Aussie_Wing

We've got no flow going early, typical of this season...

In case anyone had forgotten, Filppula owns the Blues, expect him to score tonight.

Excellent thread jawbreaker, much appreciated. Dick Axelsson certainly is a very exciting prospect. It's disappointing he couldn't spend the year playing with the Griffins but we'll only have to wait another year. The Wings management seem to love the prospect of Axelsson in Detroit and should give him every oppertunity to make the line-up in a few years.

Thanks Mac for posting, it's great to hear from Holland and I completely agree with him. Playing Downey would leave us as a 3 line team, what for, so he can start a fight for the sake of it? They're most likely going to start fights just because Downey is in the line-up anyway...

OK so I’ve been thinking about the short (and long) term future of the Wings team. I really take a keen following in our prospects and their development throughout the various leagues. I should add that this post is very speculative and no doubt I’ll get calls telling me to wait until the end of the season when thing become a bit clearer. But I thought I’d do a bit of crystal balling and I thought it could be interesting. I’d be real interested to hear some feedback. At seasons end we will have the following players out of contract. Realistically with the salary cap, which is reportedly set to decrease, we won’t be able to hold onto all of them even if we wanted to. So let’s break them down one by one, in order of importance. • Zetterberg- UFA. On the open market would command a salary of about $9mil but expect him to re-sign at about 7.5. The Wings won’t let him go and he’ll be back. • Franzen- UFA. Up there with Zetterberg as one of the biggest steals in the NHL as he is only making just over a million. I’m expecting him to sign for about $4-5mil. • Hossa- UFA. I don’t expect him to re-sign as we just won’t be able to pay him what he deserves. We can’t be paying 5 players $6mil or above, it’s just not feasible. It would require a miracle for him to be back. • Leino- RFA. Babcock has made it quite clear that he sees big things in store for the Leino. Only our depth has kept him out of Detroit. Considering his offensive upside and eagerness to improve, he could find himself on a scoring line as soon as next season. I see him as another Hudler, limited ES time but used regularly on the PP. He might force Hudler out. • Hudler- RFA. I get the feeling Hudler won’t be a Wing next season. Babcock has always been hard on him and despite his success in last years playoffs he still hasn’t won the trust of the coaching staff. Babcock might see him as expandable but personally I’d hate to see him leave as he has the potential to be a 30 goal, 70 point man IMO. • Samuelsson- UFA. To me he is expendable but considering he plays the point on the 2nd PP unit and is often bumped up to the second line it’s hard seeing us part ways with Sammy. Babs likes his size, defensive capabilities and willingness to shoot. I could see him taking a slight increase in salary to about $2mil. • Kopecky- UFA. The man everyone loves to hate and while I’m a pretty big fan, his future is up in the air. Abdelkader could quite easily take his role and we wouldn’t notice the difference. Kopecky is very cheap though and would likely stay that way so they could easily re-sign him. • McCarty- UFA. Has the advantage over Downey of being a long-term member of the Wings but hard to see him being back next season. Does have an offensive edge over Downey. • Downey- UFA. Unlikely to sign, if he does he’ll come very cheap. The fact that we don’t have any prospects of a similar style might bode well for him but to me he’s easily replaceable. • Conklin- UFA. Unlikely to stay because Howard should finally be ready to go next season. If Howard has another inconsistent year and Conklin shines, he might be back. • Chelios- UFA. Enough is enough, if he wants to return let him sign somewhere else. I understand what he's brought to our team but he can't be holding back the youngster any longer. And that leads me to my next point, how do you realistically see our prospects developing and which do you see making the team in the future (I'll touch on this later)? In the short term, there are a few prospects that come out of contract at seasons end. I expect McGrath, Oulahen and Gelech, all RFA’s, to be let go. McGrath just hasn’t shown enough, Oulahen is a Matt Ellis clone although not as good and while the Wings like Gelech’s size and physicality he’s been underwhelming with the Griffins. So here is how I see the Wings in 2009/10: Zetterberg – Datsyuk –Holmstrom Franzen – Filppula – Samuelsson Leino – Helm – Cleary Maltby – Draper – Kopecky Lidstrom – Rafalski Kronwall – Stuart Lilja – Ericsson Meech Osgood Howard A few points: • Come next season, I expect Ericsson to be up with the Wings. He’s clearly NHL ready, the coaching staff rave about him whenever they can and they won’t be able to deny him another year. Although contracted, I expect Lebda will be traded. • I don’t have Hudler in the line-up because I just get the feeling we’ll value Leino more. It all depends on what happens with Leino this season though, for all we know he could pack it up and head back to Finland but I sense he’ll stick around. • I’ve accounted for Chelios finally retiring. If he doesn’t, let him sign elsewhere. He can’t keep taking the place of the youngsters. • Maltby is next to useless but alas he is contracted for next season. • I’ve factored in Hossa not returning. If he returns, then I can safely say we’ll lose 2 UFA’s. We minimize the potential loss if Hossa doesn’t return. • Is Meech satisfied being #7 again? Hard to tell, most likely not though. He deserves a shot but Lilja is contracted another year and none of the ‘big 4’ look set to leave anytime soon. Without any shadow of a doubt though, one of Lebda and Meech won’t be a Wing next season, simply not enough room. • Some massive “hometown” discounts will have to be taken by our free agents because of the 11 I see maybe 6 staying at the max. One thing is for certain, we’ll be right up against the cap again next season. The Wings management are going to have make some extremely tough calls at the end of this season and the season after. Without wanting to look too far into the future (yes, too late now!) I think for season 2010/11 in a perfect world Maltby would have moved on and in comes Abdelkader to take his place on a checking line. By this time I expect Kindl to be NHL ready and to replace Lilja. Ericsson will have taken over Lilja’s tasks by this stage and Kindl can start by playing the role as offensive defenceman. And the last “major” move would be seeing the highly skilled Mattias Ritola replace Samuelsson in the top 6. Sorry for making it so long, if you've made it to the end I'd really like to hear your thoughts.

Surely that's just too big. I'm all for a goalie being big in the crease but his movement would have to be a major weakness would it not? It'll be interesting to see how he goes.

I just want to let everyone know that I’ll always put the new thread up on Thursday morning. If you know you won’t be online from this point onwards and therefore unable to post your picks, just send me a PM earlier in the week and I’ll send you the weekend’s games. Once again good luck everyone! Standings: 1. Aussie_Wing 15 2. Dano33 14 2. Reds4Life 14 2. LEBDA22 14 2. marcaractac 14 2. sibiriak 14 2. DatsyukownzU13 14 2. Mithros 14 2. cirov19 14 10. jawbreaker 13 10. #19=Legend 13 10. Mickeyisms Rule! 13 10. ashenhigh 13 10. GoWiings1905 13 10. Sebastian 13 10. Sgt Sharpie 13 10. Konnan511 13 10. edicius 13 10. MSDoubleJ19 13 10. FinWing 13 10. Systemfel 13 10. timothy1997 13 10. FinRedWing 13 24. irishtemper14+25 12 24. interminded 12 24. Drake_Marcus 12 24. CrossCheck24 12 24. HD30 12 24. Osgood4President 12 24. Duck Guy 12 24. wingschamps 12 24. David 12 24. Superman54 12 24. Wildwings44 12 24. Dominator 2005 12 24. JohnS 12 24. betterREDthandead 12 24. juice71285 12 24. Hockeytown0001 12 24. Kween78 12 24. Chunkylover 12 24. rwfan007 12 24. T-Ruff 12 24. Blood On The Ice 12 45. redwingslady87 11 45. j.hoop 11 45. johnnyoski 11 45. naranja 11 45. stormboy 11 45. wingsgirl001 11 45. discohadestwo 11 45. shannyfan1414 11 45. zetterisbetter 11 45. North Guy 11 45. NeverForgetMac25 11 45. Hockey13Playa 11 57. Chase 10 57. Doc Holiday 10 57. mindfly 10 57. jmgriffith 10 57. TRD604 10 57. wingsfan40 10 57. wingsfanatic4alltime 10 57. wingsfan13 10 57. hawkupaloogie 10 57. McCartyFanForLife 10 57. frederick9125 10 57. swedishconnection 10 57. puckhog419 10 57. ZETTERBERGPWN 10 57. CupChamps979802 10 57. Landstander 10 73. Elshupacabra 9 73. Ontario Wingsfan 9 73. SwedeLundin77 9 76. Shutemdown 8 76. ManLove4Homer 8 76. Williams29fan 8 76. wings1fan19 8 80. akustyk 6 81. zata40 2 Friday: Phoenix @ Ottawa Toronto @ NY Rangers Nashville @ Columbus Vancouver @ Buffalo Edmonton @ Calgary San Jose @ Anaheim Carolina @ Los Angeles Saturday: Colorado @ Dallas Phoenix @ Montreal Boston @ Ottawa Toronto @ Pittsburgh New Jersey @ Washington Buffalo @ Atlanta NY Islanders @ Florida NY Rangers @ Detroit Minnesota @ Tampa Bay Columbus @ Nashville Chicago @ St Louis Calgary @ Edmonton Philadelphia @ San Jose Sunday: Vancouver @ Chicago Carolina @ Anaheim

Yep sorry mate, you did score 14. As Dano33 said, I post the standings when I post the new thread Thursday morning.

Grand Rapids Griffins (1-0-1) @ Toronto Marlies (1-1-1) Coming off their first win of the new season against Lake Erie, the Griffins hope to win back-to-back matches when they take to the ice against the Toronto Marlies. The Griffins placed an emphasis on improving their PP during their week off and it paid immediate dividends as they went 2/5, getting goals from Abdelkader and Wilson. The Marlies have a host of NHL veterans including Body Devereaux, Bates Battaglia and Staffan Kronwall. Possible line-up (subject to change): Leino - Abdelkader - Haydar Wilson – Gangon - Gelech Ritola - Emmerton - Mursak Lemieux - Oulahen - Downey Ericsson - Pyett Galvin - Kindl Jozsa - Stafford Howard Larsson Team Leaders: Goals: Abdelkader (2) Assists: Kindl, Ritola (2) Points: Abdelkader (3) Penalty Minutes: Galvin (6) Notes: • Howard made his return to the ice yesterday and is expected to play again today. • Evan McGrath was a healthy scratch yesterday, disappointing considering this is a make or break year for the youngster. • Rookie defenceman Sergei Kolosov was also a healthy scratch.

If you look at my predicted 3rd and 4th lines, thankfully there is very little money tied up there. Cleary is reasonably expensive but then again he’s probably good enough to see consistent top 6 minutes. Draper is probably a tad high for what he now brings to the table and I wish he was on more of a Maltby salary. We won’t be able to re-sign Zetterberg, Hossa AND Franzen. We’ll be lucky to sign two. And then it probably comes down to how much Samuelsson and Hudler are willing to take. Personally I’d ditch Sammy and bring up Abdelkader, which would leave the lines looking looking something like this… Zetterberg – Datsyuk – Holmstrom Franzen – Filppula – Cleary Leino – Abdelkader – Helm Maltby – Draper – Kopecky Again, I'd have Hudler but the more I think about it the more I can't see him returning. Realistically I think Leino will have to go for him to remain. Ken Holland recently said this is the last season we’ll be able to afford everyone as he simply won’t be able to keep them all.

Week 2 Results: 1. Dano33 16/22 1. timothy1997 16 1. North Guy 16 1. akustyk 16 1. GoWiings1905 16 6. Dominator 2005 15 7. CrossCheck24 14 7. sibiriak 14 7. juice71285 14 7. MSDoubleJ19 14 7. Hockey13Playa 14 7. Landstander 14 7. LEBDA22 14 14. Drake_Marcus 13 14. HD30 13 14. Duck Guy 13 14. johnnyoski 13 14. Hockeytown0001 13 14. Systemfel 13 14. Mithros 13 14. Aussie_Wing 13 14. T-Ruff 13 14. FinRedWing 13 14. redwings56 13 25. Osgood4President 12 25. wingschamps 12 25. jmgriffith 12 25. David 12 25. Wildwings44 12 25. wingsfan40 12 25. JohnS 12 25. DatsyukownzU13 12 25. McCartyFanForLife 12 25. WingsRJ91 12 35. Doc Holiday 11 35. Reds4Life 11 35. mindfly 11 35. #19=Legend 11 35. Superman54 11 35. wingsfanatic4alltime 11 35. shannyfan1414 11 35. betterREDthandead 11 35. edicius 11 35. rwfan007 11 35. NeverForgetMac25 11 35. cirov19 11 35. zata40 11 35. P. Marlowe 11 35. SeeinRed 11 50. jawbreaker 10 50. redwingslady87 10 50. j.hoop 10 50. Mickeyisms Rule! 10 50. Elshupacabra 10 50. TRD604 10 50. wingsfan13 10 50. hawkupaloogie 10 50. CupChamps979802 10 59. Shutemdown 9 59. interminded 9 59. naranja 9 62. wingsgirl001 8 62. Ontario Wingsfan 8 64. stormboy 6 65. Chase 1 65. Sebastian 1 Congratulations to Dano33, timothy1997, North Guy, akustyk and GoWiings1905 who are the Week 2 winners with scores of 16!

Well final score ended up 7-3, safe to say that’s a pretty comprehensive victory! Good to see more solid showings from our prospects. Larsson was in net and made 35 saves from 38 shots. We sure do have a talented duo in net this season and the competition between the two is set to be interesting. Mattias Ritola with a goal and an assist. Logan Pyett, the rookie defenseman who is very much in the Lebda and Meech mould had 2 assists. Jakub Kindl continues his fine start with a goal. I’ve got a good feeling about him this season... Leino goal and an assist. McGrath and Ericsson also assists.

My man Ritola off to a fine start! A goal and an assist today which makes it 4 points in 3 games with a +2 rating. I'm telling you, this guy has a future in the top 6 in Detroit.

First of all let me say that I like Hudler a lot, so much so that he’d be in my top 3 favourite players in the team. Babcock tried starting him on the second line and yet it appears that experiment is already over. He is however very effective on the PP as we saw again tonight as he tied up the game on the PP. I get the feeling that he’s always going to be a 3rd, perhaps even 4th line guy who is used somewhat sparingly at even strength but will be one of the first called upon when we have a man advantage. It’s disappointing that a player with his skill can’t cement his spot on one of the top 2 lines but maybe he’s destined to be a PP specialist who plays 10-12 minutes at ES a night. He might have found his niche. I would however like to see him given a few more chances with Zetterberg on the second line because he, just like Hossa, needs time in order to get comfortable. Babcock is very quick to take him off a scoring line whenever he does something wrong though. It'll be interesting to see where he ends up when Zetterberg is back. I’d be interested to know what everyone else’s thoughts are.

I’m obviously too young to have any memories of this guy (at least while he was in his prime), but to those who managed to see him I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on him. We all know he was a tough guy who liked to fight but looking at his stats it would appear he was one heck of a player too, certainly capable of putting up the points. At 23 years of age he put up 62 points in 74 games to go with his staggering 398 penalty minutes. And then in 16 playoff games he had 21 points. Statistically that was the high point of his career but he managed to put up some decent numbers in other seasons too. Did he ever fulfill his offensive potential because to me it would appear as though he was more satisfied with being a fighter and enforcer and therefore his output on the offensive end was hindered. And of course there were a lot of off ice issues, issues which ultimately ended his time in Detroit. He then went on to spend a number of seasons in Chicago but he was obviously getting on by that stage. But during his early to mid twenties it would seem as though he was a pretty darn good player and I’m sure was a crowd favourite at the time.

The Griffins finally take to the ice again for only their second game of the season. It’s been a week since their last game and during practice they’ve placed a big emphasis on the PP and getting more shots off as well as creating some traffic in front of the net. Ironically they will again face the Lake Erie Monsters with the hope of extracting some revenge after their season opening OT loss. Possible line-up (subject to change): Leino - Abdelkader - Tardif Wilson - Pare - Gelech Emmerton - McGrath - Mursak Lemieux - Oulahen - Downey Ericsson - Pyett Atherton - Kolosov Galvin - Kindl Larsson Howard Team Leaders: Goals: Abdelkader, Leino, Oulahen (1) Assists: 6 tied (1) Points: 9 tied (1) Penalty Minutes: Ericsson, PJ Atherton (4) Notes: • Howard back on the ice and has practiced the past few days. However Larsson is expected to get the start. • Darren Helm still up with the Wings and therefore won’t play. • Don’t think Mattias Ritola practiced yesterday, not sure what the story is there. Hopefully he plays and if he does is on a scoring line. • The first of back-to-back games as the Griffins play again tomorrow.

Leino maybe but as much as I like Helm and Abdelkader I highly doubt they've got as much upside as Hudler. Hudler could easily put up 50 points this season, the others might never reach that mark, they're more checking line forwards.

I think I’ll rotate between Kindl, Ritola and Kiira all season. Anyway here's the scoring recap: 2. GR Abdelkader, (2) (Leino), 16:25 (PP) 3. GR Wilson, (1) (Kindl, Ritola), 3:08 (PP) 3. GR Haydar, (1) (Ericsson, Abdelkader), 7:34 Corey Emmerton with the SO goal that won the game. Howard with 25 saves from 28 shots.

Speaking of Oilers/Flames, Bertuzzi scored his 5th goal in as many games. Still got it?

HOSSA!!!!!!!!!! That'll start the rush! Watch out NHL!

HUDLER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Take that doubters, man I friggin love Huds!

Why did you use that smiley? I seriously don't get you.

Conklin, now.

Honestly, what the heck is wrong with this team? I am actually starting to worry, we keep throwing away leads.

Who was that poster who was adamant Flip doesn't have any hockey sense and can't centre any scoring lines? He's been absolutely on fire tonight and could've had more than the 2 points he has.