Your Favorite Red Wing Player

[Barrie 900]

For me, I don't get the Fedorov attraction either. He held out for a ridiculous amount of cash after winning the Cup in 1997 signed a contract with Carolina and clearly wanted out long before he left the team. Fantastic, unbelievably, fast skilled and versatile player but dear God, what a drama queen. He rejected $10 million a year (pre-lockout) to play for the Wings when he was UFA.

I knew he wouldn't have the success elsewhere that he had with the Wings.

I remembered having message board discussion when Fedorov left, some people were saying he'd get 100 points. I laughed and said he'd be lucky to get 70.

[swedishconnection 36]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo? Stevie by a nose over Lids

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be threw Trade / FA / Waiver etc...) Igor Larionov

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings? Shea Weber probably

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team? Marty Lapointe & Sergei Fedorov

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Brett Hull would be the one I never wanted that turned out OK. Uwe Krupp would be the other & we all know how that one turned out.

I was wondering how long it was going to take for someone to say Larionov....

Mine are:

1) Ted Lindsay for all time. Left wing is strange in hockey, and there are no better than Number 7. Currently it is Zata.

2) Gotta be Dan Cleary. Pure heart - determination - no excuses. What a revival.

3)Colby Armstrong - although he probably wouldn't get along with Patrick Eaves

4) By far Mathieu Schneider. He was killing it with Lids, and I miss his slapshot (that a lot on these boards still complain about- highandwide). It sucked that he left for Anahiem the same year that Bert did - totally caught me off-guard.

5)G-damned Bertuzzi. For me, there was no worse person to come to the Wings. He was a force against us so many times, plus his cheap-shots, plus the Moore crap. Talk about baggage. f***in hated the guy. However, now the "Stockholm Syndrome" has set in and I really dont mind the guy. Call it the "Pronger" situation: you always will hate the man until he suits up for your team...

[IllinoisRedWingsFan 49]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo?-Steve Yzerman and Darren McCarty. Is it ok that I chose two? If I only could have one I'd pick Stevie Y. I need a Stevie Y. jersey someday....

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be threw Trade / FA / Waiver etc...)-Shanahan

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings?-Doughty or Stamkos

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team?-Federov and Hossa. The latter because he went to Chicago.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team?-Bertuzzi

* If you guys have any other questions to post feel free to join in!

[ReallyHuh 9]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo? Steve Yzerman of course, but that is more or less a default answer for nearly all Wings fans. So my other would have to be Lidstrom or Hank.

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be threw Trade / FA / Waiver etc...) Bertuzzi and Hossa are up there but my favorite had to be Aaron Downey - I liked him a lot and new he was a great team guy. Gave us something we needed, and was a big part throughout the regular season in keeping an eye out for his teammates as well as punishing those who stepped over the line:

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings? Ryan Suter

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team? Hossa for sure. I wanted to keep him badly, even if it cost us Franzen.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Jason Williams, the second time… WOOF!

[LeftWinger 4,951]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo? Sergei Fedorov

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be threw Trade / FA / Waiver etc...) Dino Ciccarelli

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings? Shea Weber

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team? Sergei Fedorov (both times he left)

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Hudler's 2nd go round.

[Electrophile 3,554]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo? // Steve Yzerman.

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be threw Trade / FA / Waiver etc...) // Brett Hull

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings? // Henrik Lundqvist - We need more Swedes. He's also a great goalie, which we could use

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team? // Can't think of one.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? // Todd Bertuzzi

[55fan 5,133]

1) Who is your favorite Detroit Red Wing player overall to wear the Red Wings Logo? Mac

2) Who was your favorite Detroit Red Wing player that joined the red wings? (Non drafted by Wings, could be through Trade / FA / Waiver etc...) Too many to call. I'll go with Hasek, but man, there's so many.

3) Which current player would you dream of them joining the Wings? Getzlaf

4) Which are the players that really "hurt / bugged" you when they left the Red Wings to join another team? Sammy. Could have made it work.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? For absolutely no rational reason under the sun, I couldn't stand Marian Hossa until he joined our team. Then he won me over and I was sad to see him leave.

[eva unit zero 271]

1) Steve Yzerman

2) Bernie Federko... But seriously, Brian Rafalski or Chris Chelios.

3) Ryan Kesler.

4) Sergei Fedorov. Or Chris Osgood if we're counting involuntary transfer (I noticed a few McCarty mentions)

5) Todd Bertuzzi and Derian Hatcher

Kopecky.

He left a third/fourth tweener job in Detroit for a higher paying job in Chicago as a top-six forward. If your current company offered you a small raise, and a competing company offered you a much larger raise AND what would effectively be a promotion, would you take it? That's called normal.

To me this is a bit of monday morning quarterbacking. Just about nobody was opposed to him being on the team. Afterwards, yeah, things changed around when he got hurt and didn't ever play with the Wings to what standard everyone knew he played like with Dallas.

I don't know about other people, but I was always opposed to Hatcher in Detroit. I think he was vastly overrated in Dallas because of his size and hitting ability. Zubov was the best defenseman in Dallas, and I would have taken both Matvichuk and Sydor ahead of Hatcher.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Robert Lang, what we lost in the trade for this bum was ridiculous...

That bum was leading the league in scoring when the Wings picked him up. It's the first time in league history that a player has been traded while leading the league in scoring.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Lots actually (players in bold ended up liking, others I still disliked) Chelios, Ulf Samuelsson, Hatcher, Hasek in 06, Bertuzzi (07, 09), Drake, Williams, May, Commodore

Dallas Drake? You mean the Dallas Drake who began his career as a Wing in 1992-93? I wish he had never been traded, personally. Looking at trades made by the Wings in the past 20-25 years, I think that might be the second-worst trade.

I thought Shanahan could have retired a Wing after one more year in red and white. I wasn't totally bothered that he left.

For me, I don't get the Fedorov attraction either. He held out for a ridiculous amount of cash after winning the Cup in 1997 signed a contract with Carolina and clearly wanted out long before he left the team. Fantastic, unbelievably, fast skilled and versatile player but dear God, what a drama queen. He rejected $10 million a year (pre-lockout) to play for the Wings when he was UFA.

I knew he wouldn't have the success elsewhere that he had with the Wings.

The initial offer to Fedorov was $10m/yr for 5 years. Fedorov was unavailable for a week or so, and when he returned he had been notified of his agent about the offer, but by the the Wings chose to drop the final year. It was more important to Fedorov to have the 5 years than the $10m. But the Wings had decided not to keep him around that long. Anaheim gave him an offer of $8m/yr for 5 years. Same total value, more years. So he's taking a 20% pay cut from what he "declined" by asking that the initial offer be put back on the table. Fedorov is generally cast as the badguy because of the holdout in 97, when he was a free agent and the Wings were offering him a deal well below his market value. He ultimately signed the Carolina offer because it was at/above his market value, and meant he would either be playing in Carolina or for the Wings. The offer was structured by the Hurricanes with certain playoff round bonuses to try and scare Ilitch away from matching it.

5) Is there a player that you never wanted him on the team ... but eventually joined the team? Hudler's 2nd go round.

I call revisionist history. Hudler had scored almost 60 points as a third-liner in 2008-09, and was expected to top that production this season as a top-sixer - which is why people call his season horrible. If Hudler had scored the 70 points Babcock expected him to, he would have tied with Joe Thornton for 24th overall. I'm sure you were not interested in having that on the team, instead hoping to have some random veteran sit in the press box every night.

Edited July 27, 2011 by eva unit zero

[ogreslayer 1,069]

I call revisionist history. Hudler had scored almost 60 points as a third-liner in 2008-09, and was expected to top that production this season as a top-sixer - which is why people call his season horrible. If Hudler had scored the 70 points Babcock expected him to, he would have tied with Joe Thornton for 24th overall. I'm sure you were not interested in having that on the team, instead hoping to have some random veteran sit in the press box every night.

I call 'Hudler slappy' for trying to explain away why someone couldn't have legitimately not wanted Hudler back.

[woodrow40 42]

Dallas Drake? You mean the Dallas Drake who began his career as a Wing in 1992-93? I wish he had never been traded, personally. Looking at trades made by the Wings in the past 20-25 years, I think that might be the second-worst trade.

I used to think he was a dirty hitter so I wasn't a big fan of him before the Wings signed him in 07. Then his first game back with the Wings he got in a scrap with Corey Perry and just like that he was on my good side.

[cjm502 165]

I call revisionist history. Hudler had scored almost 60 points as a third-liner in 2008-09, and was expected to top that production this season as a top-sixer - which is why people call his season horrible. If Hudler had scored the 70 points Babcock expected him to, he would have tied with Joe Thornton for 24th overall. I'm sure you were not interested in having that on the team, instead hoping to have some random veteran sit in the press box every night.

Get real. Nobody expected Hudler to score 70 points. And please tell me how you know what Babcocks expectations were, I would love to get in on this insider info. Everyone is hating on Hudler because of his inconsistency and his absolutely pathetic first half. Even when Hudler was putting up points he was invisible most of the time. Watching the games last season nothing ever made me say "wow, good thing we have Hudler on this team", or "I really like Hudler he helps this team out". He was expected to be a powerplay specialist and for the majority of the season I think most here would agree he underperformed and did not do that great of a job on the powerplay. If Hudler is around next season I cant wait for Tatar to knock him out of the top 6 for good.

[Barrie 900]

Dallas Drake? You mean the Dallas Drake who began his career as a Wing in 1992-93? I wish he had never been traded, personally. Looking at trades made by the Wings in the past 20-25 years, I think that might be the second-worst trade.

I agree, that Drake trade in 93-94 was brutal!

[ricky0034 89]

1) Dominik Hasek

2) Dominik Hasek

3) Tim Thomas

4) Sergei Fedorov

5) Can't think of anyone

Edited July 29, 2011 by ricky0034