achildr1

I think Preds/Flyers or Blues/Flyers is most likely. I think a Blues/Flyers final would be fantastic. That said, personally, id love a Coyotes/Panthers final. Ratings would probably be terrible but it would be great for those fanbases.

Whoa buddy. The cliff was the feet ago and you just dove off it. #1...Columbus wanted Logan Couture from SJ plus picks/prospects. Couture, even though I can't stand him, i believe has more value alone than Cleary and Franzen (considering Franzen's contract and age). Superstar players can't be had for our old, injured, underperforming 2nd liners. #2...So we'd invest $7 MIL in Parise (cause that's more like what he'd likely get), $8 in Nash, 6.5 Dats, 7 in Z....all on offense?! What team in this league pays elite money to four players on offense? Oh and pay Fil, DOAN?! (Which is very unlikely anyway), and Bert the money they make. #3...We need a replacement for Lidstrom. With a top 10 NHL dman able to be had for just money, you gotta do that before putting that money towards an extra elite forward (Nash). Even if Lidstrom stays. #4. Our team, and defence, is not good enough. They've proven that. If they stay the same and get a year older, bad news. Although Smith, Kindl, and Ericsson should progress nicely.

I wouldn't say its the end of the Bowman era. He left the organization in what '07? He was a "consultant". Knowing Scotty, that probably means he had a big say in what we should do.

Franzen in DET, Gomez in MTL, Pronger in PHI?, Komisarek or Phaneuf in TOR, Lecavalier iin TB, Kovalchuk in NJ, Bouwmeester in CGY, Steve Mason in CLB, Richards/Carter in LA. If they allow that, it should get interesting. Washington could legitimatly look at Ovechkin.

Florida has Jacob Markstrom as 'tender of the future. Could split time with Theodore as early as next year. If they got Luongo they could have Vancouver's situation in two years...doubt that they do it. If NJ lets Parise walk and acquires Luongo, LouLam should be fired immediately. Tampa makes sense from a need standpoint but id be blown away if Steve was that short sighted, plus Vinny's contract is a big enough albatross as it is. Although, if the next cba allows for a one time, side effect free buyout, it might be ok for whoever gets him. I wonder if the Islanders would do it and if Luongo would even go there...

Kenopka would be cool as he's supposssed to be a pretty good face-off guy. I think we need to have an answer to Gaustad types. Get back to dominating the face-offs like we used to. Realistically, we don't have room on D for a tough guy. Ericsson needs to step up and be the force that he can be. Up front we're probably looking at... ________ Datsyuk. Nyquist Filppula. Zetterberg. Franzen Cleary. Helm. Bertuzzi Miller. Abdelkader. Holmstrom/Mursak/Emmerton/Eaves I doubt Holland signs a tough guy...I would venture to guess he'll just hope Abdelkader takes some more boxing classes and turns into a bonafide scrapper. Underline is either Parise or Hudler, I imagine. Filling that out just made me realize that Homer is likely to be pushed out and Emmerton should be shipped out to.

You must have a really nice job, if John Keating is the biggest idiot you know. BTW, I'm pretty sure Larry Murphy gives him a run for his money... Lol. My Wife and I were discussing that phenomena the other day. She said, "Yea, we think we can change em all...". Left me wondering what she thinks of me, Lol.

I've grown up with this game, I love it. But I've never in my life thought the NHL was so utterly pathetic, cheap, and blatently crooked and biased in my lifetime. After seeing that Torres got 25 games for that hit, I've seen enough. I understand the game of hockey and have watched and played long enough to know that hit differed from a Kronwall hit by about an extra second. Seriously, watch it again. I have no idea what all this fuss is about. Once again though, its a bottom 6 guy, so the NHL can make a statement. They can make up for not suspending clear intent to injure the head, from behind, of another on a non-hockey play by giving out an assininely overboard suspension to a bottom six guy on what essentially was a late hit. A late hit to the front of a player (head up Hossa!). The clear bias towards star players is sickening. Some of Kronwall's hits have been similar to that hit and nothing happens. The funny part is we knew already that Weber would get a slap on the wrist and it happened just like we said. "Well that's just the way it is" is not good enough, this is embarrassing for hockey. The NHL's attempt at any serious regard for players health and safety is marred by the fact that when the rubber meets the road and they have to make a tough decision, they drop the ball. Any rule they make has some kind of loophole for star players and then they act like they can throw the book at Brendan Smith, Raffi Torres, etc. E Now i start to watch closely at what happens when its a player from a team that Bettman really needs to succeed, in his small market experiments (Nashville). The fact that the NHL owns the Pheonix Coyotes is one of the biggest conflicts of interest I've ever seen and should call into question almost everything that happens in a playoffs series with them involved. Bettman has went to near every length he can to keep them there (while letting ATL go without so much as a breath of remorse) and I would not be surprised in the slightest to learn of any involvement between him and anyone that has any way to even quietly influence a series in their favor. There's hundreds of millions of dollars at stake and we all know Bettman is all about money. I'm happy for the Coyotes and I haven't got to watch any of that series but I legitimately wonder if its being called toward Pheonix's favor. I was glad to see the Penguins getting stomped but I started wondering if the officiating was goingto turn toward Pittsburgh because I know that series is getting a ton of tv viewers and makeing the league a ton of money. Call it conspiracy but in the last four years the NHL has shown its true colors and bias and it seems to follow the money to me. Our series with the Pens, the first SJ series in the 2nd round (the most epically crooked thing I've ever watched in hockey), and now the clear confusion/bias in dealing with suspensions has shown how much of a crooked league we have. I miss the old NHL. I know this is all over the place right now, maybe ill finish and expound on my thoughts when I can (at work now).

#1...blueadams can't post without making out lines. You must play Franchise mode NHL 12 for hours on end. #1a...your a little bit crazy, no disrespect, but cmon man. Suter, Parise, and Doan? That's nutty even before you declared it somewhat realistic. #2...Ericsson really surprised me lately. Don't trade him. He was one of our best players in the series. He looked poised and very good defensively. (If any of you know me, you know that this is a big admission. I've thought Ericsson has been terrible for 90% of his time here) If this is the new Big E, he could be a #4 guy. Shutdown ace, like Stuart was 4 years ago but bigger and meaner.

Anyone notice that the pick we traded for Quincey is probably lower than you thought it was going to be? 23rd overall I think. Ugh. Right with you about Bert. One year...great, I'm down with that. Two?! Uh, this is a 45 point player...in your top 6. I don't know if he would take to a checking role in year two. Our D has been bad for awhile now. '08 seems like 10 years ago. Stuart needs to go, Lidstrom has to stay, and Suter needs an offer. Cleary is the Brandon Inge of the Wings. Hard worker, great effort but always hurt and inconsistent, if you have to actually count on his production...watch out. I like Cleary more than Inge though...he has a less of the entitlement attitude.

We were there. My sons first Wings game and my daughters second. Shootout win too, one of my favorite memories of the season. Personally though, even the home streak seems like an anomaly. We had a lot of injuries but even healthy there's something about Franzen's lazyness, Hudler's ...Hudlerness, Stuart being terrible, and the just general sense that there is a huge lack of passion on this team. I don't feel like they're a tight knit group that truly wants to win the Cup. Someone told me that Bert was the only one that played like he was desperate last night, guess who doesn't have a Cup ring? Maybe it's time to show the guys that you can't play hard inconsistently and get a free ride and get to stay a Wing. Maybe its time to not push guys that exemplify the effort you need (Draper) for middling fringe prospects (Emmerton). Stop over-rewarding guys for being over 6' (Franzen, Ericsson) and go out and sign a couple guys who will play there hearts out everyshift. Oh, and let Darren Helm know just how important he is to this team.

Maybe not to that extreme but I do believe a team full of guys with Rings means a bigger temptation to not care so much about losing. On a relative note, did anyone watch the pregame interviews? Abdelkader and Stuart looked and spoke like they didn't believe we were going to win. Stuart looked like he couldn't care less about it and Abdelkader looked mad to even be a part of it. Like they didn't even want to try to come back from the deficit. Pathetic really. I believe this team needs a serious shake-up. Something to wake up the guys who float around or only play hard 1/3 of the game. Holland, although I love that he's ours, I think has really made some strange decisions the last couple years. Ericsson (although he was very good in the playoffs) getting that contract tells the team you can be near useless and get a 300% raise while Draper (We really could have used a veteran faceoff specialist who goes hard every shift this playoffs) plays his heart out for 15 years and gets forced out the door. Lidstrom is on the verge of retiring and you sit on 6 million in cap space and let your rivals upgrade. This from a team that let Quincey go to be loyal to a 47 year old defenceman only to trade a 1st round pick to get him back. Same team that kept Maltby 3 years too long, Osgood, and brought back McCarty as basically a pure favor. If Homer is booted this year, he should be mad. And Lidstrom might follow him out the door, because what has Kenny been doing to make sure he stays?

He's actually been upset since last summer at the draft, I believe. When SJ got Burns I think he said some stuff implying that our rivals got significantly better and we didn't do anything.

How do you call these guys for overreaction and then say we need to rebuild? This team could easily be a guy or two away from league dominance. Heck, if Helm and Eaves were playing we might not even be discussing this. We've at least kept up with Nashville, they've just cashed in (and mostly on fortunate plays) at the right times and Rinne has held them in it. I watch us dominate for 10 minutes but I have that sneaky feeling that they'll get a goofy goal if they make it down the ice and that's whats happened. If Lidstrom stays, sign or trade a big body and/or go hard for Parise. If he doesn't, then ill listen to the rebuild talk...unless they sign Suter.

I'm so glad he's ours. If Barry Sanders, Kent Nilsson, and Herman Munster had a baby...

Lol KEVIN KLIEN just made Brad Stuart look like a statue. Nice.

Z clearly held his stick and goaded Tootoo into taking a penalty. Hard to argue after the replay.

Hahahaha. Take that Appalachia.

They're not used to being around long in the playoffs. Throw stuff while we still can!

Love this. Epic failure (does failure imply that justice was actually giving a fair shake? because this seems like a pretty blatent pass for one of the NHL's small market stars). Agreed.

For some reason I thought Howe when I read Howie. Lol, it would probably be better than Emmerton anyway. Gordie could probably still snipe a goal or two, must line him up with Dats.

Literally LOL'ed. Pasha is very sneaky.

I have no idea how I missed him being called the "Logo hunter/Shinguard assassin". That's awesome and perfect for him.

Calling all LGWer's. Anyone going? Me, my Wife, daughter (2nd game, 2 1/2 years old), son (first Wings game), and Mom will be in attendance. I met up with a couple guys before, thought id ask.

Too bad it's team Lidstrom...not Lindstrom. How did you do that 3 times?