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Guest The Axe

kronner a #1?

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Guest The Axe

Lidstrom was a defensive kingpin. Now we have Kronner as our #1 with a new mentality. The boys don't have the luxury of looking down the bench to see Lids. Kronwall had his ups and downs last season, but ultimately improved greatly throughout the year and the Wings adopted a "defense by committee" philosophy. As a result, we saw Kronwall struggle a lot at first and then everyone stepped up and took a lot of pressure off him. Ericsson showed us he's the real deal for a shutdown Dman. Kindl earned a spot in the top 4 and silenced us all as fans that were ready to let him walk. Smith had some growing pains, but had flashes of brilliance and showed he's not intimidated by forechecks, he stands them up. DeKeyser stepped in and looked like a seasoned vet, Lashoff was a capable defensive Dman, and Quincey improved a lot over the season and was really good in the playoffs. All in all, Kronwall doesn't need to be a big time Dman, we just need 6 guys that play well together and keep them together. The Kings D corps isn't even as good as ours and they won the Cup 2 years ago.

Good call. I feel like we have 6 guys who all fall into the range between top #2 to middle #3 (maybe im a little homerish in that take?). I think that may be better than having a solid #1, a #3, and 4 guys who play between 4 and 6 level (2012).

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Honestly, we've been spoiled. I mean, think of all the high-end defenders we've had over the last couple decades or so. Lidstrom, Chelios, Rafalski, Coffey, Konstantinov, Lebda, Krupp....It's almost silly.

At the same time, though, I'm not big on Kronwall being our #1. Or, maybe it's more that there seems to be sort of a sharp drop-off after him. Ideally, we go out and land a quality first-pairing defensive defenseman - because I have a hard time seeing this current corps winning a Cup. Overachieving and being "under the radar" is nice and all...but if our goal is a Cup? We need to bolster the back end. (Preferably before Zetterberg and Datsyuk get too far up there in age.)

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Kronwall is not a number 1. Nor is he a number 2 - because there is no such thing as a "# 2 Defenceman". The question or thread should have asked whether is Nick a "top pairing Defenceman" which is debatable. In my opinion, the answer is no... And I say this primarily because he doesn't have the defensive instincts needed to play against the other teams top offensive line (reference his career plus minus to verify this statement).

He is however, an elite second paring defenseman - as shown in his career stats, his best years were in 2007-08 and in 2008-09, where he played on the second pairing behind Lidstrom and Rafalski. Outside of 2007 where put up a plus 25 rating, he has only been better than +5 once and in the past 5 seasons COMBINED he is only managed a +5 rating. What's even more trivial to me however, is the fact the the Red Wings have had a goal differential of +137 since that time and he has had only two different defence partners in Stuart and Ericsson, who play a similar sound defensive game.

Overall, I believe we are in need of an elite puck moving defenseman to play on a top line with Dekeyser so we can better utilize Kronwall and Ericcson from the second pairing.

(This does not mean I think Dekeyser is a better player than Kronwall, but certainly better suited for a top pairing role with a very good puck mover - something we are in drastic need of)

Yandle-Dekeyser

Kronwall-Ericcson

That's what I call a top 4.

Edited by WingedWheel91

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Kronwall is not a number 1. Nor is he a number 2 - because there is no such thing as a "# 2 Defenceman". The question or thread should have asked whether is Nick a "top pairing Defenceman" which is debatable. In my opinion, the answer is no... And I say this primarily because he doesn't have the defensive instincts needed to play against the other teams top offensive line (reference his career plus minus to verify this statement).

He is however, an elite second paring defenseman - as shown in his career stats, his best years were in 2007-08 and in 2008-09, where he played on the second pairing behind Lidstrom and Rafalski. Outside of 2007 where put up a plus 25 rating, he has only been better than +5 once and in the past 5 seasons COMBINED he is only managed a +5 rating. What's even more trivial to me however, is the fact the the Red Wings have had a goal differential of +137 since that time and he has had only two different defence partners in Stuart and Ericsson, who play a similar sound defensive game.

Overall, I believe we are in need of an elite puck moving defenseman to play on a top line with Dekeyser so we can better utilize Kronwall and Ericcson from the second pairing.

(This does not mean I think Dekeyser is a better player than Kronwall, but certainly better suited for a top pairing role with a very good puck mover - something we are in drastic need of)

Yandle-Dekeyser

Kronwall-Ericcson

That's what I call a top 4.

Yandle and Kronwall are basically the same Dman, except Kronwall hits harder.

And for a top 4, wait 2 years and here's your top 4 with Kronwall on the 2nd pairing:

Sproul-DeKeyser

Kronwall-Ericsson

And you can round out the 3rd pairing with Ouellet-Kindl with Backman as our 7th. Anyone who worries about our D hasn't paid much attention to our forwards and the scoring troubles the past couple years. There's bigger fish to fry there.

Edited by Z Winged Dangler

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Kronwall is not a number 1. Nor is he a number 2 - because there is no such thing as a "# 2 Defenceman". The question or thread should have asked whether is Nick a "top pairing Defenceman" which is debatable. In my opinion, the answer is no... And I say this primarily because he doesn't have the defensive instincts needed to play against the other teams top offensive line (reference his career plus minus to verify this statement).

He is however, an elite second paring defenseman - as shown in his career stats, his best years were in 2007-08 and in 2008-09, where he played on the second pairing behind Lidstrom and Rafalski. Outside of 2007 where put up a plus 25 rating, he has only been better than +5 once and in the past 5 seasons COMBINED he is only managed a +5 rating. What's even more trivial to me however, is the fact the the Red Wings have had a goal differential of +137 since that time and he has had only two different defence partners in Stuart and Ericsson, who play a similar sound defensive game.

Overall, I believe we are in need of an elite puck moving defenseman to play on a top line with Dekeyser so we can better utilize Kronwall and Ericcson from the second pairing.

(This does not mean I think Dekeyser is a better player than Kronwall, but certainly better suited for a top pairing role with a very good puck mover - something we are in drastic need of)

Yandle-Dekeyser

Kronwall-Ericcson

That's what I call a top 4.

So based on a handful of games you believe Dekeyser is ready to play against the best players in the world every shift?

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Guest Crymson

Overall, I believe we are in need of an elite puck moving defenseman to play on a top line with Dekeyser so we can better utilize Kronwall and Ericcson from the second pairing.

(This does not mean I think Dekeyser is a better player than Kronwall, but certainly better suited for a top pairing role with a very good puck mover - something we are in drastic need of)

Yandle-Dekeyser

Kronwall-Ericcson

That's what I call a top 4.

The fact aside that you probably couldn't list 60 defenseman who are better than Kronwall, that top pairing would get eaten alive. DeKeyser has played less than 20 games at the NHL level, and Yandle is just a few steps above outright bad in his own zone. For that matter, there are quite a few who would take Kronwall over Yandle.

The proof is in the pudding: Kronwall and Ericsson did just fine as a first pairing.

Edited by Crymson

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So based on a handful of games you believe Dekeyser is ready to play against the best players in the world every shift?

Depends on who his partner would be - but yes, based on what ive seen and what most educated analysts believe, if he played with someone like a Keith Yandle I certainly think that's a #1 pairing. If not this year, next year for sure... He has an all around game that fits with a lot of different players though.

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The fact aside that you probably couldn't list 60 defenseman who are better than Kronwall, that top pairing would get eaten alive. DeKeyser has played less than 20 games at the NHL level, and Yandle is just a few steps above outright bad in his own zone. For that matter, there are quite a few who would take Kronwall over Yandle.

The proof is in the pudding: Kronwall and Ericsson did just fine as a first pairing.

I apologize I didn't really clarify what expectations I based my interpretation of Kronwall as a second pairing guy were, which was a championship winning team.

Yes, Kronwall would be a suitable #1 on more than half of the teams in the NHL - and maybe more, but I believe for us to truly be considered a cup favourite he's better suited with Ericsson on the second pairing.

His best years I noted - were the two years we played in the Stanley Cup Final, played on the second pairing... Now this isn't to compare Yandle or whoever we could find and Dekeyser to Lidstrom and Rafalski, but I believe Kronwalls defensive inefficientcies don't match up to the best forwards in the world.

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The fact aside that you probably couldn't list 60 defenseman who are better than Kronwall, that top pairing would get eaten alive. DeKeyser has played less than 20 games at the NHL level, and Yandle is just a few steps above outright bad in his own zone. For that matter, there are quite a few who would take Kronwall over Yandle.

The proof is in the pudding: Kronwall and Ericsson did just fine as a first pairing.

I apologize I didn't really clarify what expectations I based my interpretation of Kronwall as a second pairing guy were, which was a championship winning team.

Yes, Kronwall would be a suitable #1 on more than half of the teams in the NHL - and maybe more, but I believe for us to truly be considered a cup favourite he's better suited with Ericsson on the second pairing.

His best years I noted - were the two years we played in the Stanley Cup Final, played on the second pairing... Now this isn't to compare Yandle or whoever we could find and Dekeyser to Lidstrom and Rafalski, but I believe Kronwalls defensive inefficientcies don't match up to the best forwards in the world.

Go watch Yandle. Kronwall is easily better defensively. I also think that a contender's #1 guy should kill penalties. Other than s 7 game stint with the team in 06-07 Yandle's top season of sh toi/GM was 33 seconds. This year in 48 games he played a total of 3:58 sh.

29 skaters played at least one game for Detroit this year. 20 of them averaged more pk time than Yandle. Helm played more pk in his one game than Yandle did all season.

OEL is the Coyotes #1 guy anyway, so your boy isn't even a #1 in Phoenix

Edited by DickieDunn

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Guest Crymson

Depends on who his partner would be - but yes, based on what ive seen and what most educated analysts believe, if he played with someone like a Keith Yandle I certainly think that's a #1 pairing. If not this year, next year for sure... He has an all around game that fits with a lot of different players though.

Most "educated analysts" have almost no data to go on here, so I really doubt they've concluded that he could successfully play as a top-pairing defenseman at this stage of his career. I don't know why you think that playing with a guy like Yandle, who is known for being poor at actual defense, would make him any more fit for this role.

If you'd watched the Calder Cup finals, you'd have seen that DeKeyser had some brutal games. He's still figuring out how professional hockey functions.

I apologize I didn't really clarify what expectations I based my interpretation of Kronwall as a second pairing guy were, which was a championship winning team.

Yes, Kronwall would be a suitable #1 on more than half of the teams in the NHL - and maybe more, but I believe for us to truly be considered a cup favourite he's better suited with Ericsson on the second pairing.

His best years I noted - were the two years we played in the Stanley Cup Final, played on the second pairing... Now this isn't to compare Yandle or whoever we could find and Dekeyser to Lidstrom and Rafalski, but I believe Kronwalls defensive inefficientcies don't match up to the best forwards in the world.

If you take any prime defenseman and play him against weaker opposition, he'll perform better. That's just how things go. Kronwall and Stuart could have formed an able first pairing at that stage. Fortunately for the Wings, they had an even better first pairing in Lidstrom and Rafalski. The Red Wings were quite simply stacked on defense back then in a way that no other team was. Rarely will you ever see such an able grouping on defense, and the fact that Kronwall played on the 2nd pairing back then doesn't mean anything about his overall acumen.

I still don't see why you believe that Yandle would perform better on the top pairing than Kronwall would; if you think that Kronwall has defensive deficiencies and that Yandle would be a better fit, you clearly don't watch Yandle play very much. As mentioned, Yandle is a one-dimensional player and is not even the #1 defenseman on his own team. He is roughly Kronwall's equal in offense, and quite a bit below him in defensive acumen.

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So based on a handful of games you believe Dekeyser is ready to play against the best players in the world every shift?

Depends on who his partner would be - but yes, based on what ive seen and what most educated analysts believe, if he played with someone like a Keith Yandle I certainly think that's a #1 pairing. If not this year, next year for sure... He has an all around game that fits with a lot of different players though.

What educated analysts said that Dekeyser is a top pair d ad a rookie? I remember a lot of people saying similar things about Ericsson after his first short stint in Detroit too, then he crashed back to reality and some of the same people who said he was a top 4 d as a rookie didn't want him extended for mote than $1.5 mil a season. Now he's developed into a pretty good defenseman. I think DD is going to follow a similar path.

Edited by DickieDunn

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Guest The Axe

DD will be the LGW whipping boy this year. Seen it with 4 guys in a row now who are all liked or at least tolerated on here now.

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DD will be the LGW whipping boy this year. Seen it with 4 guys in a row now who are all liked or at least tolerated on here now.

Over inflated expectations will do that. People are thinking he's going to play as well or better than Stuart from day one with nine rookie mistakes, then when he doesn't he'll be terrible and they should dump him. Just Luke Ericsson, Kindl, and Smith.

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DD will be the LGW whipping boy this year. Seen it with 4 guys in a row now who are all liked or at least tolerated on here now.

Assuming Cleary's not back, I think it will be Smith, Lashoff, then maybe DD. He still seems to get a lot of goodwill as an unexpected but talented signing.

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Guest Crymson

Assuming Cleary's not back, I think it will be Smith, Lashoff, then maybe DD. He still seems to get a lot of goodwill as an unexpected but talented signing.

Smith could very well come back much improved. Lashoff simply needs to improve his defensive awareness. DeKeyser had a couple of bad games in the Calder Cup finals and wasn't very remarkable in the rest, but this was possibly just rust. He's got a lot of potential, but I think that it's very premature to be pegging him as a first-pairing defenseman. I hope he turns out to be a defensive cog; we'll see.

Edited by Crymson

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