daniel1

Cleary, Stuart, Chelios, Lebda, Meech, Draper, Maltby, Osgood, Conklin... all NA born. We do have some good NA talent coming up too; Abdelkader, Helm, Howard, Smith and McCollum that will hopefully be with us for a few years and in the case of Helm and Abdelkader hopefully a lot longer if early indications hold true. Our problem is that we draft so low due to high regular season finishes that all the primeau (no pun intended) NA talent is picked by then. Would we have found any NA players in the 7th round as good as Hank? Not a chance. So while it does help to have NA players that fans can relate to it's not always the fault of the organization if we don't have more NA than European players. Personally I don't give a rats ass where the player is from as long as he plays hard and helps us win. I "relate" to Hank just as much as I would if he were from Alberta or Michigan. Good hockey player, shows up and competes every night, loyal as hell, puts the organization first, clutch in the playoffs, never whines or complains, good teammate, hot girlfriend; who can't relate to that? We did find a way to bring in some good NA talent through free agency though; Stuart, Cleary, and Downey were great pickups and meshed well with the group too which is VERY important to KH and Babblecock. We're very lucky that we have quality people who are also great players on this team to cheer for and I could care less what chunk of land on this ball of rock and water they were hatched on.

Interesting question. There's very few goalies that I would ever consider spending that much of the cap on but Bobby Lou is one (perhaps the only one) of them. If Lids did retire then yes I would because our shots/game would definitely go up without Lids and we would need a top tier goalie. I would not sign him for any more than 2 or 3 years though as goalies can go south pretty quick (see Jim Carey, Tomas Vokoun, Marty Turco) and we wouldn't wanna ever be in a situation like the one the Islanders (15yrs, 15 major injuries) find themselves in. If Lids signs for 2 more years at around 4-5mil then I would just put the money towards the forwards or another top 4 d'man. Keep in mind that next year will be the last year of Ericsson's contract and if he has a halfway decent season in the NHL next year he'll want some serious $$ for having to spend so much time time in the minors for the past few seasons due to cap restraints.

I even heard he's asked the trainers to re-label all his equipment "Sam Jones" and he's been seen hanging around teen tennis tournaments with a big bag of candy.

A s***ty one.

Totally agree; ever since Torres laid him out like a three dollar ***** on two dollar Tuesday J-Willy was never the same. He came back afraid of contact and it showed big time. If J-Willy played in a round rink he'd be more effective cause then he wouldn't have to worry about avoiding the corners. He seemed to be a good guy though and I wish him luck with the Jackets. Giving him up for Calder had more to do about getting rid of him rather than acquiring Calder.

Vancouver Canucks. What the heck is that "C whale" logo anyways? It's as far from a hockey logo as Avery is from a gentleman who doesn't kiss and tell.

Man. Oh boy. Do we suck the high hard one playing 4 on 4. I've come to the conclusion that the Wings play their 5 on 5 system so well and know that system so inside and out that they are absolutely confounded, bamboozled, dunderflucked and perplexed when it's 4 on 4. They look lost. They start and stop, they point and turn, their eyes look like those of a deer caught in the headlights of a mac truck bearing down on them at 80mph. Three easy steps to fix this quagmire: 1. ******* practice it Babs. 2. Play sets of guys who know each other real well and can SKATE. Pav with Z, Flip with Hudler, and I guess Mule with Hossa, not so fast Homer, take a seat here. Leave Draper and Maltby on the bench with Homer. We gotta start with Pav and Z, then go to them every other shift and rotate the other guys in-between. Those two have best chemistry since Pinky and the Brain, Whitaker and Trammel, and Hall and Oates. WHY DOES HE HATE PLAYING THEM TOGETHER?????? 3. Let the intern print this message off and shove it in Babs' corn flakes tomorrow morning so he knows how pissed we are at losing to the Turdco. /vent

Maybe it's all part of his master plan. He wants the other teams to THINK he won't use them together and then come playoff time they're woefully inept to stop the carnage that HDZ or even H-D will wreak upon unprepared defenses and goalies!!!! Muhwahahahaaaa! Well he is a psychology major for pete's sake, there is a chance he's using some psychoBABle on them right?

Nah, Melrose is smarter.

It's both. It's a PLOY to try to keep him in the LONG TERM PLAN. Please Ilya, if you stay we'll make you the captain of our sinking ship. Bad ploy, bad long term plan. Bad franchise. Move it to WINNIPEG!!

They are the only ones who really appreciate the Poutine.

If St. Louis leaves, think of what that would do to the Missouri economy

Ya the J-bo trade idea was kind of a joke. I was serious with the Horton one though. Unfortunately Florida views Horton as their franchise player and it would probably take more than just Flip and pick to pry him away. It's too bad cause I think Horton would be a 40-50 goal power forward here with the wings. He might be the next Shanahan if we can pry him away from Florida. I would give up quite a bit (Hudler, Flip, Kindl) to get him here.

Horton for Filpulla and a 1st or 2nd. Both are underperforming and make around the same $$. Bowmeester for Brendan Smith, Lebda and Maltby, lol Honestly I always thought J-Bo was a little overated anyways.

As I was watching the game tonight (Det/Dal) they showed a little clip of an interview with super-scout Hakaan Andersson and then Ken went on to say that the "full" interview was on Red Wings Live with John Keating before the game. I have the Center Ice package but always miss out on the Red Wings Live and post-game stuff. Does anyone happen to have the full interview with Hakaan and could they post it so everyone could see it? All of us who don't have access to FSN Detroit would REALLY appreciate it cause it sounded like a great interview and we don't get to hear from Hakaan very often. Thanx in advance as after a few years on this site I know that someone will honour my request, which is a big reason I keep coming back here. Long Live LGW!

Ouch. At this point I would settle for a link... or even a transcript... or someone to give me a little update on what they talked about... or how bout what Hakkan was wearing even lol, jk. Does anyone know a way to receive FSN Detroit over the internet?

Let's hope it's in the one we keep.

That is insane. What is even more insane is the 15$ shipping charge lol.

Neil is UFA at the end of of this season and currently makes just over a million/year. I would love to see a Kopecky/Neil swap at the deadline not just for playoffs but so we could have a decent shot of resigning Neil for a couple years. He can regular 4th line and contribute the way Mac could in his prime. He will stand up for teammates and can even chip in a bit offensively if someone goes down (he scored 16 goals a couple years ago). He's a good option to have and probably wouldn't take much more to re-sign than Kopecky would. At 29 I'm sure Neil has at least 2 or 3 good years left in him.

Anyone who gets "tired" in the playoffs and pulls a disappearing act doesn't get elevated to Lemieux or Fedorov status in my book. When he shows he can perform when it counts and when his team needs him most I'll start to consider him "great".

If there was one team that I could see giving Avery another shot in the NHL it would be the Avs. Any team that would put Claude on its roster knows no limits to what Evil they may do unto others... Avery-Tucker-Lappy will be the new grind line for the Avs after Xmas Wings 5, Avs 2 with goals from Datsyuk, Hudler, Zetterberg, Hossa and Sammy

Stevie is up on Lids 88% to 12%. Wayne the Great Whiner is leading Bobby "ankle-hacker" Clarke as well. It would have been better had Yzerman been up against Lids in the final. Gretzky's on ice leadership consisted of repeating the phrase "don't touch me or Semenko will kill you", to the other team. Messier, Lowe, Coffey and Huddy were the leaders on those Cup winning Edmonton teams. The Whiney One was a great player, but not much of a leader - as evidenced by his current coaching "ability".

I'll vote for Stuart as the best hitter right now... but Phaneuf is a close (sloppy) second. Oops, am I suspended now Gary??

You've gotta be kidding me! Implying that after you've nailed some chic and she's all loose and sloppy when the other guy gets his turn isn't "demeaning?". Maybe in the world of quadruple X rated movies it's a compliment, but in any other context it is degrading, demeaning and incredibly rude. It's locker room talk pure and simple; we used to raz each other back in junior and about girlfriends, sisters and mothers after the games in our own locker room, but we would never, ever, dare to say those things when our wives and girlfriends were within earshot. I still wish they hadn't suspended Avery though cause the storyline would have been the most exciting thing to happen in the NHL this year. It's pretty sad that in the course of the 82 game schedule there is very little drama or excitement till the playoffs get within sight. Gone are the days of "grudge-matches", "line-brawls" and heavyweight rematches in the mold of Probert-Domi II... those were the things that got us Canadian boys all riled up on a Saturday night!

Can the league censor free speech? I don't think Avery said anything that wasn't true given that Phaneuf and Stoll are dating his ex-girlfriends. Perhaps he could have been a wee bit more politically correct than "sloppy seconds" but I'm sure he said it for effect and to raise the hype around the game tonight. It would have been awesome to see what Phaneuf did to him or if they would have gone at it. Seriously though, Burke and Lowe said worse things about each other and neither one of them was fined or suspended so the league shouldn't be coming down on Avery any harder just cause he's Avery. He's entertaining though, you can't deny that.