Zetts

I still feel he's a top 10 player in the game. That puts his market value much over 6 million. While my personal feelings of a 9 million value on the open market might be a little high, I'd say that 6 is insultingly low.

Exactly. People here are somewhat over-optimistic about this. There's never been anything suggesting he'd take anything more than a slight pay cut. It's insulting to him to expect him to take a cut of the proportions some people are suggesting. My personal thoughts and impression from what I've heard is that we're looking at a number just a slight bit under 7 million. That's a guess, but I'd say it's a more reasonable one than something like 4 or 5 million. And let's be honest - most teams would easily give him 9 million without blinking (assuming they had the cap space). His salary last year was already a hometown discount.

He really is superhuman. This article gives another view on just how dominant he is: http://www.coppernblue.com/2010/5/3/1455867/the-best-forwards-in-the-nhl-tough

I don't know what you're thinking here. Everyone, I think, should be able to agree that prior to this year, Thornton has been universally considered a choker. People have considered him a choker with these numbers in the postseason: 05/06 11gp 9pts -4 06/07 11gp 11pts 2 07/08 13gp 10pts 3 08/09 6gp 5pts -3 Now this year, he had 14gp 12pts -9 And you feel that constitutes a performance that should change anybody's perception!? It looks to me like the worst year he's had since 2003-2004. Oh, and since you were asking for players who have been better than him since the first round, you can also add Marleau to the list.

Yeah, the rest of their team sure has sucked. Who's that other Joe guy? Pavlosvki? Pavelskin? Oh well, it can't be that important, I'm sure he wasn't any good.

Not a chance Pavel is winning. It was 55-45 for Pavel yesterday and that was with over 28 000 votes. There's some hard core Stamkos spamming going on. I doubt we could keep up with it.

Fischer got bashed relentlessly around here initially but he was turning out great before the incident. I don't think E has anywhere close to the same upside, but I'm confident that he'll turn it around. It just takes time to adjust and he's proven he can play at this level. You'll be able to tell everyone to eat crow eventually. It's just many, many frustrating arguments away still. And your keyboard is stuck on the French setting.

In response to Buppy's Kovalchuk defense: It's possible, but I don't really want it. Yes, I'd rather have Hudler and Filppula. Not because I feel that they're better now, but because your scenario calls for yet another long term contract. I don't want however many million tied up in an old Zetterberg, Franzen and Kovalchuk in 10 years. They might be great now, but they will drop off by the end of those contracts. Probably quite a bit, like 99% of players do. And if that happens, we're screwed.

When does this voting end?! I'm getting tired of repeatedly voting for Datsyuk.

Ah, nicely done. Thanks.

Ask and you shall receive: East vs West New Jersey 7-9-2 Pittsburgh 9-7-2 Philadelphia 8-7-3 New York Rangers 7-10-1 New York Islanders 10-6-2 Buffalo 10-5-3 Ottawa 9-8-1 Boston 7-7-4 Montreal 7-9-2 Toronto 5-12-1 Washington 10-5-3 Atlanta 8-7-3 Carolina 5-12-1 Tampa Bay 6-7-5 Florida 7-7-4 Cumulative: 115-118-37 West vs East Chicago 11-5-2 Detroit 9-6-3 Nashville 12-4-2 St. Louis 9-7-2 Columbus 8-7-3 Vancouver 13-5-0 Colorado 12-5-1 Calgary 11-5-2 Minnesota 10-4-4 Edmonton 7-9-2 San Jose 12-4-2 Phoenix 11-6-1 LA 14-4-0 Anaheim 9-7-2 Dallas 7-9-2 Cumulative: 155-87-28

And that would be another reason people aren't too enthusiastic. He finally made a difference in the AHL? Kopecky was a difference maker regularly in the AHL and look how that went.

Kindl was touted as a pretty good prospect. I think it was pretty disillusioning when he was a league-worst -34 in his first year in the AHL. The year after was -14 and this year was -4. The improvement is huge, and it's possible he'll do reasonably well here. But the +/- was the thing that, for me anyways, destroyed any enthusiasm about him coming here. And yes, I know +/- is an over-rated stat.

I'd like to have him back and I think he wants to be back. But is there a workable cap number? He'll get a raise from 1.5 no question, hometown discount or not. Maybe to 2 or 2.25 financed by a Lidstrom pay cut? Lord we're hanging a lot of next season on a Lidstrom pay cut.

Since there's a lot of complaining around here with us being down 3-0, I thought it would be interesting to see the way that people are distributing the responsibility for this round.

Your expectations are still based on your salary during the year. Whether they're technically getting paid in the playoffs or not, the amount that they're paid during the year still shows expectations for the playoffs. Clutch playoff players get paid more for that reason.

Please, for the love of god, stop calling them that.

I really have mixed feelings on this. The way that he handled the goaltenders was bad. But we did have to make the playoffs. He basically gambled and lost. If we finished out of the playoffs, and had two goaltenders going strong, who would that have helped? Still the fact that Osgood didn't get games against teams like Edmonton is inexcusable. I really wonder what will happen to Osgood next season. I wouldn't blame him if he asked for a trade. His career is almost done and I'm sure he wants to play. I do disagree about absolving Howard of blame though. The fact that Babcock screwed things up doesn't give Howard a free pass.

To be fair, when you're paid 7.4 million, you'd damn well better do more than "look good".

Yeah, that's most definitely not the roster that Babcock coached. The team that he coached that swept us was garbage on paper. The team you have there is the 2007 team.

He's been successful at every level he's coached at. You really think that Anaheim team that he coached was stacked? Really? He's a fantastic coach, and we're lucky to have the guy. Also, Yzerman chose him as the coach for the Olympics and he knows him personally and how he coaches. If Yzerman likes him, I ask no questions.

I don't know about that. His five-hole hasn't been great though.

They do dive, and the reffing did suck. But neither were bad enough that they would have stopped a team that really deserves to win the Cup. And I'm confident that we'll see that version of the Wings back in Detroit. Oh, and I never respected the Sharks.

This thread was clearly started by a troll. And yet people are once again seriously arguing it. And nobody can even come up with a new argument. Give it a rest. A thread on Osgood or enforcers would have better content than this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAB9hFDoQiI