12-13 Biggest Surprise

[Guest The Axe]

biggest surprise to everyone will be career low in points for D & Z.

concentrating too much on D to make up for the loss of Nick and Stuart.

I hope you are not right.

[Wingzman91 134]

The biggest surprise to me will be if the CBA is done in time to prevent another lockout, partial or otherwise.

[number9 3,297]

Everyone knows Smith and Nyquist will be good, and probably brunner....biggest surprise will be Kindl....he has it in him

[Guest irishock]

biggest surprise to everyone will be career low in points for D & Z.

concentrating too much on D to make up for the loss of Nick and Stuart.

Datsyuk 52 pts in 82 games

Zetterberg 41 pts in 82 games

Franzen 9 goals in 80 games

???

Edited August 11, 2012 by irishock

[Guest The Axe]

Datsyuk will score more than that

[RyanBarnes! 293]

Kronwall for breaking the 70 point barrier and Howard for winning the Vezina.

[evilzyme 769]

This is such crap. This could easily be spun into a "Cory Emmerton learning to be the next Draper" article. He played 71 games last year for a reason. If the team didnt think he was useful, they would have canned him.

no. emmerton saw that many games due that we would lose him on waivers for no value. you're not going to put a player you know that won't clear waivers like that. thats why he played that many games otherwise he'd be on the griffs in a second.

[Guest The Axe]

no. emmerton saw that many games due that we would lose him on waivers for no value. you're not going to put a player you know that won't clear waivers like that. thats why he played that many games otherwise he'd be on the griffs in a second.

Why wouldnt he clear waivers if he was so bad?

[Wing Across The Pond 196]

Why wouldnt he clear waivers if he was so bad?

Well he wont now after that report kidding I think he obviously did something that the coaching staff liked. But he didn't put up points... or shots even... so he's never going to be noticed much by fans or media. Just the way it is. Perhaps he'll have a good season this year.

I've said it before but my surprise is Ericsson. I think he's finally going to be told that he needs to repay all the faith. He's got a cannon but no confidence to use it, has been working SO hard on his defensive game that I think he's gone into his shell a bit offensively. Now is the time to reawaken it. Give him some PP time and tell him to QB. That should light a fire under him. I'd honestly love to see him get 20mins a night at least. Dude could be beast.

[GoWings1905 2,694]

Only reason Emmerton played at all was because he is a center. Seems like the Wings are planning on using Abdelkader more at center, which I don't necessarily like, but it does create a 4th line that will actually be useful this season. Emmerton is the worst player of the glut at forward -- he provides absolutely nothing and likely won't even make the team.

[Wing Across The Pond 196]

Only reason Emmerton played at all was because he is a center. Seems like the Wings are planning on using Abdelkader more at center, which I don't necessarily like, but it does create a 4th line that will actually be useful this season. Emmerton is the worst player of the glut at forward -- he provides absolutely nothing and likely won't even make the team.

That's what he offered then, why he played so much. Perhaps the upside of him playing and allowing Abby to play wing outweighs the downside of playing Abby 4th line centre. Because like has been said, if he was really that crap/brought nothing to the team then he wouldn't have played. Abby would have been 4th line centre last year.

[GoWings1905 2,694]

That's what he offered then, why he played so much. Perhaps the upside of him playing and allowing Abby to play wing outweighs the downside of playing Abby 4th line centre. Because like has been said, if he was really that crap/brought nothing to the team then he wouldn't have played. Abby would have been 4th line centre last year.

I think Abdelkader is more effective at wing so ideally maybe the Red Wings envisioned Emmerton being able to fill the 4th line center spot. He got an adequate chance and it seems pretty fair to say Emmerton doesn't provide much of anything. Now after a full season of seeing Emmerton and adding more suitable players to the mix on the 4th line, there's really no role for Emmerton on the team.

Edited August 12, 2012 by GoWings1905

[Guest The Axe]

I think Abdelkader is more effective at wing so ideally maybe the Red Wings envisioned Emmerton being able to fill the 4th line center spot. He got an adequate chance and it seems pretty fair to say Emmerton doesn't provide much of anything. Now after a full season of seeing Emmerton and adding more suitable players to the mix on the 4th line, there's really no role for Emmerton on the team.

I think this is false

[GoWings1905 2,694]

I think this is false

Excellent elaboration on why you feel that way. Care to provide what you see in Emmerton that nearly no one else here does?

[Guest The Axe]

Excellent elaboration on why you feel that way. Care to provide what you see in Emmerton that nearly no one else here does?

Speed, youth, experience. You really expect Emmerton to score 50 pts with Holmstrom and Abdelkader for 8 minutes a night? Cory is fast. He will improve this year.

[GoWings1905 2,694]

Speed, youth, experience. You really expect Emmerton to score 50 pts with Holmstrom and Abdelkader for 8 minutes a night? Cory is fast. He will improve this year.

Experience compared to which players he would be competing against? Mursak is young and faster if those are Emmerton's best assets. I don't expect Emmerton to put up big numbers playing on the 4th line, but that further elaborates my point really. His offensive ceiling isn't high enough to assume a bigger role and ideally you would like your 4th line to do something other than nothing, which is what the Red Wings got last season. Putting Abdelkader at center, adding Tootoo to the mix, plus having Eaves/Miller as well gives you a useful 4th line that actually provides energy while also having the ability to contribute offensively. Emmerton is solely a skill player, with minimal skill.

A surprise would be if Emmerton somehow even makes the team.

[joshy207 156]

I agree with the OP on the Kindl thing. Everybody is down on him because they can't be down on Ericsson anymore. For years Ericsson was the whipping boy and nobody noticed how good he was on the PK until he was injured and Babcock made it clear that the the failure of the PK was largely due to Ericsson's injury. As soon as that happened everybody jumped ship and started chiding Kindl, as if our seventh defenseman was somehow to blame for last season.

My guess is Kindl continues his develpment, comes into his own, and nobody notices for another year or two, until he's injured and his services are noticeable. Then it will be someone else's turn.

I think a big reason a lot of people are down on Kindl is that he was a first-round pick, supposedly good offensively in juniors. and 7 years after being drafted, he hasn't shown the ability to even hold down a regular shift, let alone any offensive flair.

[kipwinger 8,522]

I think a big reason a lot of people are down on Kindl is that he was a first-round pick, supposedly good offensively in juniors. and 7 years after being drafted, he hasn't shown the ability to even hold down a regular shift, let alone any offensive flair.

Sure, and I'm not setting here saying he's a superstar or anything. All I'm saying is that Kindl wasn't nearly as bad last year as everyone made it seem. And I'm expecting better for him in the coming season. He may never be a top two guy, but I think he could easily be a top four with a little more development, and he's certainly better than he's been portrayed here at LGW

[Guest The Axe]

Yup, Kindl is good. Hes getting a bad rap.

[number9 3,297]

Experience compared to which players he would be competing against? Mursak is young and faster if those are Emmerton's best assets. I don't expect Emmerton to put up big numbers playing on the 4th line, but that further elaborates my point really. His offensive ceiling isn't high enough to assume a bigger role and ideally you would like your 4th line to do something other than nothing, which is what the Red Wings got last season. Putting Abdelkader at center, adding Tootoo to the mix, plus having Eaves/Miller as well gives you a useful 4th line that actually provides energy while also having the ability to contribute offensively. Emmerton is solely a skill player, with minimal skill.

A surprise would be if Emmerton somehow even makes the team.

He simply brings nothing desirable....so what if he can skate good?....if everyone who could skate good made NHL teams, me and all my buddies would be slappin pucks with Toots next season. Bottom sixers need to bring to the table what the top sixers dont.....size, grit, fighting, hitting, penalty killing, whatever.....Cory is a top 6 type player, he doesn't have the skill set or the assets to be in an NHL bottom 6.....unfortunately for him he doesn't have the level of skill that is required of a top sixer. Thus he'll prolly be a top sixer in a lesser league for most of his career. It sucks that he didn't work out, but they can't all workout....For every Emmerton that fails, a Nyquist succeeds......I was never really ever high on Emmerton anyway, never thought he was anything special....and what that tells me is that if he can get the amount of time that he got on this team, then I've very excited for our other prospects who I'm actually excited about and who actually might be something special lol. Good things to come.

Edited August 12, 2012 by number9

[evilzyme 769]

Why wouldnt he clear waivers if he was so bad?

Because other teams have a need and could use him better than we could. You don't drop one of your prospects to waivers for no return value, especially when you know they wouldn't pass through waivers... it's a pretty simple logic here.

[TheXym 2,606]

Because other teams have a need and could use him better than we could. You don't drop one of your prospects to waivers for no return value, especially when you know they wouldn't pass through waivers... it's a pretty simple logic here.

They could try to slip him through, but he'd get picked up. If I recall correctly, we lost Quincey originally because teams knew we'd put him on waivers if we couldn't trade him, so they wouldn't do the deal.

[Red Crazy 201]

I think that the the surprise of 12/13 will be the fact that Ken Holland was not able to fill the holes in the Wings line up. Ken Holland has not let us as fans down yet but this is not looking so good so far. Losing Nick and Stuart in the same year will hurt this team much more then some realize. I just hope I am wrong.

[Guest The Axe]

Because other teams have a need and could use him better than we could. You don't drop one of your prospects to waivers for no return value, especially when you know they wouldn't pass through waivers... it's a pretty simple logic here.

This IS saying that Emmerton is good! Cant you see that?

[number9 3,297]

This IS saying that Emmerton is good! Cant you see that?

Cant you read? "Because other teams have a need and could use him better than we could"