paulwoodsfan

I think Babcock might in fact be interested in the Michigan job. He'd be able to stay in the area and would have absolute job security, something no pro coach ever has, and less of a travel grind. He has coached at the university level before, in Canada. I could see him seeing it as a fun challenge.

Leafs have extended Carlyle for two additional years, so there would seem to be less threat of Babcock being lured away by Shanahan if he gets to free agency after next season.

I don't see any chance of Howard getting traded even if he were to waive his NTC. Goalies are available in abundance these days, with lots of proof that cheap goalies can provide a lot of value, and he does not have a major playoff pedigree. I cannot think of one team that would view him as a sizeable upgrade over either what they already have or what they can obtain cheaply elsewhere. I think this will be a much bigger issue somewhere between eight and 18 months from now, by which time I expect it will be apparent that Mrazek should be our No. 1. Not to veer too far off-topic, but to me one of the most interesting questions the org faces right now is how to handle the eventual transition from Howard to Mrazek, and when that transition should take place. I think this fall is too soon for that, but it might happen by late next season, especially if they decide to keep PM as the No. 2 rather than send him back down for another year. (Mind you, I don't think they will do that until 2015, so the real crunch may come later that season,)

In addition to Yzerman, there was also Lane Lambert that same season (83-84).

I think we should assume he will not be bought out. So the question, IMO, is what role should we ask him to fill? IMO we should put him back to what he was before his offensive breakout -- a checking-line guy (I prefer him at centre) who shadows the other team's big men (Getzlaf, Thornton et al) and kills penalties. He was very effective in that role and chipped in with the odd goal, including a series winner in OT when he was still a third- or fourth-liner. I think if he was returned to that role, he would not only excel in it, he would regain some of his lost confidence and he'd be worth most of the $4M he's going to collect each of the next six years. Any offence would be a bonus, but we'd stop relying on him to be a big scorer and put that mantle on younger players like Tatar, Nyquist and Mantha.

This is why I always laugh when, every time the Wings re-sign any of their RFA types, letsgowings blows up with "we overpaid!" It happened with Ericsson and Kronwall, and it has happened with others. Invariably those "overpaid" contracts start looking pretty darned good later when other teams pay more for lesser players. Not saying Holland has never made a mistake, obviously, but for most of the in-house guys who would be considered core players, he has locked them up for less than the market soon became.

I prefer the Pens because (assuming we get past them) we would stay in that division for Round 2. I think Rangers or Flyers would be easier to beat in Round 2 than Tampa Bay, assuming the Lightning get past Montreal. TB has had our number this season and Bishop has been especially tough on us (altho he may not be healthy). On the other hand, I don't love our chances in a Round 2 matchup with CBJ if they end up seeded in the Metro Division and win Round 1.

The Wings have been playing well, but so have the Jackets and they are not missing their top forward and their second-best defenceman. Plus CBJ is a pretty physical team. I'm not saying the Pens shouldn't fear the Wings, I'm saying I think if they had to choose one or the other they would rather meet the Wings, mostly (but not solely) because of the injury situation.

I think with the Wings missing two key guys and the way Columbus has been playing lately, the Pens probably fear the Jackets more than the Wings.

I'm liking Smith more and more. Yes, he makes some mistakes (as do all of our defencemen) but he seems to have fantastic offensive instincts -- he knows when to move up on the rush and when to attack the net. I think he would bring way more to the power play than DeKeyser does at this point, altho DD's slapshot seems harder.

For those saying we should have tried some of these young defencemen sooner, how would you have done it cap- and roster-wise? The roster has space for only 23 active players. If we were going to give a young d-man a 20-game trial, wouldn't we have needed fewer defencemen than we actually had? I'm sure some will say it's all Holland's fault for signing Cleary and Bertuzzi and Samuelsson, but those guys are irrelevant when it comes to giving defencemen NHL tryouts. I believe if we were to try waiving Lashoff or Kindl and banishing one of them to the minors, there's a good chance they'd get snapped up as NHL-experienced depth guys with manageable cap hits. Then we would have lost our own depth and been forced to ride 20- or 21-year-old defencemen on a playoff push. Doesn't make sense to me and it obviously wouldn't make sense to Holland or Babcock.

Massive game for Ramo -- way to go, Flames!

For some reason I can't get Quotes to work, but Dabura is correct about what I meant. There was post early in this thread asserting that this year proved the Wings are stupid to leave the kids in GR as long as they do. I am arguing the opposite -- that this year proves the strategy works. We were decimated by injuries and forced to use kids from the farm, and lo and behold most of them were ready. To me that proves success, not failure.

I can't believe no one has challenged the idea that this year proves mgmt is stupid in leaving players down to "overripe." If anything, this year has proven that the Wings are correct in leaving the kids in the minors as long as they do. Everyone who is on the team now and spent time in Grand Rapids is ready to play in the NHL now, including a few that none of us expected to be playing this soon. That tells me that that they are doing the right thing, not the wrong thing.

In today's NHL, every roster needs useful players who are cheap and provide roster flexibility. Glendening provides all of that. His less than $700k per year for three years means we will have more money to spend elsewhere and a guy who can pick up valuable minutes checking, winning d-zone faceoffs and killing penalties.

I'm in the camp of "let's wait until the guy is healthy for a while before we declare him a bust." I know the seemingly endless injuries have been aggravating, and when he did play he didn't show much, but I just don't think we should assume he's done on the basis of 26 games played at mostly well below full health.

The Bertuzzi-Moore lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial around the start of next season. I cannot see Mike Illitch wanting to be Bertuzzi's employer when that black eye for hockey comes back into public focus. For that reason as well as his obviously declining play, I don't think Bert will be back next season.

It was fun seeing the old guys play, but how in the world did the organizers manage to introduce the Wings first before the second game? Surely they could have foreseen the explosion of affection for Stevie and made him the last person introduced. There were a number of other faux pas, at least on the CBC broadcast. The announcer started by introducing Pat Quinn while another Leaf old-timer (probably Brian Conacher) walked on without any introduction. Quinn was nowhere to be found and then suddenly the Wings were all being introduced. And after all players had been introduced and CBC cut to commercial, they came back to introduce one more Leaf player who had apparently been forgotten. CBC also did a poor job of capturing the Gordie-Ted puck drop and Vladdie's appearance. It was almost as if no one bothered to share the script with the TV people beforehand. Disappointingly shoddy.

I'm loving the chemistry three lines seem to have right now: Franzen-Z-Nyquist Alfie-Helm-Abdelkader Miller-Andersson-Tatar So I'd go with Bert-Pav-Weiss when B and P come back, and sit Cleary/Samuelsson. It might get Weiss going, and Pav/Bert seems to be a good combo. Andy and Tats really seem to have something going chemistry-wise, and the top two lines are gunning on all cylinders right now.

As time goes on it is becoming more and more apparent just how unique Homer was. There really has never been any player in hockey quite like him. Other guys have tried to screen the goalie and occasionally get slashed for it, but Homer did it night after night for something like 16 years, without ever letting the punishment -- or the risk of being beaned by a high slapper -- deter him in the least. He is one of my all-time favourite players because he was truly one of a kind.

Thanks for clarifying that.

If Pulkkinen gets suspended, it will be for regular-season games. I'm pretty sure that means he has to be on the RW roster at the time. Further complicating the need to get down to 23 bodies by the season opener. Unless they have a slew of injuries, I'd say Nyquist is now pretty well guaranteed to be heading down, and the Wings will have to waive/trade two guys, not one (plus put Helm on LTIR), in order to keep Pulkkinen on the roster through his suspension.

At least they got rid of the black unis.

Yes, but Draper/Maltby/McCarty (or Kocur) was quite a long time ago, when there was a somewhat different approach to line-matching. Even then, I think the only time that trio got on against the other team's top line was when Scotty won the matchup game either because he was at home or because the other coach wasn't as smart or as matchup-oriented. I don't think the Draper/Maltby line played many minutes against a No. 1 or No. 2 line in 2008. It would be interesting to go back and see how Anaheim used its third line in 2007 but I seem to recall that they were noted primarily because of their PK and because these "defensive" guys gave their opponents fits in the offensive zone. I'd be surprised if they were able to consistently get them out against the top line for the other team. The Wings lost to Anaheim that year -- does anyone remember how the line matchups worked in that series?

1. You can control the matchups in only half the games. A shutdown third line doesn't do you any good on the road when the other coach can (and often, if not usually, does) get his own third line out against yours. 2. Do you really want your third line getting the most ice time of your forwards? That's what will happen if you match them up against the other team's first line (at home). The matchup game has changed dramatically since the days when teams would put a Bugsy Watson out against a Bobby Hull. I don't think we will go back to third line-vs-first line (at home) any time soon. It would be nice if Z and D didn't have to expend a lot of energy checking the Toews line and the Kane line, for instance, but I don't see too many coaches resisting such head-to-head matchups. The real key, I think, is to get a third line that can outscore the other team's third line. When the Wings were up 3-1 against Chicago, it was in large part because Nyquist-Andersson-Brunner were outplaying the third-liners they were matched against. When Chicago came back, and also against L.A., a lot of it had to do with the scoring it was getting from Bickell, not the big guns.