toby91_ca

You have got to be absolutely s***ting me. I have to admit, I didn't read your entire rant, I just read the part about Wings fans not bitching about the refs when we lost in prior years. This is so far from the truth it isn't funny. I tend to stay away from here when the Wings lose....the complaints about the refs get that bad.

People say it all the time about Brodeur. For the most part, any great player is going to have doubters. The greater you are, the greater the arguments against you, just the way it is.

You need to have played 41 games or at least 1 game in the Finals. Downey has played 56 games, so his name goes on if they win. Had he only played 39 games, the Wings could petition to have his name added, but I think it would be a tough argument as I am not sure the what the extenuating circumstances would be that have kept him from playing.

Lids, Zetterberg, Draper and Ozzie are in a bit of different situation....just having gone up 3-1 and ready to win the Cup, vs. Crosby, who has just gone down 3-1 and ready to lose the series, being asked about his team's failure to score on the 5-3 and asked to comment on the play of Zetterberg. If I was in his shoes, I would have been so pissed, I would not want to be sitting there answering any questions at all, he must have been so frustrated. When you consider that, I don't have a problem at all with how he conducted himself. I say this based on seeing other press conferences of his, or general public speaking. He always, always downplays his role and points to his teammates as being very important, he compliments other players around the league, etc.

I agree with this, however, I think the tendancy is to first look at the winning goaltender to see if they are worthy. With Osgood, his has the best GAA, the best save % (for goalies that have played more than 6 games) and is tied for most shutouts with 3. Someone can argue all they want about these being team stats, which I agree for the most part, but Osgood has been great when he has need to be and it would be very difficult to argue against those stats. Without someone with a clear edge offensively (which Zetterberg does not have), it would be difficult to not award it to Osgood. I think the fact that Zetterberg has been able to hold Crosby in check for the most part is huge, but I think that variable will fall a little lower on the list when it comes time to vote. Had Zetterberg come into the Finals and put up some big points and finished as the scoring leader, I think he would have a good chance at winning it. Like or not, I think that what it will come down to.

Thought about it some more and if you really want to look at it on a round by round thing, think about this: Yes, with the first selection in each round, theorectically, you get to pick the best player available each round.....HOWEVER, if I have picks 20 and 30 in each round, I get to pick a player better than the best available player each round by having the last pick in the previous round (plus the other additional picks each round). The only time that doesn't hold true is with the 1st overall pick....which is why that is the ONLY benefit of that scenario.

The first overall pick is the ONLY benefit, not the obvious benefit, the ONLY benefit. You have not even attempted to explain the other benefits yet. The examples you provided attempt to point to why the 1st overall pick is a huge benefit, but nothing further. Why on earth would I look at it round by round vs. simply looking at draft order. I'm sorry, but on what planet would someone rather have the 31st pick than the 30th? After the first overall pick, the difference between the two scenarios is that you are shifting each pick one position later in the scenario you prefer, plus the other scenario throws in an extra pick each round as well.

I think Ozzy has it locked up unless something strange happens. While Zetterberg and Datsyuk have been great defensively in the Finals, they haven't been scoring, which will matter when it comes to the voting.

That is true, had the series been close and Gretzky picked up a lot of points, maybe he would have won it. Crazy stats going into the finals though (34 points in 12 games). Even if Crosby had 10 points in the Finals and leads the scoring list by 10 points, I don't think that is enough to award him the Conn Smythe if his team doesn't win. The thing is, if he puts up those numbers and leads the scoring list by 10 points, then its hard to imagine the Pens not winning, so its a moot point.

He did give credit to the great play. I stopped listening after the discussion on Zetterberg, so didn't hear the so called whining about obstruction, but that' s a different discussion anyway. I'd like to see some examples from Lids, Yzerman and Sakic where they are giving credit where credit is due anymore than Crosby did immediately after losing game 4 in the Finals to go down 3-1 in the series.

I don't understand your logic.....the first overall pick is the ONLY benefit. First picks: 1st 31st 61st 91st 121st, etc. 20th and 30th picks: 20th 30th 50th 60th 80th 90th 110th 120th 140th 150th Please explain how there are more benefits in the first scenario other than getting the 1st overall pick

Do you actually believe this, or are you just saying it.....? If you truly believe this, then I seriously have to wonder........I'll leave it at that.

Nothing to worry about. Crosby will only get consideration if the Pens win. There has only been 5 times in the history of the award whereby a player from the losing team has won it and 4 of those times, it has gone to a goalie. The only time in history whereby a non-goalie from a losing team won it was Reggie Leach, 32 years ago. He just so happened to dominate the scoring chart that playoff year. He had 19 goals in 16 games. The closest teammate to that had 6 and the highest scorer on the winning team had 7 goals. Crosby has been excellent, especially later on in the playoffs and while he is the leading scorer that is simply not enough to get consideration. Now, if he had 35+ points and everyone else's stats were the same, then we might start talking. I'm not even sure that would be enough. Look at Gretzky in 1983, he had 38 points in 16 games (closest teammate was Kurri, with 23 points). A couple Islanders had 26 and 28 points in 20 games (1.4 ppg vs. Gretzky's 2.38). As dominating statistically as Gretzky was that year, he didn't win the Conn Smythe. Billy Smith did

Yzerman whined quite a bit actually, and not just as a youngster, I think most captains whine. That said, I haven't seen all this whining from Crosby during the finals that others seem to see every time a camera is on him (which I think they are just spewing BS). I have been watching some games and see something occasionally that a Wings's player does (be it whining or a dive, etc.) and I think to myself, "I'm glad that wasn't Crosby, because if it was, there would be an entire thread or 2 on here talking about it." Fact is, the things people complain about that Crosby does are nowhere near out of the ordinary. The things he does, 100% of the players in the league does, people just criticize Crosby for it because of who he is. Can you even imagine what he has to deal with on a daily basis....at his age?

I'm not sure why the poll is so close, I think it should be closer to 68-0 in favour of the #20 and #30 picks in each round. The absolutely only benefit of the other option is getting the #1 pick in the draft, after that, what's the difference other than getting twice as many chances at landing a good player? The only way the 1st option is really attractive is if you have a surefire star who is going to be drafted 1st overall....and there are not a lot of those examples around.

I think what is most pathetic is the actual critism towards Crosby for his post game comments. Have we really gotten to the point that we can't find anything on the ice to complain about when it comes to Crosby so we are going to look at what he says during press conferences and just wait for one small thing said wrong and then jump on him? For the record, I hadn't seen the comments, but went looking and found video of it and didn't see anything out of the ordinary. He suggested Zetterberg made a great play on him and went on to say that he didn't do anything else that another player in that role wouldn't have done. To be honest, I can't say I disagree. The play on Sid was excellent, but other than that, he wasn't superhuman out there. That is not a critism, just reality. Did he play excellent on the penalty kill? Yes. Was his play during that penalty kill (aside from the play on Crosby) so good that it should be the talk of the game? No. Are we really bashing on Crosby now because he isn't drooling over the talented Wings' players. Are we seriously doing this? What do you expect someone, who just lost a game to go down 3-1 in a series, to say? Why the hell should he start throwing compliments about the other team, if he was doing that, I would probably bash him because that's not what the captain of a team should be doing....at that point in time. I thought he was very focused, acknowledged a great play and not much else, WITHOUT BEING DISRESPECTFUL. I think it was a supid question to ask to be honest with you.

Don't get too hung up on stats, Crosby has played very, very well in all games. The difference in the 3rd game is that the pucks have gotten to the back of the net. He's been creating chances in each game. Datsyuk and Zetterberg have been great defensively so far, but they definately do need to pick it up offensively. Detroit has actually been getting lots of scoring outside those 2 guys....which I'm somewhat pleased and surprised with. If you told me that after 3 games, Datsyuk would have 0 pts and Zetterberg would have 1g, 1a, I wouldn't believe that the Wings were up 2 games to 1.

And the Wings are getting away with just as much if not more....it goes both ways. The only thing I don't like about playoff time is the constant complaining on here about reffing. When the team dominates, everyone here puts down the other teams fans for their complaining, but watch out when the Wings lose, not a pretty place to be when that happens. Normally there are guys that start hating the refs, Bettman and then they start ripping into some Wings that are easy to pick on. Here is a FACT: If you are a fan of a team and you are complaining about how the reffing has gone in the series, I can guarantee you that the other side is complaining about the same thing. More often than not, calls are missed on both sides, bad calls are made on both sides and it all evens out in the end. The Wings have had 19 power plays to the Pens 11. It is hard to justify any bias towards the Pens when looking at that stat.

5 of the top 6 players in the world play for the same team? Yeah, guess that makes sense.......

Here's the thing.....both of these teams have been pretty unbeatable at home, in Fact, Fleury hasn't lost at home since sometime in November. Let the Pens win every game they play on home ice, as long as the Wings win their home games, they win the series, simple as that. With all the talk about how useless the regular season had become (though, probably less so after the lockout), I think we are truly seeing payoff for getting the top seed.

From everything that I have heard, Malkin will want a lot more than Crosby. The thing is, if players really felt they had something special going, they might consider taking less to keep the team together. In looking at Malkin, I'm not sure I see him doing that. It's become more recent as I didn't see it before. I'm not sure what it is, just a feeling I have. P.S. this has nothing to do with any Greedy Russian theory.

It will be interesting to see what happens. If they manage to win, it will give them some much needed confidence (which an inexperienced team loses very quickly). I keep harping on the "experience" factor in this series and I will continue to do so as I see it as being HUGE. That said, if the Pens win tonight, gives them confidence going into game 4 and if they win that....what out. Interesting stat.....Pens haven't lost at home since Feb. 24th (over 3 months now).

How is this classless? Teams do this ALL THE TIME. If you can sellout to local fans, why would you want anyone else in?

Well, they are actually following the same pattern as the Oilers almost exactly, except just a year or two sooner. The Oilers were a very young and talented team in the early 80's and the first year they made the finals they were swept by the Islanders. Inexperience..... The next year they came back and won it all. I can see where people will try desparately to draw comparisons......they need to, they want something to talk about. However, there is a very key difference here, the times were different back then. Everyone was heart broken when the the Oilers weren't kept together for the long term, but if you think about it, the core (Messier, Gretzky, etc.) were together for 9 or 10 years. Even that is unheard of these days. The cap will hinder the chances of ever having another dynasty like that. If I am not mistaken, I don't a single player on those 80's Oiler teams made more than $1 million.

I think more than a few on this board have taken the Datsyuk a little too far and have exaggerated what really happened. To be clear, unless someone has other video that I haven't seen, Datsyuk and Roberts were in a scrum and the cameras were all over the place, when it came back near those two, from what I could see, Datsyuk threw a couple punches at the same time a linesman was basically pushing Roberts away. The awesome part about it is simply that Datsyuk is there and being physical, not backing down, sticking up for teammates. In the past, he was basically eliminated during the playoffs because he was not able to keep up with the physical game. So, let's be real here, Roberts would destroy Datsyuk if they actually fought, Datsyuk did not knock Roberts down with a punch, etc. Even those exaggerating on what happen don't believe this (I would think not anyway), I just think everyone is getting excited about his increased physical play, his desire to win, etc.