wings4thecup06

While that's true that there might not be any kids besides Jurco who you could say definitely should be on the roster at the start of the year, were we really saying that about Sheahan and Jurco this time last year? Nyquist and Tatar yes, although Tatar properly hadn't proved himself at that point either. What I'm getting at is that given the opportunity, some of these kids will step up and grab the job and just run with it. Like Sheahan and Jurco did last year. I get the feeling that that would probably happen with either of Ouellet or Marchenko. My personal opinion is that they should find a way to trade Kindl and go with either of those two guys and just see what happens. What really, have we got to lose? That third pairing can't be worse than it was last season, and both guys have been strong when called upon for NHL duty.

Starting Jurco in GR for 12 games or so isn't necessarily a bad thing. Gives him more experience for a start, I'd much prefer he start the year in the NHL. I guess what I fear is that if the wings start slowly, or look like they're struggling, and there's one particular player who's really dragging the team down (Cleary? Cough Cough), will they do the right thing and demote Danny boy and bring up Jurco?

DD that's a good lineup, and one that I would pick also. Cleary really doesn't have a place here, but like it or not, he's the one that will squeeze out Jurco, not alfie. I'm anxiously awaiting training camp so we can find out what happens in this debacle. As for the D, they've got to move Kindl really. Now that Q is back for 2 years they've got to free up a spot to at least allow Marchenko or Ouellet to make the team and contribute.

Yea I read it too. Good article that seems to actually give credence to the youth that the wings have built up while simultaneously chastising management's somewhat costly obsession with hanging on to older worn down players for too long.

Hockey withdrawal symptoms have reached a point of catastrophy. To alleviate these symptoms I'm watching the entire 97 cup run and will spend most of September watching the 98 run also. This got me thinking. If you could name one Wings game that you saw that was in your opinion the greatest game you've ever seen, what would it be? For me it's game 6 2002 WCF vs the Avalanche because it just demonstrated just how dominant Hasek really was and Roy's gaffe was such a beautiful moment. Even better that it virtually cost the Avs another shot at the cup. I just remember being so elated with joy after seeing us stick it to Colorado. That series and that rivalry had so much passion and intensity and I can still hear Gary Thorne's voice as Shanny put the puck past a showboating Roy. What about anyone else?

Ah. Gotcha. I stand corrected.

Injuries aside, I think for me the X factor here is that we've got youngsters now who are ready to contribute and have proven to do that over at least half if not a full NHL season. You combine that with a healthy D and Z and a better season from Howard and I can't possibly see how we can be worse than last year. Back on topic, Alfie re-signing will most certainly push Jurco down to GR unless Cleary literally plays his way off the club in camp, and they trade away Andersson.

Sorry what? Stevie Y became captain in 1986…..

I've got to say that I agree also. The stadium series last year was just a money grabbing gimmick that completely destroyed the legitimacy of the winter classic. But even now the WC is getting devalued itself I feel by the constant rotation of only a few teams. Look at this years game. Chicago vs Washington. That isn't a rivalry whatsoever. They're not even in the same conference. WTF? It's about time they started having WC games in new venues with new teams. See Minnesota.

The Wings are missing out on free agents maybe, but could you really say that any of those guys they targeted since Suter have been essential? If anything, missing out is helping to further the future of this team quicker, by allowing what we saw last season - guys like Jurco, Sheahan, Nyquist and Tatar have emerged as legitimate NHLers. Prospects will undoubtedly be moved when the Wings feel the need is there, and when they feel they are absolutely ready to do something that will put them either very close or over the top. I don't feel that we necessarily need to make a trade right now, other than to erase Kindl from the roster to allow for Marchenko/Sproul or Ouellet to begin the year with the big club. What this team needs most right now is to get its top players healthy for 90% of the season, and have further growth from the young guys who were such a big part of the team last season. Once that happens (and I firmly believe it will), then we all will have a better view of precisely what the Wings have and how good they could be. After that, something will happen to strengthen this team. All it is is patience. And in the trigger happy world that is the NHL, patience can be a virtue. I don't think any of us would be sitting here moaning about the Jarnkrok trade still if we'd gone on a deeper playoff run. But so what? This has been battered to death so can we just forget about it?

They'll find a way to f*** it up. Even if they draft both.

I agree. No matter how good the offence is. As we saw with the leafs last year, even a very talented goalie will have trouble carrying a team to the playoffs if the D is bad. Not helping things is the fact that they're in the West.

Either way, I don't think he's worth $9m per.

Did you read my post where I listed the changes for all the teams in the east? To repeat. Tampa added Stralman and Garrison on the back end, and Morrow and Brian Boyle up front, and Nabokov in net. Despite losing Purcell, they'll probably promote Drouin, so they'll definitely be better. Even with a healthy Stamkos for a full season and no other changes they'd be better. And what's your point about this years loss to the Bruins vs the 14 games we played in the previous years playoff? If you ask me, this year wasn't a true measure of our team, due to the decimated lineup and the fact that we never had our kids play with our top guys all year. Add into the mix subpar goaltending and a bunch of rookies who had never seen the playoffs before, and its no wonder. You will stick to your opinion of how this team will do this year and I will stick to mine, and that's fine. They're still a playoff team, and Im personally looking forward to seeing the Wings shut a lot of people up this season.

You can't really compare elite goalies to elite D men. For a start, there's like, 1/4th fewer goalies than D men. And I don't think you could say also that it has to be top 2 or top 3. Because if you went with just the top 2, and you've got Brodeur, Hasek and Roy, one of them therefore has to be classified as not elite right? Top 10 for the D men is probably more realistic because there are alot more of them for starters and with that being the case, there will be a few more elite players. Just the way it works. Altbough really, how many elite D men there are is all relative to the talent currently playing in the league. If there was a sudden influx of top elite D men talent into the NHL, you could easily make it top 20. As for the direction of this team, (back on topic) I think we're doing fine. This summer though has seemed to drag on and on, can it just be October already?

Well if you'd have asked me what I thought he was probably worth I would have said about $7.5 per. But $9? No way. Neither side really had a realistic estimate, but they never are for arbitration hearings. Still, it sounds like the Habs got killed by the bridge deal combined with taking PK to 2 arbitrations. Certainly doesn't help with the relationship. Now that they've got him signed, they'll be on the hook for driving up D men salaries for the next while also.

Most definitely. I've been waiting for it for a while now. It'll come sooner or later because these escalating contracts will only continue to get bigger and bigger. It is fundamentally, a joke. PK is a great player, yes, but no guy is worth that kind of money IMO.

So you've essentially gone and just contradicted yourself. You say that we are 'a basement team', now we're a top team? All in the span of one page of a forum thread? Words in CAPS aside, you're opinion that we are a mediocre team and the fact that you think that everyone in the east has got better while we have 'stayed the same', is precisely that. Opinion. I believe that lots of teams in the East didn't get better. Some stayed the same, and some got worse. That is my opinion. Let's have a brief look at the playoff teams from last season in the East and those on the bubble who missed out: Bruins - Lost Iginla, lost Thornton. Are still over the cap and haven't yet signed Reilly Smith or Torey Krug yet, so they're going to have to move someone. While still an elite team, losing a 30 goal scorer and a key 4th line component doesn't make them better, it means they got worse Tampa - IMO the team in the East that improved the most. Added Brenden Morrow and Brian Boyle up front to replace Purcell and Thompson most likely. They re-signedCallahan. Solidified their backup position by signing Nabokov. Big addition on the backend is Stralman, and they acquired a reclamation project in Garrison. With a healthy Bishop and possible Drouin addition, they definitely improved. Montreal - Subtractions - Gorges, Briere, Vanek, Gionta. Acquisitions, PA Parenteau, Gilbert and Malhotra. And they haven't got the Subban mess sorted out yet, which if they don't agree to a long term deal before the arbiter awards the 1 year deal each side proposed, then they'll have the entire thing hanging over their heads. No way this team improved. Pittsburgh - Losses - Niskanen, Orpik, Neal, Engellend, Jokinen. Acquisitions, Spaling, Hornqvist, Downie, Comeau, Ehrhoff. Are they better? I really don't see how. Spaling and Hornqvist don't make up for the loss of Neal, and neither does Ehrhoff over both Orpik and Niskanen. Even if they didn't get worse, they certainly didn't improve. NYR - Losses - Boyle, Richards, Stralman, Pouliot, Dorsett. Acquisitions - Stempniak, Hunwick, Dan Boyle, Glass. So they lost arguably their best line in the postseason, their top D man and only really got reclamation projects and Dan Boyle, who as we all know is on the way out. Am I missing something here? Because I don't see how the Rangers improved either. In fact I think they got worse Philadelphia - Losses - Downie, Gervais, Hartnell. Acquisitions - Stortini, Nick Schultz, Umberger. While they didn't improve, they didn't get worse either. Columbus - Losses - Nick Schultz, Skille, Comeau, MacKenzie, Nikitin, Umberger. Acquisitions - Hartnell, D'Amigo. Can you honestly sit here and say that they improved as well? Detroit - Losses - Legwand. Acquisitions - None. Re-signed Cleary and Quincey. So we didn't get in worse IMO, but I would argue that we got slightly better IF Pavel and Hank stay healthy and the kids contribute. The reason I'm optimistic is that at no point last year did we see this team with Pavel and Hank healthy play with the likes of Nyquist, Sheahan, Tatar, Jurco and co. And this is the key. Our top players stay healthy so that those young guys have less pressure and contribute more. A return to form from Howie will also help, as would 60 decent games out of Weiss. While I'm not oblivious to the fact that all that might not happen, I'm still optimistic that even if some of those things happen, we'll be a good team. So right now we definitely didn't get worse, but we could get better pending health. Washington - Key losses - Grabovski, Halak. Additions - Niskanen, Orpik, Justin Peters. So they got better on the backend, and the loss of Grabovski will probably be replaced by a full season out of Kuznetsov. So they got slightly better, although their goaltending is slightly shaky NJ - Losses - Fayne, Volchenkov. Acquisitions - Clemmensen, Havlat, Cammalleri. So they lost on the backend but improved their secondary scoring upfront, while also re-signing Jagr. So they got slightly better. Ottawa - Losses - Spezza, Hemsky. Acquisitions - Legwand, Chiasson, Guptill. No way these guys got better. Legwand and Chiasson do not replace Spezza and Hemsky. These guys might be challenging for McDavid. Toronto - Losses - McClement, Kulemin, Raymond, Bolland, D'amigo, Gunnarsson. Acquisitions - Winnik, Booth, Santorelli, Robidas, Polak, Frattin. They kind of replaced what they lost. They might have got slightly better on the backend, but other than that, I don't really see much improvement here from the Leafs. Probably stayed the same. Now, this is just my opinion, but by my count, that makes 5 teams on that list that I think got worse (Boston, Montreal, Pittsburgh, Ottawa, Rangers), 3 that got better (Tampa, Washington, New Jersey) and 4 that stayed put (Detroit, Columbus, Philadelphia, Toronto). With that in mind, I'd have to say that if healthy, the Wings have a decent shot here.

I don't know why they're messing about with Subban so much. That bridge deal really killed them though. PK's going to get paid, whether it be now, or in 2 years time if he gets to free agency.

I agree. With the state of the East and also our horrendous injury record from last season, this team is definitely capable of grabbing the number 4 seed, if not 3. While I will remain reserved until we see how the early part of the year plays out, I'm cautiously optimistic. Think about it. We've got Gus and Tatar not only starting the season on the roster, but they're both playing solid minutes each and every night. Add Sheahan into the mix, and Jurco, although he's looking like the first recall right now, pending what happens with Cleary. Even just with those 4 kids, that's a massive improvement right there. Increased speed, scoring depth and a little size with Sheahan. A healthy D and Z will be key, and getting Weiss going will really help too. Obviously there will be injuries. But if they're less frequent, and to less important players, then there's every reason to think that the Wings will at least challenge for a much higher seed, made all the more believable in my eyes by the fact that really only the Lightning got better in the East this offseason (of those that made the playoffs). Like I said, cautious optimism I think is how I'm approaching the upcoming year.

Yea I don't see why they'd re-sign Andersson. If anything, he'd be put in a package first, although I doubt that'd net us very much in return.

What about the Lilja OT giveaway to Selanne?

We could actually see this lineup at some point this season, which to me, is pretty exciting!

Yea. Having re-thought this, I think it'd be better just to scrap the loser point altogether and go with winner takes all in OT and shootout. But there has to be something done about reducing the amount of shootouts.

If the league is really concerned there are too many shootouts, here's what I think would be an interesting idea. Play the full 60 minutes as normal, if it's a tie, each team gets 1 point heading into OT. Play 4 on 4 OT but with a dry scrape and long changes But, if the game remains tied after OT and goes to a shootout, remove the single point from both teams and go winner takes all. Makes it a gamble to go all conservative in OT praying for a shootout. Not sure if my intended purpose would work though. Having thought about all of those rules, them helmet one is the worst damn thing. If they were really that concerned with players getting head injuries because they've lost their helmets, then just blow the damn whistle!