NeverForgetMac25

There you go...that makes perfect sense then.

I liked a few years back when a writer wrote Rex Hudler. Seriously, where the f*ck do you come up with Rex?

Is this a joke?

Meech played defense for the Wings yesterday, not offense. Abdelkader stepped in for Kopecky yesterday (and was great for his TOI).

The Red Wings do reward loyalty, but you also have to earn your ice-time come the playoffs. Point and case: Chelios As for the organization sticking by its players, no doubt it what's given them their sustained success especially once the cap was instituted. I understand their system and why it works....I would never want them to deviate from it. However, this time of the year ice-time is earned. No doubt experience is a factor here....but the Wings have plenty of it. It's not as if when a guy like Raf went down, the Wings absolutely needed to replace him with another proven vet. Meech stepped in yesterday for similar minutes to what Cheli was getting and was just fine.

“I actually bent down and told him, ‘Nice save, Ozzie,’” Christensen said. “I had him along the ice. He was going one way. I was going the other way. He just reached out and it was right in his glove — unlucky for me, lucky for him. I had a feeling he was either saying that, or "you're ******* lucky". Glad to hear it was the former.......classy thing to do.

"Loving" a player doesn't mean the should they be on the ice during the playoffs. I'm a huge Mac fan, but Babs has plenty of better options to stick out there than Mac. Abdelkader's game yesterday was reason enough for him to stick around and Leino should get a shot before Mac. I love Darren too, but that doesn't mean he should get to play (or the chance to contribute).

QFT The nice thing about next year is that barring injury we'll be seeing that lineup all season.

Don't misunderstand me (and I know this isn't what you were insinuating), the Wings *absolutely* need a relentless forecheck and strong physical play in front of Hiller. That's the toughness combined with their skill level that will beat this ANA team.

Depends on their talent level. If you're icing a bunch of goons and the other team has the ability to make a good first pass, the team of goons is in trouble. In this case, I would agree.....but the Wings are icing a far superior defense *currently* than they were when DET and ANA met up in the WCF's. Lids-E Kronwall-Stuart Lebda-Chelios vs. Lids-Markov Chelios-Lilja Lebda-Meech

I thought we've been flipping between both. And at the same time get caught on the wrong side of the play and expose Hiller to higher percentage shots? Take penalties? The Ducks are a rough-and-tough team, no doubt....Parros isn't going to put them "over the top" in the grit/toughness department, they're already there.

That's the game that *has* worked against Detroit in the past. The jury's still out on this season's squad. But the Wings most certainly showed they can handle a grind last year regardless of them not matching up with ANA or CAL, etc.

Yet, all the Wings players aside from Rafalksi (whose injury is yet TBD) who started the playoffs are still just fine. Hmm.

Pronger also got suspended for that play. Congratulations, Chris.

Kronwall's injury was a freak occurrence given the hit he took in the Dallas game and IIRC, Schneider broke his arm because of a slash. Not exactly the result of tough teams "crashing and banging the Wings all series". None of the injures came against the Ducks.

Nobody in their right mind thinks that, but the Wings are physically tougher than the grit-slappies want to admit. They can't accept the fact that this heavily European team doesn't like to fight, but that doesn't make them physically weak. NHL players can't play 82 regular season games and around 25 games in the playoffs and be cream-puffs. I'd like for the grit-slappies to lace 'em up and wear a #96 jersey for even one period and see how "tough" they are.

No road to the Cup is easy, regardless of the opponent. There's nothing to say the Wings wouldn't have been able to match up with the Ducks last season, and the year before that is still kind of a question mark with missing the number 2 and 3 defenseman. As much as the physical grind was tough for the Wings, the PP not being able to run effectively is what did them in that series.

Guys like Parros playing physical is gonna land them in the box. No doubt the Wings have been beaten by physically superior opponents in the past, but the team last year showed it can stand up for itself to the extent it needs to in order to be successful in the playoffs.

I rank those two comments right up there with calling someone "Hitler" on a message board.....its an automatic win for the other guy. Besides, for how much I'm on this site (and how long micah has been a member), does he really think I've never been to a game (or played the sport for that matter)?

I referred to Wis later in my post and I must have been thinking two steps ahead of how fast my fingers were typing.

Should, could, woulda...what? The matchup between the Sharks-Ducks is completely different than the Wings-Ducks. Versus the Sharks, a guy like Parros is more useful. Vesus the Wings, he's useless.

In the sense that it got the crowd excited, but it did harm the Ducks more than it did good. Beauchemin was then out until under the 4 minute mark. That's helpful for the Wings.

I think both teams get charged up seeing their guys stand up for each other. Last night's fight was counteractive because it got the crowd into the game, but it also took out one of the Ducks' better defeneseman when they desperately needed two goals. Of course fighting gets the crowd/players into it....there's just plenty of other things that do it as well.

No s***. My point is just because the crowd gets "into it" doesn't mean the players are all of a sudden going to start playing better like so many grit-slappies seem to claim. A strong play can have the same effect on the players....which is more important than the crowd anyway.

I know this was meant for NN, but I'll chime in. The Sharks are a more physical team than the Wings. Dressing a guy like Parros makes more sense in *that* matchup. Not to mention the Ducks jumped out to a 2-0 series lead. If they had lost the first two (and possibly as early as after the first loss) Parros would've been benched. Carlyle wasn't about to mess with a roster that was winning, no coach does. Simple as that.