Drake_Marcus

There's only ONE #19! How dare you own a Sakic jersey!

Ugggg... I still hate the stars down the arm with the dates of the previous all-star games on it. But I like the rest of the jersey enough. I love the asymmetrical arm colouration- that's actually a cool idea that looks really neat on the Atlanta jerseys.

Just one more reason why he's such a fan favourite! He's full of surprises

Well... 19 is a pretty popular number now a days.

Hahaha.... Nichol would've won if Big Joe's face was located on his left shoulder, but alas- he's not that much of a freak. That was like watching Hudler fight Phaneuf. Tootoo was a ***** for not fighting Staubitz when he stood right up after getting punched right of the bat, but he redeemed himself by accepting Staubitz's challenge later in the game. Too bad that was a lame fight too

You don't have lag?!? I can't get the damn lag to stop! I got so frustrated I had to switch it off and play the wxyt audio stream.

With only 6/18 correct so far I've decided my best bet is to roll a dice for each team next week. 33% is much worse than 50%, so I have to assume that somehow knowing about the teams playing is a disadvantage when you're as bad at this as me

I'd rather balance my big money players out. Strong defensive players, strong offensive players. Long term- we know Lidstrom will retire before he's Chelios' age. Rafalski is here for the year after Lidstrom retires. And he is playing up to those standards. Long term- he's played fantastic as a Wing. I just wouldn't trade all star player diversity in for 3 near identical forwards.

That's a dumbass move by Tampa's management. WTF did they expect to happen in the first 15 games of their season? Did they honestly think he'd make them into cup contenders overnight? If you hire a new coach for your bottom feeder team at least give them an actual shot to do something to turn the locker-room culture around. Like it or not he made them a much more defensively capable team. I don't like mullet at all, but this is an absolutely retarded move. They hired a guy who hasn't coached in years a big contract then can him after a handful of games? Give him a chance to show what he can do.

The problem is that front loading a team with 3 uber high price forwards and maintaining 2 5million+ d-men leaves a barebones roster and handcuffs you in terms of retaining home grown talent. Franzen does bring a completely different element than Hoss or Z. And we all know Holmer can't play forever, so we need a big, strong net presence. Franzen is that player. He excelled at it during the end of last season, he excelled at it in the playoffs and he still excels at it. Like another poster mentioned- Hossa is the same player as Dats and Z. I just don't see how the Wings can have Dats, Z and Hossa on this team while Lids is still here and still have a great team surrounding them. That being said- Filppula's being grossly overpaid right now (although the Wings management sees this as a Kronwall situation- pay lots early and have a great player at a discount for the other half of the contract) and Cleary is very much the odd man out in terms of replaceable players with salaries large enough to make a difference if replaced with a league max salaried rookie. The "trade Lebda, trade Sammy, trade Hudler, trade Lilja" calls don't make sense. These guys make almost nothing- you're not going to get relief by dumping them because someone has to come in and take their place. Putting aside the difference in talent, ability, chemistry, etc, you're still only saving a few hundred grand at the most and you're probably not going to make the team worse. The Wings need to find 8-9 million just to keep Franzen and Z. Plus they have to magically give Hudler a similar contract to Filppula (and trust me- they do need the offensive depth he provides- offensive prospects that translate to 50+pts a season aren't a dime a dozen).

I was going to post a similar thread- I was down on Malts a bit this year and last, but he was fantastic tonight and definitely came to the rink wearing a hardhat! Thumbs up for the fourth line's play tonight- they looked fantastic together... I really hope they can keep this energy and chemistry all year long and into the playoffs. By the way- anyone else impressed by Maltby's little 3 shots in 2 seconds barrage early on? If those weren't blocked he'd have had another goal, but at least he did make the defenders work their bags off!

Friday: New Jersey @ Washington Columbus @ Buffalo Carolina @ Atlanta Detroit @ Florida St Louis @ Chicago Nashville @ Anaheim Saturday: Toronto @ Vancouver Philadelphia @ Montreal Washington @ New Jersey Ottawa @ NY Islanders Boston @ NY Rangers Buffalo @ Pittsburgh Columbus @ Minnesota Dallas @ Phoenix Colorado @ Edmonton Nashville @ Los Angeles Sunday: Tampa Bay @ Carolina Montreal @ St Louis San Jose @ Chicago Atlanta @ Philadelphia Los Angeles @ Anaheim God- that week I missed absolutely brutalized my standings

Well I'm not surprised- Nick's been less than perfect and for him that's just not normal. But what we do know is that he's a damn hard worker and he will get back up to snuff.

On that point I think we can all agree. That's what Babcock refers to as wanting it more than the other guy. And his emphasis on that point makes this situation all the more perplexing... how is a Babcock team having this happen to them? This season is the real test of the new pieces of this team. Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Kronwall- this is your time to prove that you're the next Stevie, Feds and Lidstrom- that you can lead this team to a repeat championship. Winning in 98 was so much more of an achievement than 97... 2009 will prove far more challenging than 2008. God I wish we still had Bowman right now... he's the last guy to repeat and he did it with a quarter of this fricking roster. Again- it's less than 20% of the way into the season, but the fact remains that the Wings apparently haven't turned the corner like we thought they did vs. the Devils.

You effing rock Snepsts!

Ok, that just sounds dirty.

Which is exactly what someone in the management better ******* beat out of every player, coach and ******* water boy. Because that is not the Wings' identity.

Anyone who saw the game and understands hockey would have to agree with Harold on this one. Ozzie played as good a game as one can imagine given how many goals he let in. The defense let him out to dry. That being said- he still shoulders 4.5% of the blame. Also- Lidstrom has not looked like himself since he put that visor on.

Agreed 100%.

Oh it totally does. Just like being a communist makes you inherently evil and being black makes you a criminal. It's all here in the KKK handbook. (not that my anger is directed at you Crymson!)

This is especially smart if they are smart enough to get an accountant to calculate the present value of both contracts at the end of the contract term (using a conservative estimate of the rate of return he'd get on investment).

Saw the replay of that hit. He deserves a suspension- he made absolutely zero effort to avoid doing damage to a guy who had his back to him. That's exactly the stuff they're trying to crack down on (and rightly so- there was no need to hit him that hard on an icing play).

And if Holland can keep the big names it'll be at the cost of guys like Cleary (assuming he waives his NTC).

Leino's not playing in GR tonight- no sign of him on the roster given for tonight's game on the AHL website and no sign of him on the game summary either... I've searched all the usual places- Bruce McCloud's blog, Red Wings Snapshots, and the Red Wings Central forums. Franzen's rumoured to be returning on Tuesday- meaning he can't be retroactively put on LTIR (he was injured on the 25th of October- so he doesn't fulfill the 24 day requirement if he comes back on Tueday, and regardless- he wouldn't fulfill the 10 games missed requirement by then). There's no room for Leino under the cap unless someone is waived. McCarty can't be waived to make room- he's only making 500k and there's 49.15K left under the cap with him here. Leino has an 850k cap hit. Is there a special rule for single game call up relief players? Or is something else going on? I don't imagine Leino's a healthy scratch unless it's for movement reasons (good or otherwise) since he's a vital part of the GR scoring capacity and had a fantastic game last time they played. Any thoughts? Edit: Turns out he has a sore hip. Get well soon Ville http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/20...ith_sore_h.html

Friday: Ottawa @ Carolina Montreal @ Columbus Atlanta @ Buffalo Dallas @ Anaheim Saturday: Buffalo @ Boston Montreal @ Toronto Pittsburgh @ NY Islanders Tampa Bay @ Philadelphia NY Rangers @ Washington New Jersey @ Detroit Calgary @ Columbus Nashville @ Colorado Florida @ Phoenix Minnesota @ Vancouver Dallas @ San Jose St Louis @ Los Angeles Sunday: Atlanta @ Carolina Calgary @ Chicago Edmonton @ New Jersey Florida @ Anaheim San Jose @ Phoenix Edit: I hope this helps my record get back up to where it was in the first two weeks