mutherpucker27

Holland says Grigorenko isn't ready for the NHL and needs another year. He's the GM. I've never even seen the guy play; all I know about him is what I've heard about him. I would guess the same is true for most of the ppl on this board. Detroit's got one of the top scouting staffs and best player analysis in the league. They didn't even think he was ready to come to the rookie camp (unless I'm mistaken, I don't think he was there). I'll take their words for it.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. We do not need a 42 year old on the team, no matter how sweet a player he is/was. I have no problem w/ Stumpy, but he is NOT what the team needs. By the same token, what possible reason do you guys have for screwing up the development of one of our top prospects by making him ride the pine in the NHL instead of getting top line minutes in Russia? You guys do want him to turn into a decent NHL player, right? Not going to happen if he doesn't get ice time. If Holland says he ain't ready, he ain't ready.

Meant Kovalchuk/Heatley, but voted Kovalchuk/Hossa by accident. Only reason against Kovalchuk/Hossa is just to keep all your eggs out of the same basket (but then again, when I had Bert/Naslund/Morrison all on my fantasy team 3 years ago, that went pretty well )

No reason for Howard to leave early. He's the best goalie in the NCAA. And he probably wants to finish up his degree.

It was in Canada. How does Randy Moss run over a police officer w/ a car and get away w/ it? Athletes can do these things. And I'm totally with you on the fast, grinding style. But goons will hurt that style, not help it. I'm partially convinced Lewis is half the problem on the style. Yzerman, Shanny, Drapes, Maltby, etc had no problems w/ cycling the puck down low when Bowman was in charge. It was when Lewis took over that all the sudden we started sniping all over the place and playing perimiter hockey. Babcock should help us get back to a faster style. This slow, methodical crap I've had a stomachful of. But in order to play a fast, physical style, you need to have players who are going to work and skate hard, not guys who are going to take shifts off and back away from contact, and not guys who don't know how to skate. I want strong skaters and aggressive personalities before straight size and WAY before fighting ability.

Hehe, as far as Probert goes, that guy's a badass. I was talking to this guy in Windsor, and has saying how his dad was in a bar once, and Probert was in there, and ended up getting kicked out. Well, he didn't go quietly, lol. He ended up beating the crap out of five cops before all was done and said. At the same time. Imagine if THAT happened in modern day sports, lmao.

My point on Datsyuk and Zetterberg got twisted a bit. I don't want them going out there and throwing their weight around constantly, but I do want them to be able to take abuse and fight through it instead of just floating around. They are never going to be able to score in the playoffs if they can't body through tight checking defense. And loading up the roster w/ goons isn't going to change that fact. That was more my point. Barnes, as far as Gratton goes, here's our main disagreeing point. For 3rd/4th liners, pretty much the only thing I *really* care about is work ethic. That's #1 for me for any hockey player, really, but especially for guys on a "checking" line. You have to be willing to get your nose dirty and play physical, and you cannot take ANY shifts off. So I pass over a player like Gratton on principle b/c he has a reputation of being lazy and taking games off. I don't want players like that. That's my beef w/ Gratton. That's why I really had no interest in him whatsoever. The other thing was just that a lot of ppl had built Gratton into a "savior" type player, who was going to step in and make all our problems go away. All over the board, ppl were going "if we don't sign Chris Gratton, we'll miss the playoffs" or "if we don't sign Chris Gratton, we'll never win the Cup". And that's ridiculous. Chris Gratton has never performed well in the playoffs. How is he going to help us win a Cup? Anyway, ultimately, I want guys who are going to give their all to the team. I don't want guys who are big but aren't going to bring their game everyday. Give me somebody who's going to go down and block a shot, or take a cross check in the back and go back into the corner 5 seconds later, or take a huge hit to negate an icing. Those are the players I want on the 3rd and 4th lines. Not Chris Gratton. He's not tough in any way that matters, and he won't address our toughness issues anymore than a combover fixes a lack of hair. And Dom: please give me a list of those players that were realistically "available". I scanned the list and found about two.

Chris Gratton's a lazy *****. if we brought him in, we'd need to bring in someone else to protect him.

I said nothing about there being no need for those type of players. I said there's no need for a Sandy McCarthy or Brad Brown. There's no need for players who can't be trusted to step on the ice w/o giving up a scoring chance. Almost every player on your list can play actual hockey. To be honest, I'd rather trade for one of those guys than sign some of the names that have been thrown around.

*stares slackjawed* Are you seriously trying to arguing that more than 10 of the guys on that list are GOONS? For god's sake man...we are not talking about bringing in Chris Pronger for 450k! We're talking about useless players who just fill in the 4th line and play 7-8 minutes a game.

"I'd rather take a chance on him then a guy who couldn't find his own defensive zone with a GPS system." But you wanted Gratton? No, I agree w/ you in principle there, but I still prefer to build from w/i the organization than pick off free agent scalps. kocur: it'll deter some, and it'll encourage others. I think on the whole, it'll have a nil effect. And it isn't going to affect whether we win or lose games, either way.

Kocur: you think a goon's going to stop players from targetting our stars? Do you watch hockey? Other goons would be more likely to target our stars if we've got a goon on the ice. Whole retaliation bit.

Barnes: Well, you're not the only person who's commented, and most ppl seem to want some guy who can't play, just fight. Worse, they want to waste a defenseman's slot on a guy like that. lol, and you should see the Bruins' reactions when they got Scatchard. The "Fire Mike O'Connell" cries were out in force. While Isles fans laughed at them and told them to get used to a worthless, lazy player. So I dunno, maybe they all don't know what they're talking about, or maybe Scatchard isn't that great. *shrugs* I wouldn't have objected to that signing, I don't think. And isn't Lapointe still making like 2 mill? That's too much, w/ our cap problems. I dunno, I see where you're coming from, but I don't think its going to make or break the season. And I frankly dislike free agent signings in general. I'd rather fill a need w/ someone from w/i the organization than a merc. Mercs rarely fix a problem, they just put a really weak patch on it.

But having a guy who can fight and be a solid 4th liner will have no impact on our w/l record, regular season OR playoffs. I'm more concerned w/ the ppl who are going to play than the ppl who are going to sit on the bench. We need more grit, obviously, but we need more grit from the players on our top 3 lines, not from worthless goons who aren't going to play. That's coaching and mentality, and I *hope* that'll be fixed w/ Babcock.

Dominator, I'm going to pay Datsyuk and Zetterberg to DO BOTH. We don't need one dimensional scorers anymore than we need one dimensional fighters. We need players who are willing to grind it out at both ends of the rink AND score goals. Our problem w/ playoff scoring wasn't that we didn't have any goons to score goals; our problem w/ playoff scoring was our forwards were too ***** to go down and cycle the puck down low and pay the price in front of the net. They just floated out at the perimiter. And signing Brad Brown is not going to make Shanahan go behind the net or convince Datsyuk to hang out in the slot. That's a coaching issue. Not a goonery issue.