Drake_Marcus

Looks great. Thanks Matt.

Here is the line-up I'd like to see tonight: Leino-Datsyuk-Holmstrom Abdelkader-Zetterberg-Cleary Bertuzzi-Helm-Eaves May-Draper-Miller Lidstrom-Ericsson Stuart-Lebda Rafalski-Meech PP1: Zetterberg-Datsyuk-Holmstrom Lidstrom-Ericsson PP2: Bertuzzi-Leino-Ceary Rafalski-Stuart (we need a serious PP quarterback on the 2nd PP) PK1: Zetterberg-Helm Lidstrom-Ericsson PK2: Datsyuk-Cleary Stuart-Lidstrom/Ericsson

It's true. But on the other hand, I heard oranges are better than apples because apples make inferior orange juice!

Fine-- have your face-off argument as a point of comparison between a centre and a left winger. I'll take hitting. Ovechkin's one of the top 10 hitters in the league each year (based on his number of hits). Crosby's physical play is average at best. So there you go-- Ovechkin's superior in that facet of the game where Crosby is a non-factor. Even now? Or is physical play only worth 50% of face-off skill in your rating system? Ovechkin still wins in the main category-- offense. Both players are about equal defensively (sorry if people disagree but the numbers say otherwise-- talk to me when Crosby is shutting anyone down). Crosby is great on face-offs now. Ovechkin doesn't take face-offs because he's a left wing. As for the bolded portion-- wtf? First of all-- yeah it's a great f***in' defense. Ovechkin doesn't play goal either. Are you going to argue that Kipper is a better player because his Wins stat is superior to Ovechkin? I mean I guess I can't point out that Ovechkin doesn't play goal and thus couldn't have a Wins/Loss stat, but then you'd say I'm implying Ovechkin would be great goalie? Yeah, when I say one person can't be compared to another in a category because only one of them actually does the action in question due to their position and position alone, I'm implying the other guy would be great at it. How you inferred that from my argument is beyond me. Crosby was horrible at face-offs when he entered the league. He learned to get better on them through experience. Good for him-- he's honed that skill. Now you expect ever other non-centre in the league to have to make up for their apparent inability to take face-offs? Assuming the idea that 'everyone is compared in every skill set regardless of whether their position on the ice even allows them to do it' isn't a retarded one, I have to question how you know Ovechkin's bad at face-offs. Is there a stat there for him? Perhaps he's amazing on face-offs. You assume that Ovechkin doesn't possess that skill based on his position alone. It's interesting that you think it's fair to compare players in statistical categories where only one of the two players has data. Crosby doesn't have SV% data on NHL.com. He doesn't have GAA data either. Thus I could make the argument that he's inferior at saving pucks and thus he's at an immediate disadvantage in any comparison between him and any goalie in the league. After all-- it's certainly not logical to base one's comparison between two players on only the areas relevant to each player's position. One, apparently, must assume players without a FO% listed are terrible on the draw. And of course, based on this assumption we can compare them to players who play a different position on the basis of the areas specific to only one of those players' position.

It's weird because Holmstrom is 3rd overall in points on this team and tied for 1st in goals.

What can I say-- I'm predictable when it comes to my Wings fandom.

Who makes $2,250,000 a year and is tied for the lead in goals on the Detroit Red Wings? This guy.

Oh snap!

I've got even more shocking news: Datsyuk is not of this world. Actually I can't decide: It's possible he's a living piece of candy corn as well.

I've had the same reaction every night he's scored so far. I'm so excited that he keeps meeting my high expectations. I can't wait to see how he does long-term. Like Zetts just said-- he's got tons of time to figure out the AHL schedule and bend it to his will.

Unfortunately, probably nothing... His last goal was bookended by the same snake-bitten play we're seeing now.

Yeah, aside from telling them how it is, I enjoyed giving them time-outs too.

If there's one area where you don't have to worry about Abdelkader it's the gym. He's definitely ahead of the curve when it comes to physical preparation for the game. From what I've read he was considered a gym-rat in college and he spends the summers working out as intensely as possible.

Speaking of whipping boys being clutch-- Howard played the SO perfectly. And Ericsson had a good night too. He was on the ice for a goal against-- but Lidstrom and Zetterberg were on the ice for 2 of the 3 goals against. E did get 28 mins in tonight, played 2:27 of the 4:00 of PK the team had, had only one give-away but made up for that by getting a take-away too. Did I mention that Ericsson was second on the team in ice-time tonight? I'm happy for him-- this was a good defensive game on his part. He generated a few scoring chances too. I'd have liked to see him pick up a point or two, but that's not really the role Babcock's given him right now. Abdelkader was dangerous tonight as well. I'm excited that he's getting time as a 2nd line centre out there when Babs has Dats and Z together. He needs some goals to boost his confidence-- right now they need to be careful not to let him think he's only a checker at the NHL level-- he's got the chops to possibly be something more.

Tonight the Wings were great on special teams: 100% PP success 100% PK success Just goes to show how critical the PK and PP are to a team. Also-- how good was Howard? He made some game saving stops tonight. He came up HUGE. Too bad they scored that third goal and hurt his GAA. Still, he won the game and managed to put up a 0.914 sv%. EDIT: Oh and the Wings were 58% on the face-off. Another good sign.

I hate to be the downer at this party but shoot-out goals don't count towards your stats and as such don't give you a GWG to your name. Sorry.

I think he did!

Just because he was shut down doesn't mean he was their main focus. It means he was successfully shut down. By your logic Hossa was critical to the Wings because he was so thoroughly shut down by the Pens top defensive players and it allowed his complementary player (Zetterberg) to score. If Malkin is Crosby's complementary player then Lidstrom's Rafalski's complementary player. Face it-- the Wings tried to shut down both Crosby AND Malkin (if they didn't they were retarded). One player rose above it and won the series for his team, one wilted under the defensive pressure. Even if you think his being shut down by Zetterberg and Lidstrom makes him the better forward that makes Zetterberg better than him.

I'm talking about the stats for that playoff series. I just don't know how you can argue that Crosby's better than Ovechkin when every piece of evidence points to Ovechkin. You have to reach all the way to position to justify your argument. By that argument I could say that Miller's better than Crosby because goalies are more important to a team's victory than centres and Miller's the top goalie in the league right now. If you're going to weigh the stats towards one position it'd go: Goalie, Defenseman, Centre, Winger. It could be argued that the best defenseman has more impact than the best goalie, but it's certainly true that both are more crucial than the team's best centre if we're talking in terms of position. Edit: spelling.

Thanks Drumnj-- your stream is awesome. It's a blast moderating it for you.

Considering that Ovechkin posted a superior +/- in 40% fewer games I'd say your defense argument is bulls***. Ovechkin plays left wing, so you win there-- he doesn't take face-offs. Crosby's hardly the best face-off man in the league either. He's above average now, but was horrible in the past. Woppie- he's doing something better that Ovechkin doesn't do due to his position. That's like saying Ovechkin's better at playing on the Capitals than Crosby is-- meaningless because the two players cannont be compared on the basis of a statistic that's exclusive to one player's position. It's as stupid as saying that Ovechkin's a better Russian than Crosby.

OMG! By your brilliant logic McCarty is better than Crosby! (and unlike Crosby, McCarty's actually scored a cup winning goal)

No, Zetterberg had a history of shutting down Crosby last year so he did the same thing this year-- he shut down the guy he knew he could shut down. The Wings knew they could shut Crosby down so they went with what they knew they could do. Last year they coudn't shut Malkin down once he woke up. There was no reason to think they should try and do so again when they had the option to shut the guy down they knew they could shut down. Also: 2009 Playoffs: Crosby: 24gp 15g 16a 31pts +9 (1.29 points per game) Ovechkin: 14gp 11g 10a 21pts +10 (1.5 points per game) pwned

Marcus on this game: