b.shanafan14

Jeeze, for all the soft crap they've called to put the Kings on 5-on-3, they aren't calling anything the other way. Pathetic. ...and goal. Great.

I'm with you. I feel a combination of surprise and confusion. I think this is one of the only times since Babcock has been here that I can recall him benching an established player. Its made more confusing by the fact that: 1) a guy like Cleary wasn't benched way before White, and 2) that he waited until after the Wings/White have started to have some success. I suppose healthy bodies are part of the reason, but it seems like this is a little late, considering the 5-7 games span where White was garbage defensively and producing nothing offensively. I pretty much understood that Babcock just plain didn't use benching as a means to spark/discipline players. Now I'm just confused. And I know we need to get Quincey reps to test his injury, but he still remains Duke of Suck, A-Number-1 when it comes to blueliners.

Great signing, so pumped about this. This kid has been great so far. He has been so steady, and lately has been throwing the weight around big time. The way he tossed a Nuck to the ice and took the puck behind his own goal last night made me think Brad Stuart never left. Good one, Kenny!

Please win? :/

RIGHT NOW, it is a perfect storm of injuries and subpar coaching from the entire staff. As I've said before, while Bertuzzi, Franzen, Helm, and Smith would improve the lineup, they would not be replacing the players who deserve to be scratched, but rather the young guys who have been steady and energetic throughout this mess. Replacing pluses with pluses provides limited returns when compared to replacing minuses. If the staff, Babcock included, had the balls to grant ice-time based on merit, not seniority this team would not be losing games as often now, and they would be much better off when certain healthy players return. This has been a problem with the Wings for a few years now. Also, Renney's powerplay is dreadful, and yet nothing is being done to change it. Given these problems, I don't think you can attribute any of this season's limited success to coaching, but rather huge performances out of Datsyuk and Zetterberg on any given occasion. That said, this team in its healthiest state is not built well, and that lies squarely on Holland's shoulders. Bringing in spare parts, past-their-primes, and glass men to replace great players is not a solution, but its what we've seen since 2009. As others have said, Bertuzzi while decently solid has had his share of injuries and is getting old, and he is the best acquisition not named Brunner the Wings have had since Hossa. A healthy Sammy and Cola does nothing but force out more young players who have earned their spots. Overriping has turned into wasting away and this team is too old, too fragile, and too complacent, with players forced into positions they don't belong (Kronwall as #1 D, Cleary/Sammy as top-6/PP, etc.) As bad as this team is injured, payroll to returns comparison looks much worse with it healthy. TLDR: Injuries suck, but ice-time needs to be merit-based and it isn't. Coaching has not kept us afloat, individual performances have. Injuries and coaching aside, Holland has done nothing to build a winner and insure the future in almost 4 seasons and should shoulder the majority of the blame for the sad state of things.

The kid must have looked to skillful and energetic last night to stay :/ Seriously though, while the kid hasn't set the world on fire in his call-ups, this move makes zero sense to me. I'm sure he'll be claimed and relegated to the 3rd/4th line of a bottom feeder, but still. I feel like we've waived so many players like this that eventually someone is going to make something of himself. Even worse, I shudder to think of the Quincey situation, sent out, making something of himself, then when he is beginning a downswing all of a sudden Holland pulls a "we regret moving him, he's grown, he knows the system" and gives up a pick.

I've been saying it since the season started, that as much of a patchwork lineup the Wings are icing these days, logic would dictate that their weakness lies in the young call-ups from Grand Rapids. Unfortunately, the consistent issue has been the play of our healthy starters. The play of guys like Lashoff and Tatar has been super consistent compared to White, Quincey, and Cleary. In fact, today's game recap article from MLive says it all: "Veteran mistakes negate youthful spark Red Wings received, as surging Ducks skate away with 5-2 win" The Wings are injured as much as I've ever seen them, and the guys that they are missing have left some serious holes in both scoring and defense, but their biggest problem every night is not the guys they are missing, or their young replacements, but they guys that would be in the lineup for better or worse, injuries or no. Its hard to say we lost because we were missing Datsyuk, Franzen, and Bertuzzi, when the two scorers from last night were young call-ups, Tatar has more points than Miller, White, Eaves, and Emmerton, and Andersson has more points than Abdelkader, Cleary, and Quincey. The positive, this team has some great young players in the system that are hungry and ready for a chance. The negative, this team is spending too much cap-space on scrubs like Quincey, White, and Cleary to give those kids a shot with a lineup healthy enough for them to make a difference.

Something has to give on this team. They played great for the first 2-3 minutes, then kind of just tread water.

Oh. My. F******. God.

Why am I still looking at Cleary on the first PP unit? Brunner has gotten every single goal this season humming around the crease, he needs to be out there with D and Z.

Great...

Just win. The Wings need points desperately. It is nauseating to see Cleary and Abdelkader on Datsyuk's line again tonight. And is it too much to ask that we try something new on the PP? How much longer do we have to watch Brunner at the point, where his shot is either useless or we give up short-handed breaks because he is pinching. D-Z-Brunner-Kron-Lashoff Tatar-Filpulla-Andersson-Ericsson-White Those powerplay units couldn't possibly be any worse than the ones we have been working with, and at least we have defensemen at the point to hold the zone and Brunner down low where he belongs.

I feel like your evaluation of Cleary is the same as Holland and Babcock's: valid a year or two ago, but no longer. Cleary this season has proved far less capable of battling along the boards, giving the opposition fits, working, digging, and retrieving than most anyone on this team. He's appeared to have played better the last few games, but its because he is playing with the best player in the game. Last night Cleary did very little from a mucking, creating havoc, and generally being a work-horse standpoint; the things that used to make him successful. You seem to acknowledge that he isn't the same Dan Cleary anymore, and yet when I read the rest of the post it sounded like you were Ken Holland and just brought him back after he failed elsewhere, living in the past, describing how he was years past to justify his acquisition today. Dan Cleary has provided nothing unique or useful the majority of this season. Any flashes of his old self do not trump the contributions just about any other player in the lineup could provide better and more consistently at this point in time. Tatar provides energy, skill, enthusiasm, and scoring touch, on top of being generally tough to play against. Even Tootoo would do a better job on Pavel's wing, providing all the things you described in Cleary but a whole lot better.

I wish I had a replay of Pavel that entire game. It was a rare effort, even for him. Every time he touched the puck last night, my jaw dropped. As good as that play was, its crazy to think he made 3-5 more plays of that same caliber or better throughout the night. He had a definite "f*** this, we're winning tonight" swagger about him every shift. Unfortunately, he was stuck with two 4th liners for 20+ minutes.

This. 1000 times this. Besides Howard's injury and the loss of a point, there is nothing worse to come out of this game than Cleary getting two gimme points off of Pasha's superhuman effort. Cleary is the single worst player on this team not named Quincey or White, and has been all season. Pasha was in rare form even for him last night. I swear Babcock chooses Pavel's linemates based on seniority, or perhaps intense rounds of rock-paper-scissors before the game, because it hasn't been based on merit for years. Now in Holland and Babcock's minds, Cleary's minutes to this point and beyond are completely justified. Cleary's two points last night (which puts him at 3 points for the season, averaging 17 minutes in ice time a night with some of the best players and on the PP) could not have been less earned. One was a shot from the slot after a terrific effort from Datsyuk, scoring his first goal on his 30th shot of the season. The second was pure coincidence that the puck hit him before Pavel molested all 6 Predators on the ice.

Nothing gives me an aneurysm quicker than hearing "keep doing what we're doing" as the answer to "how do we change our fortunes in the win-loss column".

Babcock's strategy: spread your talent thin, make your best players play with your worst, switch even strength lines often, never change up powerplay lines no matter how bad they are, call out good players in a slump, baby bad players playing awful, and always end in a post-game presser talking about how good you thought you were and how you deserved better. Repeat. *sigh*

Dan Cleary played 21 minutes tonight............. How could they lose???

Datsyuk did everything tonight, which makes that ending suck even more. The poor talented bastard is stuck dragging around Cleary and Abdelkader the whole game. The team was on his back tonight. Thanks for the point, Pasha... Babcock's lines are absurd, even with the injuries. The powerplay is sad. Let the best shot on the team Brunner play wing and hang around the crease, it's where he is getting his goals.

I agree, but I think it is both, because there are times when they do establish possession and then spend the next 30-40 seconds killing off their own PP by passing, double-clutch, lane closes, pass, double-clutch, lane closes, errant pass, retrieve, pass, double-clutch.... well you get the point. But overall, I think their problem when they are really pressed to get a PP is trying to bull-rush the zone then forcing a poorly placed shot that is either immediately cleared or blasts along the boards and out of the zone altogether. Set-up and TAKE the shots that PRESENT themselves. The whole team is second-guessing which results in either rushed shots or none at all. A successful PP finds the happy medium called "confidence" or "composure". The Wings have very little of that on special teams right now.

I swear, Cleary has something on Babcock. Anytime he starts calling out positives and negatives on players (ala calling out Filppula), he always omits Cleary: Link: http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2013/02/red_wings_coach_mike_babcock_s_2.html

With Samuelsson, "shot the puck" doesn't really consider the target. Babs loves seeing pucks hitting glass, the protective netting, or shinpads, so it counts

"Our July 1st was really April 4th when we were able to lock up Filppula, Howard, and Cleary long-term. We really liked our team and thought that if it wasn't for injuries last season that prevented our team from really gelling, be would have made some serious noise. We'll wait and see for the next month how it plays out, but we like our squad now. We think the addition of *insert one-time second/third line winger with one high scoring season forever ago turned journeyman* really bolsters our secondary scoring, plays tough, is a good veteran presence for the (one or two) young players (who will see even less ice-time than said scrub acquisition), etc. etc."

Unfortunately, the biggest culprits in the recent losses are not the "green" kids from GR or the players we are missing to injury. As players get healthy, we'll start to replace young and energetic players who have been great in their replacement roles, instead of the lackluster veterans who are guaranteed roster spots under this staff. Look at tonight, we have two players rotate in, Samuelsson and Huskins for two players that have played pretty good, Nyquist and Kindl. The energy of Nyquist was replaced with Cleary 2.0. This will continue, and while the Wings have players like Bertuzzi, Franzen, Helm, and Smith which will benefit the group, their impacts are diminished by the fact that we are not replacing the problem players but rather players who have really earned their ice time. Tatar for Bertuzzi is a wash the way Tots is playing. Smith's return will likely lead to the demotion of the steady Lashoff. The problem players like Cleary, Quincey, and White will remain. The lineup is weak, and it won't be as simple as replacing negatives with positives, more like replacing positives with other positives. Bertuzzi (+1) replacing Tatar (+1) is a wash. If Bertuzzi (+1) was replacing Cleary (-2) that would be a completely different story (+3). That's how I think about it anyways...

The worst part of this whole thing is that this is completely avoidable without missing the playoffs. Holland knew Lidstrom was close to retirement for years. He knew the equation of clinging to old players too long wasn't working anymore. And when things are going ****-up like they are right now, there is shuffling within the system and trade to try and right the ship. There is absolutely no need to miss the playoffs other than to shine a brighter light on what everyone can see plain as day.