, maybe he spends the rest of the regular season on the bench (or at least until we get destroyed by injuries). That's my rationalization.

Howzabout this. No points are awarded for a tie at the end of regulation. Instead, we go to an OT PP dealy. Round 1 A two-minute 5-on-4 for each side. A PP goal would mean the end of the PP, just like in regulation. If one team scores on its PP and the other team doesn't score on its opportunity, that's two points for the former and zero for the latter, game over - unless the team that didn't score on its PP opportunity scores a shorthanded goal. (Shorthanded goals have the same value as PP goals, except they don't end the other team's PP, just like in regulation.) If both teams finish even, we go to a second round. Round 2 Now it's a 5-on-3 for each side. Again, winner gets two points, loser gets zero. A tie would be the final result, with one point awarded to each team. All goals would contribute to the final score. So, a game that's 3-3 after three periods could end up at 5-5, or as high as 7-7 (each side scores a PP goal and a shorthanded goal in Round 1 and Round 2). I have to figure out what to do about penalties.

meh

Mike Bacock out. Ron Rolston in.

The thing about Chicago, of course, is that they went the suck-mercilessly-and-get-rewarded-for-it route. Unless we're going to go the same route, we really can't count on our kids just coming out of nowhere and leading us to glory. I know we're generally pretty good at drafting, but, bottom line, you don't make the playoffs every season and then decide, "Y'know what, our picks and prospects are gonna carry us from now on. Screw outside help." It doesn't work that way. (Unless your scouts are LUDICROUSLY good, and you have a handful of absolutely can't-miss young studs who have already cracked the lineup and are, in fact, practically carrying the team on their backs.)

Fixed. Getting Nyquist back will be like a big trade deadline acquisition. We all know this script by now.

Oh, I know - but your joke made a good point. (What do you want him to do, say, "I screwed up. Actually, I''ve been screwing up a lot lately. This is just the latest in a reasonably long line of recent screw-ups"? Be reasonable.) Fire Ken Holland and replace him with Larry Murphy!

I honestly feel we should make Smith a forward. Zetterberg Datsyuk Bertuzzi Smith Weiss Alfredsson Tatar Helm Franzen Miller Glendening Abdelkader

I think I'm down with Mule on the third line, but, holy jumpin', that is one very smallish, non-physical scoring line. (I believe Weiss is secretly 5'9 and 170-ish. He looks so small on the ice.) It'd be one thing if we had a sure-thing goal-scorer on it (Datsyuk or Zetterberg). But as it is - I mean, the way you have it...I'd worry about that line. I'd almost want to flip it with the third, so Mule - Helm - Abby becomes our second line. Man. So much is riding on Weiss. I'm very fond of my Franzen + Nyquist + Tatar + 1st for Giroux idea, but it looks like Giroux is getting good again, and Holland is emphatically promising NO MORE TRADES. FOREVER. So, yeah. Tatar is pretty much awesome, but I think it's pretty official now that Babs is not his biggest fan in the world.

I'm not saying he should lay all his recent mistakes bare. I'm not even saying he shouldn't bulls*** the media and fans. I am saying he should be at least a little crafty and creative, and maybe even halfway convincing. I mean, in this context, "It's complicated" is basically a euphemism for "I screwed up." You might as well just drop the act altogether. What I'm saying is, no matter what Ken Holland does, I'm going to be outraged by it. BUT, the guy doesn't have to insult me every time he answers a question. (I'll do the insulting around here, thank you very much.) On that note... http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/56388/nhl-grab-bag-rasks-wipeout-wasnt-even-the-sixth-funniest-thing-in-hockey-this-week

This. Datsyuk is one of the best two-way players I've ever seen. This season he actually seems to be skating harder on the backcheck than when we're going up ice. Whereas Ovechkin literally doesn't understand the nuances and general importance of defensive play. And/Or he's just lazy. They're both phenomenally gifted hockey players and goal-scorers (and Russian), but comparing them based on point production alone is lame.

I am in favor of scratching Datsyuk and/or Zetterberg in an effort to get the rest of the team to show up.

This is the kind of thing I'm referring to when I say Holland is full of s***: http://kuklaskorner.com/tmr/comments/more-moves-coming-for-the-wings No, it's not complicated, Ken. It's actually very simple: you re-signed Daniel Cleary.

"Sign mah boobz?"

The case can be made that Tatar deserves top-six minutes.

I was there, and I can assure you it was a genuinely huge deal. There were riots in the streets. A long-sleeping volcano erupted. Bedlam. Also, it's not really a conspiracy theory. A conspiracy theory, in this context, would be something like "Pierre was talking trash, trying to shake up Zetterberg's confidence! This is irrefutable proof that NBC hates the Red Wings!"

Personally, I think Pierre let out a really, really wicked fart. Or he flat-out crapped his pants.

I think it was mostly an attempt to sort of defend Pierre. It was a huge thing (by hockey world standards) at the time. Everyone was laughing at Pierre. Why was it such a huge thing? Because 1) a lot of people don't like Pierre, and 2) it happened in a big, big game, and everything that happens in a big, big game has to be crazily over-magnified. It's an unwritten rule of the playoffs.

Good for Sabres fans, they deserve much better - or, at least, progressive-minded change. The improvement part remains to be seen.