Legionnaire11

probably would have been 2 games if he didn't have prior history of suspensions. And unfortunately, he's got some naked photos of Trotz or something. Nichol is the one guy that I do not want on the Predators. Don't like him, never have, never will. He's cheap and dirty. Nice guy, dirty player.

I know, I think this group of players will lead a resurgance of the NHL. I also think that a lack of these type of players in the 90's are part of what hurt the league. Kind of like a team that doesn't draft well for a few years, the league as a whole didn't draft well (figuratively) for a while. As for you you left out. Eric Staal (only 4th season). Weber and Radulov in Nashville. Not in the NHL yet... Kyle Turris. Angelo Esposito, Alexei Cherepanov. Steve Stamkos, John Tavares. When these guys are hitting 26-27, the current group of stars will be the "30 something" veterans. Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Lecavalier, Iginla, Thornton, Kovalchuk, Marleau, Gagne, Briere, Nash. for the most part, this group is great, but took a few years to develop. The current crop of young stars seem to have hit the ice running and are already on fire. It's going to be an awesome league in just a couple of years (I think it already is, but the casual fans will be drawn in more in a few years)

Lots of love for Kane and Toews here. Will be interesting to see how people feel about them in 3-5 years after they've been torching the Wings for a while. Though, they are fun to watch. So is David Perron in St. Louis, that kid can't be older than 13, yet he consistently comes up with some amazing plays.

Favorite non-Preds.... Crosby Ovechkin E. Staal Holmstrom Brodeur Jagr Recchi Linden

the real shame is that all of the stars are stuck in a league that nobody cares about. all of those markets have fans. they love their teams and players. All of the other NHL markets know those star players and enjoy seeing them. But with the lack of exposure that the NHL has, it's not like a Mats Sundin is widely known outside of hockey. Having Jaromir Jagr in New York hasn't saved the game. Sure people have some great suggestions on how to make the league better. Everyone has ideas about re-aligning divisions, relocating franchises, changing rules, changing the schedule, etc... but there is really only one solution to the NHL's problems. Get a better television contract in the states. There is a lot of talk about how much money the Canadian teams make for the league. Well, the NHL has a good television deal in Canada. Look at how well the NFL does financially. What is the salary cap there? like $80M? And their television deal basically provides each team with enough money for their cap. That's at least $2B that the league gets from television. So tickets and merchandise are all gravy for that league. Imagine if the NHL could just manage to land a $300M contract. That would kick in an extra $10M for each team, and I don't think anyone would be losing money at that point. Plus the exposure on a contract like that would do wonders for tickets and merchandise. Instead I think the VS deal is something like $60-70M... less than $2.5M per team. That is your main problem with the league right now.

Where is "Juwana Man" on this list????

holy moly... Where are you going to fit those contracts onto those teams?

they may have just meant that they were paying a % of the $10M deposit

I don't think it's a %. I think it's $10M no matter what. And I believe the tampa group was going to pay that $10M in two payments of $5M rather than a lump sum like the Nashville group paid. could be wrong. But $10M was the number for Balsillie bid in Pittsburgh, and it was the number for Balsillies $220M+ bid on the preds as well as as the Nashville group's $193M bid on the preds. So I don't see why it would change to a % of the sales price for the tampa bid

Tennessean Article not sure if any wings fans caught this. Good luck with him, most Preds fans couldn't stand the way the marketing direction went after Violetta came on board with us. He just did a very poor job all around, especially for the kind of money that Leipold put into marketing. The article would have you believe that Violetta increase ticket sales... while totally neglecting the fact that the biggest increases came when we made the playoffs, signed kariya, signed arnott, traded for forsberg and had a ticket rally led by groups outside of the Preds organization. Oh well, i'd like to say that I hope he doesn't ruin the Wings marketing... but I really can't. Just thought i'd give you guys a heads up on who you're bringing in.

not only is it true that he threatened playoff blackouts (one of his first acts on the job), but he also blamed it on the individual fans, or as he likes to refer to them "jack-and-jill fan" rather than pointing the finger at the corporate community that has always been the main culprit of our attendance woes. He's a ncie guy by all accounts... just not great at his job.

yeah man, Moses could part a defense like no other!

i'm not disputing the mathematical technicalities. no one is saying you're wrong in your explanation. Only that for any historical purposes, past, present and future. If you look up any decade in a history book, it will start with the 10 and end with the 9. if the Canadiens don't win a cup in the next two seasons, history will state that they failed to win a cup in the first decade of this century.

some calenders start with 0. either way, the new decade is always regarded as starting on the 10's. for the NHL's purpose, the next decade will be from 2010-2019

if you guys are such great predictors of the future, surely youd have won the lottery by now. lets give these guys the first year to see if the corporate support starts turning around, there are supposedly a lot of fence sitters waiting for the new owners before they'll jump on board (even though that makes no sense if they really wanted to help the team). As it is, it's likely that the team will make a profit this season (slashed payroll, no marketing, higher ticket prices). And then when this re-worked lease kicks in it'll be even more favorable to the owners, it's already going to kick in even more money than leipold was losing on average, and then throw in the fact that AEG is getting on board with arena management (they'll already diverted a Celine Dion concert to the arena as a show of good faith), I think a lot of people outside of Nashville will be surprised by how well this thing works out over the next 5 years

Agreement reached with Mayor Still has to be passed by the Metro Council and the Sports Authority. It's very likely both will pass it. Then the NHL is expected to vote and approve the new owners without any problems.

Mats Sundin - Yes Eric Lindros - Yes Peter Forsberg - Yes Jeremy Roenick - Yes Rod Brind'Amour - Yes Mark Recchi - Yes Mike Modano - Yes Keith Tkachuk - Yes Chris Osgood - Yes Scott Niedermayer - Yes Brendan Shanahan - Yes Sergei Fedorov - Yes Rob Blake - Yes Alexander Mogilny - Yes Curtis Joseph - Yes Teemu Selanne - Yes Gary Roberts - Yes Nikolai Khabibulin - Yes had to go back and research some and then change my answers. look for yourself, not just regular season, but playoffs included. All of these guys have been unbelievable, I was actually surprised at some of the guys I originally said no to and then saw the numbers they put up.

strange that paul would say that since the legal stuff was worked out last week. The hold up now seems to be that the city wants every one of the investors to provide a PERSONAL financial statement to the city every year. Something that no other professional sports owners are asked to do. And by submitting their personal information to the city, it becomes accessible by any resident of davidson county who requests the information.

so wings fans are finally starting to see their team as the evil empire??

the roller coaster continues... No Deal Yet

popping in a little late, just wanted to drop a line and wish the wings good luck. I HATE the blues, especially jackman and mayers. But hey, this is a good game to watch so far for someone who doesn't have a team in it, it's starting to look like some of the older 90's matches between Wings and Blues... stinks that perron is killing you right now

here's some Lindros video. Ask yourself how many players would survive 13 years and put in 800 points playing this type of game. He was as physically dominating as any player ever. Didn't live up to the hype, but you can never call him a bust... and a bonus for Wings fans... Lindros TKO's Konstantinov

Mason also played that shootout terribly. he's generally a great shootout goalie, he stays upright and doesn't bite on dekes, stays square and forces the shooters into favorable angles, but for some reason on both the Datsyuk and Zetterberg shots, he overcommitted early. Last season he was way better than Vokoun in the shootouts. Seemed to correct it again last night. as for Radulov. he went in the Ovechkin draft, all the scouts said he had the second best offensive talent behidn Ovechking, but lacked the overall game and had a bad attitude... so he fell to 15th or something. hasn't shown any bad attitude, the kid is great.

this forum won't let me make tables... so I can't show you graphically. But lets look at some players... Gretzky Lemieux Yzerman Sakic Jagr Fedorov Messier Forsberg Selanne Kariya Modano Robitaille Hull Sundin Shanahan Recchi LeClair Now other than the bottom two, most everyone agrees that these guys are all going to the hall (if they're not already in). And if you project everyone's stats over a full season, and compare them to Lindros' stats over a full season, you'll see that lindros was at or near the top every year from 93-00 (which was his Flyers career before he was forced to take a year off and go to the rangers) Projected over a full season, lindros had the following stats... Year ... Goals/Points 93 ... 56/103 94 ... 57/125 95 ... 53/128 96 ... 53/129 97 ... 50/125 98 ... 39/92 99 ... 46/107 00 ... 40/88 Project his career stats across full seasons... 511 goals, 1199 points The best barometer of his greatness is to look at his wingers. (seasons with Lindros in bold) Mark Recchi 93 ... 53/123 94 ... 40/107 95 ... 27/82 96 ... 28/78 97 ... 34/80 98 ... 32/74 99 ... 18/61 00 ... 28/91 John LeClair 93 ... 22/51 94 ... 22/49 95 ... 47/99 96 ... 51/97 97 ... 50/97 98 ... 51/87 99 ... 46/97 00 ... 40/77 Great Players make their linemates great. You can't argue with the production between of players with Lindros and without Lindros

absolutely. would love to meet you!