Drake_Marcus

He can certainly score in the way Chara does. Chara's scoring comes from shot placement (learned over time) and pure speed/power. Ericsson's already got Chara's power and speed when it comes to his slapshot. All he needs to do is learn to get the shot off quicker and work on his shot selection. And to be honest, it takes quite a while to master point shot selection in the NHL. E's got all the tools, all he has to do is mature and put them all together. We'll have to wait to see what becomes of him. Worst case we've got a big body who can play a Lilja role with more offensive production.

He had 2 assists. I know because he had the same number of points in the Finals as Datsyuk did but took more than twice as many games.

Crosby has Malkin. Malkin's a better offensive player than Crosby. Ovechkin has no superior linemates because he's the best offensive player in the league. There's no question that Crosby has a better supporting cast.

Is this front page suddenly a blog roll?

Sawchuck didn't have the benefit of 82 game seasons, though. Sawchuck's record still blows my mind more. But congrats to Marty.

Osgood did this same routine in the regular season last year only to play amazing hockey in the playoffs, so I don't see why you're ready to ditch him at this point.

Howard did bail them out, but that's why they say the goalie is the most important member of the PK, right? Overall the PK has been much, much better than it was earlier in the year. The forwards look better, the defense looks better and the goaltending looks much better. Everyone on the PK deserves a pat on the back. Last night's game was basically won because of the Wings' strong PK-- they had to kill 3 penalties in the 3rd period that were only separated by a minute of 5-on-5 each.

Good quote. Definitely sums up what the sophomore slump is all about. Based on how much post-season play those guys have had I think you're assessment is on the button.

Thank you. And Lidstrom didn't pass Ericsson's point total until tonight's game.

1) Let's do a quick math lesson: Wings 09-10 W-L-OTL: 14-10-5 10+5=15 losses 14=14 Wins 14+10+5=29 Games Played 14/29=0.483 Is 0.500 > 0.483 ? Yes. Thus the Wings are a sub-500 team. They've played 29 games and lost 15. 2) +/- is not projected forward based on games played. Go check any site that pro-rates stats. (TSN.ca for example) Edit: clarity

His play during the 3rd period was outstanding.

True.

At 25 Kronwall was playing on the 06-07 Wings as a "rookie" (he has played two seasons prior but never surpassed 27 games, so this was his first full season). Ahead of him on the depth chart were: Lidstrom, Schnieder, Chelios, and Markov. I'm not sure where you got the impression that Kronwall was a member of the top 4 that year.

Wow... someone is forgetting how brutal Kronwall was defensively for his first few seasons. Kronwall's first defensively responsible season was 07-08. Last year he was terrible defensively. This year he's been good. Hell, Kronwall made this many bone-head plays last season. Kronwall was TERRIBLE defensively in his rookie season. He came into the league as a poor defensive player with superb offensive instincts. Kronwall's learned his defensive lessons the hard way. For as many dumb defensive plays Ericsson makes he makes many more good defensive plays. He's -7 right now (he went -3 over the last two games) and the Wings are a sub-500 team. Kronwall's never played on a sub-500 team. And for his bad mistake tonight I'd like to point out that he spent the most PK time on the team over the last two nights and the PK was perfect both nights so his defense can't be as brutal as people are painting it. The fact remains that he's been on the #1 PK all season-- something that would never have happened with Kronwall even 3 years ago when he'd played about 3 times the number of games Ericsson has. Oh, and Ericsson's on pace to beat Kronwall's rookie production by about 17% with more than double the goals. Kronwall's rookie season (06-07 based on when he finally played more than 27 games): 68gp 1g 21a 22pts +0 (On the 50+ wins 07 Red Wings) Projected forward (over 80 games): 80gp 1g 25a 26pts +0 Ericsson: 27gp 3g 7a 10pts -7 On Pace: 80gp 9g 21a 30pts -7 Oh, and right now Ericsson's in an offensive slump. He has 2 pts in the last 16 games. His first 11 games were significantly more productive. I'd say it's safe to assume he'll get out of his offensive slump sooner than later. His season end numbers should be over the 30pt mark. In other words He's on pace for a 15% more points than Kronwall scored and three times the goals. All without a sniff of powerplay time. And for reference a -7 on a sub-500 team is hardly worse than a +0 on the President's Trophy winning team who had the best defensive numbers in the league. Oh and half of Ericson's minus came over the last two games so it's hard to imagine he won't recover it unless this is the start of a sudden slide. And for all these dumb mistakes Ericsson averages the same number of turn-overs per game as Lidstrom, Kronwall and Stuart and he's better than Rafalski in that respect. Right now Ericsson's been thrown into the fire as a top 4 d-man in his rookie season who plays on the #1 PK. Since Kronwall was injured he's been in the top 3 in even strength ice-time on the team (sometimes sitting 1st in that category), yet his turnovers and mistakes haven't significantly changed. He's still good for one goof a game. Ok, great, if we assume where he sits as a rookie 27 games in is where he'll be in even a year then you can *****. It's amazing how little tolerance people have for rookies around here. Did you think he'd walk in and dominate with minimal NHL experience? This is defense we're talking about. Defense has the toughest NHL transition of all positions. EDIT: Also Kronwall's true rookie season (when he played more than 27 games) he was, gasp, exactly the same age as Ericsson. Are you sure he was in the top 4 in 06?

With Hudler netting 26g and 57pts last season that statement falls out of range of even your dry 'humour'.

This. His time on the top six has also corresponded with the Wings' greatest offensive struggles-- both Zetterberg and Datsyuk have been under-productive during that period. Lately, no one on the Wings has been particularly impressive offensively. He's having a rough rookie season so far. Hopefully he can pick himself back up and get his ass in gear. He's still got tons of talent and potential, so it's not like they're going to give up on him after 39 games. He still has 53 games left to string together a good rookie season. He's got the talent to do it, he just needs to get the confidence up again. Ericsson's having the same confidence issues... same for Abdelkader (offensively). Rookie struggles are just more noticeable for offensive players than they are for purely physical/defensive players. With a huge chunk of the season left I'm not ready to throw this kid under the bus. Filppula's rookie season was good for 15pts and he's ended up as a fairly useful player around here. It's really early to start calling him a bust.

Don't forget that he held the NHL's leading scorer pointless and to 0 shots.

You can thank Lidstrom for shutting Gabby down

Ahh there you go-- Mickey just did. Thanks Mick. But what happens when E leaves his man open to go double team Abdelkader's man? Why couldn't Abs tie his stick up instead? E was the only guy on his side of the ice.

*waits for someone to blame that goal on Ericsson* Damn it Abdelkader! SKATE

Kronwall was 11th in defensive scoring league-wide last year, lead the playoffs in assists in 07-08 and was leading the d in scoring when he was injured. I have a hard time ruling him out as a future #1 d-man. In fact, on pretty most teams in the league he'd already be the #1 d-man. You're right that Ericsson isn't ready for a top 2 spot yet, I'd be shocked if he got there in only one year of NHL play. Ideally, I'd like to see Ericsson on the second pairing next year to give him more mins to grow and mature. I'd expect Kindl to be the #6 d-man who gets a bit of PK and PP time depending on his play (obviously right now he's riding it a bit high since this is his first NHL call-up, things will settle down and he'll make mistakes in his rookie season, as you expect from a young guy). Futhermore, separating Kindl and Ericsson is key since they're both too young and inexperienced to be paired together. Here's what I'd like to see: Lidstrom-Kronwall Rafalski-Ericsson Stuart-Kindl That gives the pairings a good mix of veterans and youth to help mitigate rookie errors.

Wow... Howard has identical GAA and Sv% stats to Lundqvist with superior winning percentage. Sweet.

Excessive, but then again that's how Campbell does his job-- excessive suspensions for the average player and no suspension or a light suspension for star players. The rule book is applied based on your point per game average.

While I'm not ready to declare him a success yet, I do think he's done very, very well with the hand he's been dealt this season: ...So Far: 18gp 2g 6a 8pts +8 On Pace: 72gp 8g 24a 32pts +8 That would be tied for his best career pts total in the NHL, but would be behind his two best seasons for goals scored. Still, if Eaves can put 30+ pts up as a 3rd/4th liner I'd say he can be very happy with this season.

I'm sure Eaves will get his share of ice time. Babs' system rewards the role players who are doing well.