WordPress is clearly bad luck. I’m packing up and heading for greener pastures.
Not quite the reason, but still. It can’t hurt, right?
I’ve been asked to join the Bloguin network. Bloguin is an up-and-coming network that’s currently completely juicing up their hockey section with all kinds of talent throughout the internet. I was flattered when they asked me to join, and I’ve gladly accepted the offer. Bloguin is a network of 97 (and rising, rapidly) sports blogs covering every angle out there. They’re not even a full year old but they boast some of the best blogs on the net, including the biggest (and most likely cruelest) team-specific hockey blog out there in Pensblog. It’s bound to be interesting, right?
What’s in it for me? A sleek new page design coupled with a professionally, and hilariously, created banner, and a domain name. So no more ridiculous long bookmark — babcocksdeathstare.com will take you right to where you need to be. The added exposure and traffic will hopefully bring some more regulars around so the half dozen or so I have now, lovely as they are, will have some more people to talk to! The blogging platform that Bloguin runs off of is really nice and seems to have a lot of features that I can mess around with, so hopefully that means I can add on some cool features. Or maybe I’ll click the wrong button and bring the network down in a fiery mess. We’ll see.
Nothing will change, besides the new look. The guys at Bloguin are super-cool and accommodating. They made it clear that I didn’t need to change a thing about what I write about or how I write it — and that is something incredibly important to me.
Update bookmarks and RSS feeds, because I’m over there now. Bare with the mess for now. The front page is empty, but the archives are up and functional. The only thing that won’t work is links inside posts, as they will still link to articles over here as I’m not nearly dedicated enough to fix hundreds of posts worth of links.
And, as I don’t nearly say it enough, a big thank you to everyone who can actually read me. You’re good peoples, all of yous, and I admire you because sometimes I can barely stand to read what I have to say. Thanks for making things interesting and keeping me inspired to keep going. Questions, concerns, or comments can always be voiced via e-mail.
Just wanted to make a little note to everyone alerting you that I am alive. Devastating as that may be to some, it was mid-terms week so blog posting took a little break. On the bright side, pretty much all I missed was Detroit getting destroyed by Colorado. I left after the second period, so conveniently I missed the meltdown. They’d been playing well up to that point, I understand but it looked like the same old story with Osgood letting up a questionable goal, but Detroit making an inexcusable mistake leading up to it. So it’s nobody’s fault; everybody sucks equally.
Datsyuk seems like he’s playing tomorrow, but the way there’s been no official word makes it seem like one of those things where we don’t find out until game time that he’s going to miss another five games. Because that’s just how it works for Detroit. I’d like to be proven wrong. We need him, so there are no excuses when the team lays an egg against the Colorado Avalanche. That said, Craig Anderson is a great goalie.
I just wanted to touch on the Griffins really quick. After winning the first game of the year and losing the second on a last minute goal, last weekend they headed into Texas for a game against the Texas Stars, and the San Antonio Rampage. They lost to Texas rather dramatically, with Thomas McCollum stopping every shot he faced until 1:33 left in the 3rd when Sergei Korostin beat him. The next night, things went bad.
Let me preface that I was extremely interested in the games verse the San Antonio Rampage. As some of you might know, I cover prospects over at the prospects web site Hockey’s Future. I wrote for Phoenix up until last month, and now I write for Anaheim. San Antonio is Phoenix’s AHL team, and Anaheim doesn’t have a team, so they’ve sent most of their players to San Antonio as well. So last month when I had to write the San Antonio AHL preview, all I wanted to write was “holy eff this team is stacked,” but that’s very unprofessional and I likely would have been terminated. San Antonio was pretty bad last year but not terrible, but this year with the likes of Kyle Turris, Mikkel Boedker, and Viktor Tikhonov, in addition to some of the best and brightest from Anaheim’s system, I thought they might be one of the best teams in the league. I thought Grand Rapids would be good, too. Both contenders in my mind, I was interesting to see how they would stack up, as I don’t follow any other AHL teams closer than these two.
Well, the stacked factor I talked about really came into play. San Antonio scored on five of their first six shots, chasing Daniel Larsson to the bench. McCollum came in and did what he could, but San Antonio took the game 7-4. The next night, McCollum got the start and things didn’t go much better. In fact, the Griffins lost 7-2. McCollum went the distance and made 23 saves, but still, I can’t imagine you can take a lot of positives out of a weekend like this. On the bright side, Tomas Tatar finally made his season debut and was on the ice for both goals the Griffins scored, finishing with an assist and a +1. UPDATE: It was finally revealed that Tatar’s debut was delayed by immigration issues. But he impressed Curt Fraser, as mLive’s Michael Zuidema notes.
So it was interesting today when it was learned that Michael Nylander is being loaned for two weeks on a conditioning assignment to Grand Rapids. Yes, the Michael Nylander of 679 NHL points and 920 NHL games, who was essentially a point-per-game player from 2003-04 to 2006-07, is now a Griffin. Funny, kind of.
The Nylander saga has become a rather sad one. He was a player I always randomly liked, and I definitely recall demanding the Wings make a push for him before the 2007-08 season when he signed a four-year deal with Washington worth $4.875 million a year. There was a rather funny moment to file under the “everyone hates Edmonton” category when this happened because his agent apparently had him agree to a deal with Edmonton, and they reported this accordingly, but then Nylander pulled out when it was being finalized and signed in Washington.
Nylander was coming off of his two best seasons ever, with 79 points in 81 games and 83 in 79 the following year. The first year under his contract, where he should have been playing with Alexander Ovechkin, he got hurt, missed out on the opportunity to play with Ovechkin, and was limited to just 37 points in 40 games. Then last season, banged up and 36 years old, he scored just 33 in 72 games and was barely used in the playoffs.
On the hook for such a disappointment for two more seasons, things turned ugly between Washington and Nylander. He sounded banged up last season, but Washington mostly scratched him for the playoffs. They basically told him not to report to camp this year, but he did, and expressed his desire to play for the Caps. The Caps, meanwhile, were trying to reach a deal to get a European club to take Nylander off their hands. He hasn’t seen a minute of pre-season or regular season time thus far.
They’ve now chosen to loan him to Grand Rapids. Doesn’t Washington have an AHL club, you ask? Yes they do, and they feel so strongly that they don’t want Nylander around that they loaned him to Grand Rapids so he won’t be in the way of Caps prospects. Ouch.
But make no mistake — this is no audition for Detroit, although Ken Holland did have a hand in agreeing to let Nylander join Grand Rapids. His contract is bigger than Franzen’s and he’s under contract until next season. It’s completely unmovable. From the sounds of things, they’ve contacted a few European clubs (Russian and Swiss), but these clubs are concerned because he hasn’t played since April. Nylander contends that he’s playing 10 pounds heavier than ever which means he either sat on his ass since April, or he’s in the best shape of his life. He says the latter. We’ll see. So this is more of an audition to show the world he can still play. Then he’ll be loaned out to Europe, most likely.
It will be interesting to see what happens, he does have a lot of skill, but I have seen very little of him since his last season with the Rangers. He’s joining the Griffins tomorrow and will play the home opener on Friday against Abbotsford. As I’m going to the home opener, this means I’ll get to see Nylander skating on the same ice as Tomas Tatar, which is a strange and outlandish thought.
So there’s your up-to-the-minute Griffins news. I’ll be around after the Coyotes game with a recap, hopefully. And hopefully soon, you’ll all be ready for my super-exciting blog announcement (the blog is day-to-day with a lower body injury oooh, whatever could it be?)
Just because I feel like posting another Entourage clip to sum up how I feel:
Specifically, I’m feeling pretty similar to the last ten seconds.
Alright, where to start? I wanted to write this post yesterday. But it would have been much, much angrier. I’ve had some time to calm down, and think about it, and be reasonable. That said: This team sucks right now, and I hate almost everyone on it.
I’m not happy. I’m not happy with the play on the ice, and I’m not happy with what everyone else is saying about the loss.
To preface, is it time to panic? No, not to that extreme. Do we need a trade? Not yet, but let’s just say Kenny H. shouldn’t leave his phone on silent anytime soon. Do we need to wake the hell up? Yes, I think so.
The effort last night was unacceptable, and it starts right at the top. I see a lot of people blaming Bertuzzi, Meech, Kronwall, etc., all the usual. But I can assure you, these are the only players not at fault for yesterday’s loss: Darren Helm, Justin Abdelkader, Valtteri Filppula, and Jimmy Howard.
I can’t believe the stuff I’m reading today. Osgood looked “great?” On which of the five goals that he let in do you think he looked best? I personally like the one where he fell over against the post and left a whole net open. But the one where he kicked a rebound up the middle off a stuff in by a rookie defenseman to a grinder, and then stood up so his five hole would be open — that one was pretty good too. He looked great there. And, my goodness, the way he moved off his post so Clarke MacArthur could stuff one in was just veteran savvy at it’s finest. Left a gift of a rebound for Stafford to put in for the first of the game as well, you don’t think he knew Stafford was there?
Let me clarify; none of these goals were tremendously bad, blame can be placed elsewhere. But at some point, Chris Osgood needs to step up and make what should be easy saves, regardless of who makes a mistake leading up to the goal. That’s what the goalie does. He’s the last line of defense. Defense. He’s part of the defense. So Myers may have walked Jason Williams and Derek Meech en route to the stuff in that led to Patrick Kaleta’s goal, who was untouched and unbothered by anyone as he sneaked in, but why the hell did Osgood just leave that in front of the net and stand up? Kronwall passed to Patrick Eaves’ knee cap on the second Vanek goal, but you can’t tell me Osgood can’t move better laterally to the point where he doesn’t topple over when he needs to stop quickly. There were all kinds of turnovers in the corner that led to the MacArthur goal, but he cheated off his post and I have no idea why. It was a terrible angle, that is not a goal that should ever go in.
He was not great, and I’m blown away that people think so. He looked good in the first, but by no means does four goals against in a period equate to a great performance. A great performance entails making the big saves to keep the team in the game, regardless of how sloppy they were. If Buffalo was just burying goals, or if they were all going in of Nick Lidstrom’s stick in front, that is something you can’t do anything about. But considering the ease in which Detroit allowed Buffalo to walk right to the net, Ozzie didn’t face a variety of difficult shots.
I understand what people mean by not placing the blame on him. I’m not either. It really doesn’t matter how he plays when Detroit isn’t mounting any offensive attack. But “great” is not the word I would use. He was left out to dry, and he did nothing to help his own case. Just watch the highlights. Don’t watch the turnovers leading up to the goals, because I’ll touch on that later, just watch the goals themselves. Picture to yourself that Detroit is playing well and Osgood is letting up goals on those types of shots. If you can do that, and tell me Osgood looked great, I will e-punch you in the face and let you know that you know nothing about hockey. But I won’t really e-punch you because I’m quite frail and afraid of conflict in real life. He was bad, but he was not at fault for the loss — it’s a team effort. Do you see what I’m getting at here?
And I’m not taking the easy road here and blaming the loss on Bertuzzi, Williams, Meech, and the decision to bench Draper and Maltby. Really? Draper and Maltby would have made the difference tonight? I realize they have more goals than our top line, but this is another stupid statement. Those two have never had that kind of impact, let alone in their waning years here, I’m sorry. And while I think Draper at least needs to come back in, May-Abdelkader-Eaves was Detroit’s best line last night. They were the only guys out there skating and trying to get the puck. But none of them were offensively competent enough to do anything with it, and Draper and Maltby would have been no improvement.
I’m blaming the loss on Pavel Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterberg, Nicklas Lidstrom, and Mike Babcock. It starts at the top, I’m tired of hearing about everyone else when these guys have done nothing this season.
I can lump Zetterberg and Datsyuk together. These are the Eurotwins. Why haven’t they had a good shift yet? And, to clarify, there’s a different between a good shift for a line with Brad May on it, and one with the Eurotwins on it. May’s job is to never stop skating, punch people, and hit anyone who he can possibly catch. Zetterberg and Datsyuk’s job is to dominate all three zones of the hockey rink. At no point in these first five games have I seen that. They’ve been good defensively (more on that later) but their job isn’t to be checkers. What happened to last season when they were able to hem a team in their defensive zone for 90 seconds and finally score a goal when the defense finally lost their will to live? Datsyuk barely even touches the puck anymore, he just dumps it in. Zetterberg keeps trying to dangle, but he gets it taken away constantly. More shots, more possession, better passes. No excuse for 0 goals combined in 5 games.
Nicklas Lidstrom had four giveaways. He knocked a puck into his own net (not his fault, but it didn’t help his case). He was the defenseman that didn’t touch MacArthur when he stuffed one past Osgood, not Ericsson as other people have been blaming. He was not good. He was outmuscled and outhustled for pucks all night. Very un-Lidstrom. Cost himself the Norris with this performance, I guarantee it. The media has gotten wind of his four giveaways tonight already. This is how it was last season. Nick has a series of not great games (nothing this bad) and everyone decided he had lost a step, even though he was perfect for the second half of the season. He’ll be perfect from this point forward, I have no doubts, but this four giveaways thing is going to kill him, even though in Washington they consider that a good game for Mike Green.
And Mike Babcock, along with the whole coaching philosophy. I blame him in part for why Z/D don’t explore the offensive zone more. This whole concentration on team defense needs to stop now, because it’s not working. Detroit decided they were going to make up for goals by not letting in so many. But here’s a newsflash: Toronto, Florida, Calgary, and Washington are the only teams who have surrendered more goals than Detroit. Calgary is a mess right now. Kipper looks terrible, but they do have two more games played than Detroit — Detroit will probably pass them, at this pace. Toronto and Florida are terrible, and Detroit and Washington don’t exactly have the same caliber defensive group. Great start. I’m just worrying more and more that this defensive concentration is hurting the creativity of our offense. Let’s not change the system. Let the forwards do what they do offensively and outshoot teams 40-20. Hopefully we’ll win a few 7-6, 6-5 games along the way.
But that’s something I don’t anticipate will change. I’m just bringing it up now because no one else will say it. The way Detroit plays, and how they coast through most of their games, there’s no way this system will hold up an entire season. But what does need to change are the defensive pairings. This is the second full season of them, save for Ericsson instead of Lilja and, for now, Meech over Lebda (wash). Lidstrom will be better off without Rafalski. Stuart and Kronwall may be the Bash Brothers or the Twin Towers or whatever you want to call them, but really they’re the pairing most likely to make colossal, game-changing mistakes. Even through last season, this is the one pairing I did not like. Babcock always splits them up when he juggles lines, but I think we need to make a permanent change. The offense needs to be juggled too, this is what I’d suggest:
Lidstrom – Kronwall
Ericsson – Rafalski
Stuart – Lebda
Just.. anything different. Maltby will probably come in for Thursday, but I don’t think Eaves deserves to sit yet. I’d rather see Draper than May, as well. Draper is important to the PK, and Abdelkader has been awful on faceoffs this season. Drapes needs to stay on that 4th line, and then May and Maltby can be rotated in with Eaves and Abdelkader whenever. But if this continues.. something drastic needs to be done. Sit a star. Sit Kronwall, sit Cleary, sit Williams, I barely noticed these guys last night (which is both good and bad, because I noticed al ot of other guys for the wrong reasons). Eaves and May, as much as they’re not helping with the goals for or the goals against, do actually move their feet. Maltby doesn’t really move his feet, and neither does anyone on the top two lines right now. Babcock needs to send a message. I do like him as a coach, and I’m certain he screamed himself hoarse a few times already this season, but nothing cures complacency like a well-timed healthy scratch. Bowman was the king at it, but so far since Babcock took over the biggest name he’s tried to send a message is Kris Draper. Set some examples, make this team hate you. We’ve got tons of cap space now, bring up some Griffins if you need to. Waive Meech, sign another defenseman who’s looking for a chance in the NHL. On a team like this, new blood — guys who want to play regular season hockey — should be at a premium.
As I finish this post, I learn courtesy of Drew at NOHS that Datsyuk and Kronwall are getting “looked at” (and like Drew, the first thing I wondered was if they were getting mentally evaluated) and didn’t practice. Lebda, Maltby, and Draper are coming back in the lineup, and there’s no starting goalie yet. The Wings need to play a 60-minute effort on Thursday. Even if they win 6-1, if they’re not hustling for a full 60 minutes I’m not going to be happy. I’m not going to rest until they do. I’m tired of writing such nice things after a win when the team still did so much wrong. Fix these problems, please!
UPDATE: Finally a post-game take that I like. Eric Duhatschek hits the nail on the head a couple of times. Even though I didn’t exactly exercise patience in this post, I find it to be a soothing and accurate read.
I had a discussion with loyal BDS citizen Zach before the game. We mulled over the various stages of grief over our Franzen-related depression, and we both agreed upon the importance of this game. I noted it in my last post, but I’m not sure if I stressed it enough. This game was to showcase our depth, and nothing would have made me happier than to see Detroit dominate. It would say good things about our depth, and just.. re-assure me that we can do good things without Franzen. Because, if you think about it, Franzen was pretty much just a checker until late in the 2007-08 season. He was like Filppula, in a sense, that he just looked like he has all kinds of skill but it looked like he might never break out of his role. I feel like I, along with many fans, has been been waiting for Filppula to do that, and he’s got a chance to do so this year. So we scored hilarious amounts of goals before the Mule got super confident in himself, and I was hoping to see some of that tonight.
It wasn’t completely as I had hoped, but I was impressed with the win tonight. To expand on that, my attention wasn’t 100% in tune with the game. The 8 PM Michigan/Iowa (dammit Robinson) and Florida/LSU (zzz) games started, so the Wings got pushed onto my laptop, forcing me to rely on inconsistent streams and sometimes lose a little focus because of crucial plays in between those games. So I don’t have any hard-hitting, well-supported analysis from the Wings, just general impressions of things I noticed when my wireless was cooperating.
- I thought Filppula looked like a man possessed. FSN’s pre-game kind of unfairly singled him out as the guy the Wings were looking at to step up with no Franzen. I expect him to as well, but I was looking at Bertuzzi, Williams, Eaves, Leino, and Abdelkader more, because they’re all new guys I’ve said in the past can really break out for Detroit. Needs to be a committee, in my opinion. But Filppula seemed to be the only guy to really take that challenge seriously. In the first, I felt like he was trying to do too much. He Samuelsson’d it and made an extra move at the line, twice, sending himself offsides and Leino (partially his fault) on another occasion, and tried an unusually finesse and powerful move in trying to split the defenseman (well, one was Mike Green) on the play where Green took a holding call on him. However, in the final 40 minutes he seemed to be all over the place. And for a player on who’s balance I rip on almost all the time — it is pretty bad — he knocked 6′3 super-gump Tyler Sloan on his back and came out on top over contact with Ovechkin. He seemed angry. I like it.
- Oh boy! Williams scored from the point. But don’t acknowledge it, so you can bash him when he makes his once-every-three-game mistake despite the fact that he’s been the better PP2 point man than Kronwall 4 out of 4 games. However, he was invisible other than that, to me. Better than being visible for the wrong reasons, I suppose.
- One big switch from the line combinations from the pre-game. Bert took Holmstrom’s wing spot with the Eurotwins and Homer was bumped down to Abdelkader and Williams. I think that’s the first time in the Mike Babcock era that Holmstom hasn’t been with one of the Eurotwins. However, he responded well. He looked angry as well (that’s what I want to see in this team, if you haven’t figured that out yet), and scored that big goal. Bertuzzi didn’t do much with his new linemates, but I like the idea — I’m hoping he’ll get a few more games there. I haven’t been blown away yet, and frankly I thought he’d be a little more involved offensively (however, he’s been better defensively than I thought he could be), but if he can regain his form and become a player that can take over a game, as he’s said he thinks he can, he’s certainly getting the right opportunity to. Like him or not, I think you have to admit if there’s a hidden gamebreaker on this team, it’s gotta be Bertuzzi. And again, I did notice additional anger in him, but no penalties or… incidents. Probably an unneeded shot there, but I’m going to leave it in, as I’m the only blog that doesn’t take regular shots at that.
- Biggest problem on this team right now: Draper/Maltby goals: 2, Zetterberg/Datsyuk goals: 0. Okay, so neither Datsyuk or Zetterberg have had the luxury of a shorthanded breakaway and a retarded defensive zone turnover leading to a short break on Huet the super-sieve, but credit to Draper and Maltby for making those things happen. I wasn’t opposed to Maltby being scratched tonight because he hadn’t done much outside of the first period of the Blues game, but I have been impressed that both of them finally look like they realize they’re not guaranteed lineup spots in a Babcock lineup. Datsyuk and Zetterberg have been noticeable in spurts, but for the most part, too quiet for the roles they play. I feel like Zetterberg especially has been trying to do too much. He’s never been the guy to make a quick move through three defenders; he’s so good because he always makes the right play and finds the open guy.
- Patrick Eaves looked like a player tonight who decided he didn’t want to be a regular healthy scratch on his new team. He was energized, and had a couple of shots, but no great chances. However, Babcock noticed and tried him with Zetterberg and Datsyuk for a while. I don’t recall for how long, and he didn’t do much. But I hope he realizes that that’s a hell of an opportunity. This is a guy who was bought out over the summer, and then he finds himself in a close game on a line with two of the best players in the world. If you want to revitalize your career, you’ve got to take a few chances and make an impact. Detroit could sure use it.
- Barely noticed May tonight other than the occasional heart-stopping feeling I instinctively get when I see the Wings’ #24 with the puck. Only 6:24 played I see. Just noting this because I’m only going to notice him if he’s running guys questionably late, Aaron Downey-style. Just hoping that May comes out if/when Maltby comes back in; Eaves was much better, and like I said when Abdelkader got sent down, he’s not here to sit. Darren Helm is targeting a Tuesday return as well. I’m thinking Detroit might not actually send May down because they have so much cap space now with Franzen on LTIR, so I hope the 4th line rotation can keep everyone in that mix (May, Eaves, Draper, Maltby, and Abdelkader to an extent, though he will get more leeway since he’s not as old as time or Patrick Eaves) honest. Need to make your minutes count if you’re staying in — May did that in the pre-season, but not tonight.
- For the time being, no longer clenching up inside every time a puck goes towards Osgood. The first goal was weak, but he was excellent for a second straight night. I expect he’ll have a few off nights — I don’t expect playoff form every night. All I expect from our goaltending is to not be the reason we lose. Teams that see that more often than not are teams that have hard times making the playoffs. Detroit has too much talent to lose on goals that they lost in with Osgood/Howard in Sweden.
- Meech has been decent in his two games, but the Wings need to be able to count on a 6th defenseman for more than 10:05. I realize a lot of speculation in the past few days has been for a cheap top-six scorer, but I wonder if the Franzen cap space makes a Lebda + mid-round pick trade for a more reliable, stay-at-home #6 a possibility instead of waiting for Lilja. The trade would come at a cheaper price than a deadline deal, and it’s going to all be wasted cap space anyhow, regardless of when Lilja comes back. You wouldn’t need to worry about him being rusty or slightly less effective, either.
- I’ll try to keep people updated on the Griffins as well. They dropped to the Toronto Marlies tonight. Jeremy Williams and Doug Janik gave them a 2-0 lead but the Marlies took it 3-2. Daniel Larsson took the loss. Tomas Tatar was still a healthy scratch — was almost positive Curt Fraser said he’d get in this weekend. I’ve said that he needs to be on the scoring lines to make an impact, but there’s no sense keeping him scratched when he could be playing meaningless 4th line minutes to get adjusted to the speed of the game. He’ll definitely see a few games, but this tells me that Plymouth is looking like a good option for him. And clearly, Plymouth needs him. They won 9-2 tonight with the help of five points from Tyler Seguin, who’s already improved his stock from “definite first round pick” to “challenging for #1 overall” with a rather impressive 25 point in 10 game start. Tatar is starting to look mouth-wateringly good as his winger. Ohhh man.
Panic level has fallen about 10 levels. A nice win tonight. Give me some thoughts on the comments — I did not pay as much attention to the game as I would have liked, and I’ll probably re-watch it on NHL GameCenter (which is infinitely improved from last year with full screen multi-game, more HD broadcasts and, subsequently, adaptive streaming quality, as well as the pausing/rewinding functionality) tomorrow if it’s up in time for when I inevitably shut the Lions off whenever the Steelers are by up enough to put Charlie Batch in. I want to look a little harder at Williams, Bertuzzi, Eaves, and Filppula.
Ugh. Just when Detroit showed some, but not a whole lot, signs of being a competent and competitive team not in the Taylor Hall sweepstakes, this happens.
I don’t even want to write about this. I’d recommend you check out On the Wings, because Matt was on top of all the updates and comments from the team.
Basically, here’s what happened from my perspective. My post-game concern was for Jonathan Ericsson, who looked like he was in a world of hurt after a shot off the foot and he could barely get off the ice. Post-game, I was relieved because Mike Babcock said he’d be okay. Yesterday morning, they said Ericsson should play against Washington tonight, but Franzen might not practice. It seemed precautionary. I rolled my eyes, because that’s just what Franzen does. He gets minor injuries that never change his effectiveness on the ice.
Then I went for a quick skate, came back… and… I don’t want to even say it.
He tore his ACL!? What? No, no, no, no, no, no. Why does Franzen always get hurt against Chicago? In October. I hate hockey.
Franzen, initially reported to have “gotten bumped” in the Chicago game. In the first period. Before he scored. In a game he finished. With a blown ACL. Cocaine’s a hell of a drug.
This is the part of the video game where I’d turn it off without saving.
So now we get too see how deep we are. Dammit. This means significantly more Abdelkader, he may be a Wing permanently now. Most likely, a lot more May. And more than that, the Williams, Bertuzzi, and Eaves signings I defended because I viewed them all as three players who could have breakout/comeback seasons.. need to live up to that hype. Eaves is only making his debut tonight after doing not a whole lot in the pre-season. Williams looked good to me the first three games, made too many mistakes against Chicago (though I felt like Kronwall has been the weak link on that powerplay so far). Bertuzzi has actually been the opposite of how I thought he’d be. He’s actually playing well in his own end and backchecking hard, but so far he hasn’t been a factor offensively.
Henrik Zetterberg | Pavel Datsyuk | Tomas Holmstrom
Ville Leino | Valtteri Filppula | Dan Cleary
Todd Bertuzzi | Justin Abdelkader | Jason Williams
Brad May | Kris Draper | Patrick Eaves
Babcock says the Eurotwins reunion isn’t permanent. But it will be if they each score 4 goals tonight, which is what I’m expecting. I still want them together, I felt they were separated too much last season. Right now neither have been much of a factor, so hopefully together they can do some damage. Meanwhile Leino and Filppula have been playing really well together, I think that’s a solid second line. And that third line.. interesting. Abdelkader is going to need to play a lot better than he did in the pre-season to make it work. Bertuzzi keeps saying he feels like he can take over a game still — he needs to on this line. I’ll be watching those three like a hawk tonight. Eaves gets his shot tonight as well — if anyone on the top three lines is struggling, he moves up, so he needs to give Babcock a few reasons to put him there.
On the bright side, Osgood was quite good against Chicago. The team was on their heels early, but they withstood the Kopecky-led barrage and got the win. This is the part of the season where the team hopefully realizes they no longer have the skill needed to win games in a period. Complete efforts. Nobody slacks. And naturally, that’s got to be as difficult as possible against a team that can score 14 points in a period.
On a side note, now that he’s not in the lineup instead of Abdelkader, I kind of like that we have Brad May. His fight was impressive, a clear win, and I love how he went right after Cam Barker after he leveled Maltby. He’s noticeable on the ice and that’s something that we haven’t always had in our 4th line the past few years. As long as he doesn’t get too comfortable here, I like it. Also, as I tweeted, his interviews are great. The way he looks at the camera, and how soft he speaks, just make me feel like he’s about to say “My, uh, new series of audiobooks is available on Amazon right now.” Just soothing. I would listen to those audiobooks.
On a more depressing side note, two career-length contracts for Zetterberg and Franzen. It starts with Zetterberg missing the pre-season with a groin injury, and Franzen missing more than half of the first season. Great.
As I promised, a little bit more news on the signing of Brad May. One-year, two-way, $500,000 according to CapGeek.
So are we all excited? We should be. I’m a big fan of this move for reasons I can’t explain. I like that we have May, but even if we get to the point where we need to call up forwards from Grand Rapids, I’d prefer giving young guys a shot. But if it came down to needing one guy from Grand Rapids for a must win playoff game? Gotta be May.
I pretty much wrote everything I needed to when he was originally invited to camp. I suspected with Detroit at only 47 contracts, they would burn one on Brad May. He fills a sort of hybrid role of Aaron Downey and Darren McCarty for Grand Rapids from last season. He’s a great locker room guy, earns rave reviews from fans everywhere he goes even if he’s not that useful of a player. That means something. Mike Babcock is certainly a fan, as he revealed he’s asked Kenny to go after Brad May in the past. Babcock missed May in Anaheim by about two seasons. So I’m not sure if they’d bring him up in the season or test young guys out, since we need a “next wave” of players to drool over now that everyone worth noting is in the NHL.
But May impressed me during the pre-season. I feel like I say this a lot, and I feel like a lot of people don’t like it, but I like him right in the mix of Draper and Maltby. That doesn’t mean I’d get rid of either, but I like them in different ways. Maltby just did nothing for me in the pre-season. He just coasted around and then I’d look at the boxscore and my jaw hit the floor when I realized he played 15 minutes. Meanwhile, May would be all over the ice and my jaw would hit the floor again when I saw he played only 8 minutes. Obviously, that’s the way it’s likely going to look when you’ve got one veteran 100% sure he’s going to make the team, and another taking a chance on the best team in the league as his last chance of an NHL job. One’s going to want it more, I’d think.
But still, I fully expect if he gets an NHL job that’s how he’ll play. Like I pointed out in the tryout post, this guy’s played over 1,000 NHL games and not one in the AHL. He’ll embrace his role, but I think he’d rather be in the NHL. But I do like him in the AHL. He’s probably not as good of a fighter as Downey, or as good of an AHL every shift player as McCarty, but he’s about right in the middle. A nice blend. He’ll police, he’ll probably be able to put up some points. I think he’s going to be a fantastic guy for the young Griffins to look up to.
While we’re on the subject, I meant to write a longer Griffins’ season preview, but I didn’t have the time. They opened up their season with a 3-1 win over Peoria. McCollum got a win and played to rave reviews. Dick Axelsson, who didn’t play in the pre-season because of the knee injury he suffered in the final prospect’s game, and not because he has attitude problems like I’ve seen some people suggest) picked up a goal and an assist.
In even better news, the AHL website is going to post free highlights for all of their games. Bookmark that, and keep up on the Griffins. I’m still going to make a point to get out to more games this year (I’m going to the home opener on Oct. 23), but I love that they’re posting highlights. The Griffins site does something, but it’s all done with a very shaky and zoom-happy camera. It’s the hockey highlight equivalent of a Bourne movie. At times you realize you’re just looking at a various blend of shapes and colors, and you feel cheated.
Based on the starting lineup and who was on the ice when goals were scored, this is the lineup I’ve pieced together:
Mattias Ritola | Kris Newbury | Jeremy Williams
Newbury and Williams are the veterans, so it’s great for Ritola to get on this line. Especially since Newbury is more of a grinder, and Williams can’t really do anything but shoot, Ritola has a chance to be really creative and be the playmaker.
Francis Pare | Evan McGrath (A) | Francis Lemieux*
The McGrath line was one of the hottest down the stretch, Pare scored most of his 23 goals in the second half of the season when that got re-united. McGrath gets a letter this year and a chance to put up big numbers all year and finally earn that NHL callup that he deserves. Grand Rapids re-signed Lemieux at some point — ex-Detroit prospect (traded Brett Engelhardt for him in 2007-08) that’s really rekindled his career in Grand Rapids, but not to the point of NHL interest anymore.
Dick Axelsson | Cory Emmerton | Jamie Tardif (C) Definitely the line I’m keeping an eye on the most when I hit up the home opener. Emmerton needs to have a big year because he looked phenomenal in the pre-season. People are quick to write off Axelsson but not many players his age scored like he did in the SEL, he’s got edge and the right attitude to score a lot of goals. Tardif had an off year last year after earning a contract from Detroit. Now he’s got a chance to be the captain and play on a line with two talented offensive players.
Paul Crosty* | John Vigilante* | Jan Mursak
I’m writing off Mursak if he can’t get off the 4th line again.. although Vigilante is a legitimate 2nd/3rd line player, so they could be explosive together, good speed. However, they won’t get much help from Paul “Sidney” Crosty. He’s a swingman, but playing forward for now. The Griffins just picked him up, he’s an established AHL heavyweight. He’s got 3 goals to match the number of seasons he’s played in the AHL, and 451 penalty minutes giving him an average of 3.4 per game. So.. we know his role. Ideally he won’t play every night if they keep Brad May in, I think May on this line gives them a great four line attack.
Brad May | Ryan Oulahen | Tomas Tatar These guys were just the scratches. May didn’t have a contract at this time. Oulahen got hurt last March-ish (slammed into the boards, had to be stretchered off because his hip bone was sticking through his skin.. sorry.. but at least the video isn’t online anymore) and he’s had a setback, so he’s out until January. You might see Tatar here and say “why on earth is he not playing?”.. and I’ll tell you why. He can play up to 9 games before it counts as a year on his contract, so they’re likely going to spread it out over maybe 12 games or so. It’s a tough lineup to crack even with Johan Ryno gone. You don’t want a Detroit prospect coming out, but the Griffins still need to focus on winning so they’ll want to keep Lemieux and Vigilante in, as they’re established and effective players. Curt Fraser says he’ll get in this weekend, but if he’s only average or something, he’ll probably end up in the OHL with Plymouth. Toledo does have a roster spot open, but that’s not really a spot you’d want to waste on Tatar, May would probably retire if he was ECHL’d (he’s too good anyway); if Mursak doesn’t get going, however, that might be a good kick in the pants for him. Everyone else is a bonafide AHLer.
Jakub Kindl | Doug Janik (A) A good balance. Janik can put up some numbers in the AHL but is a stay-at-home guy. He’ll need to stay at home and bail out Kindl, most likely. But hopefully this will lead to Kindl being more confident, because he’s not smart enough to play conservatively. He needs to take risks and make big plays.
Andy Delmore | Sergei Kolosov
Another balanced pairing. Kolosov looked very composed in training camp, definitely suited to take a top-4 role. Meanwhile, Delmore is going to be skating around the ice like a maniac. But he should be pretty fun to watch, I think he can score 12-15 goals with that shot of his.
Logan Pyett | Travis Ehrhardt Yikes.. Hopefully Ehrhardt isn’t as bad as Pyett looked in his pre-season action. Two small defenders, but Pyett is more of an offensive guy while Ehrhardt is stay-at-home, but he’s a great skater and jumps up into the play. I worry about this, though, for bigger AHL lines. A pairing like this could mean Kindl/Janik are playing 30 minutes a night. Wonder if they’d move Crosty back to defense just to get some size, not really sure how the guy skates or anything (probably not well).
Sebastien Piche Odd man out for now. Fraser says he’ll play this weekend. Likely for Ehrhardt I’d imagine, but I see the bottom pairing as a three man race with Pyett included — he’s not guaranteed anything from what I saw last season. They’re all dynamic players, so I hope one will step up. Piche and Pyett especially have a chance to get big powerplay minutes because Janik and Kolosov aren’t really great options for the point on the second powerplay (Kindl and Delmore sound awesome together on the 1st, but I think I’d rather have Jason Williams and Mikael Samuelsson back defending if the other team had a shorthanded rush).
Daniel Larsson | Thomas McCollum | (Jordan Pearce) Larsson’s back in Grand Rapids after attending a seminar on sieves in Sweden over the weekend. McCollum started this last game, a good professional debut (no chance no his goal). When Detroit signed Pearce I thought the race would be between he and McCollum, but I think the real race this season is who’s going to get called up to Detroit first, Larsson or McCollum. Not a slight towards Pearce, but after a shaky WJC performance I wasn’t sure what to expect of McCollum. He’s the real deal, and much more advanced than I imagined. Pearce was sent down to Toledo when Larsson got back to GR, they’ll start their season on October 16.
* = Griffins contracted player
A lineup to get excited about, for sure. None of those lines have the firepower of Leino/Abdelkader/Haydar from last season, but I find the first three lines to be extremely balanced. Defense worries me, but we’ve got goalies who are ready for some serious shot totals. This is definitely a team that could contend for the division. It’s young and exciting, but many of these Detroit prospects are in their 3rd or 4th year and a good deal are ready for NHL jobs.
I’m not a baseball fan by any means. In my mind, the only acceptable time to watch the sport is a) in person or b) with your grandparents. These are the only times I will watch the Detroit Tigers.
Yet, somehow, I got caught up in the Tigers hype yesterday. I’ve been vaguely aware about how they had been choking away their playoff hopes, but I hadn’t watched a minute outside of what was forced down upon me via SportsCenter. I had no intentions of watching the tiebreaker game they had with the Minnesota Twins. I had class until 9 PM anyways, but I most likely wouldn’t have watched it even if I wasn’t. Sorry. Just can’t get into it. And if you’re on Facebook, you learned yesterday that 90% of the people you’re sure don’t watch baseball will watch a big game simply so they can coach the team via status updates, which was rather annoying. I did not want to be one of those people.
But I’m aware of what happened. The fellow that sat in front of me during my night class was following the GameCast on his laptop, so at times that was more interesting to me than different all the millions of scene transitions we were going over in Film Culture. Only at times, though. I’m not a fan, but I’m not one of those people that’s going to root against the hometown team just for the hell of it. I wish them well. The city of Detroit just seems like a happier place to be in when the Tigers are doing well. I noticed that they were up 3-0, and I was happy. The next time I looked, it was 4-3 Twins, late in the game. I then learned via my Twitter feed how exciting the end of the game was, and I almost wished I watched.
I watched the game highlights, voluntarily — the first time in my life such an event has transpired. And honestly, I felt bad. The team essentially choked their way out of the spot, it’s not like they worked their asses off and just fell short (and that Cabrera drunkeness news is just hilarious to me, and certainly didn’t help the team), but I didn’t realize how much it would bother me. Not just for the Tigers, but for the fans. They’re definitely a legit team, unlike in the early 2000s, but no playoff success other than the World Series run.
And while they likely would have been crushed by the New York Yankees, that’s not a certainty. They would have been a big underdog, the way I understand it, but this town needs a good story. They need a pick-me-up. And now.. the good story possibilities have been greatly reduced. The Tigers just played like 300-something games in one season, and didn’t make the playoffs. The Lions won one game — making this season a drastic improvement over the last — but even if Stafford was healthy right now they’re only going to win like three or four games max, making this season another meaningless one in the ever-lasting rebuild process.
The Pistons were a mess last year, but I follow them with less interest than the Tigers so I don’t know how they’re shaping up for this season. Regardless of who you follow in college football, that season is shaping up poorly as well. The Spartans looked like their season was absolutely lost, leading most to start wondering when college basketball starts, but then they beat an undefeated Wolverines team, delaying their run back into national prominence. I’m a Wolverines fan. I didn’t think they would go undefeated by any stretch, and I don’t think this changes the fact that they’re going to play in a bowl game (likely on January 1st). But if you’re not winning the National Championship, you need three things for a good season — a win over Notre Dame, a win over Michigan State, and a win over Ohio State. I would be happy if Michigan went 3-9 every year as long as those were the three wins. But now, with the severe likelihood of only one of those three things happening, I’m a little less enthused. That said, a win in Iowa on a beautiful ABC night game would be outstanding.
So, it’s up to the Red Wings to provide the good story. And they couldn’t look any worse right now. With Vancouver leading Montreal 3-1 late in the 2nd period, there’s a good chance Detroit could end up back in the conference cellar by the end of the night. While that means nothing at this stage of the season (Taylor Hall, here we come?), it’s still never happened in my lifetime. It feels weird. And the first two games sent the message that this team is exactly like last year’s team, which leads to less than happy thoughts when you figure you don’t have Hossa or Conklin to bail you out. As much as I don’t miss either, they did bail us out last season on our patented 20 minute effort games.
It’s time to step up. It’s time to forget about Sweden and play like a team that’s actually angry and actually wants to atone for shitting the bed last season. We’re on a four game losing streak, in games that matter. That’s no good. Get the act together.
Home opener tomorrow night against Chicago. Tomas Kopecky says it will be fun to beat Detroit. Yeah… remember the three games you played well in while you were in Detroit, Tomas? Because most people think it was too, but I think it was three.
Everyone’s least favorite player Brett Lebda is benched for tomorrow night, and everyone’s second-least favorite player Derek Meech is in, according to Ansar Khan. Also, Darren Helm is certainly out, and Patrick Eaves may come in for Justin Abdelkader or Kirk Maltby. I realize he’s (tied for the lead) leading the team in scoring right now, but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s much more useless than Justin Abdelkader, who wouldn’t be in Detroit right now if he was about to be a healthy scratch to Patrick Eaves and Kirk Maltby.
Meech will be paired with Ericsson. I hope he plays well, and eventually, that pairing is split up. Meech or Lebda, I don’t like either with the rookie Ericsson. I think a Lidstrom-Kronwall (an official passing of the torch), Ericsson-Rafalski, and Stuart-Lebda/Meech is a much more rounded out lineup. All I know is I’m going to throw a tantrum if Detroit struggles defensively and Babcock doesn’t mix up the pairings, because it occurred to me tonight that I probably should have been calling for that when Detroit was letting in hilarious amounts of goals last season, but that never happened. Either way, we need Lilja.
Lastly, via Bob McKenzie, Detroit signed Brad May today, after his tryout with the Griffins. Not a big surprise. I’ll write a little something on that later tonight. I like it a lot, but I’d be surprised if he wasn’t a Griffin for the entire year. But that’s just a nice player to have at your disposal.
For the first time since I can remember, Detroit is 0-2. 0-2 in what should be considered two homes games. I’m not sure if the Sweden thing turned into a distraction, but I hope they were because I don’t want to see this team play like that ever again.
Detroit came out absolutely flying both Friday and Saturday afternoon. I can’t even remember a time, regular season or playoff, last season where Detroit came out so motivated. Ignorant and forgetful of how many times they fell apart last season, I commented on Friday during the second period how comical Detroit’s domination was. They must have felt the same way, because they stopped trying.
So what do we know after two games:
Our goaltenders possess qualities similar to sieves.
This team still doesn’t understand that when the pressure is on, you need to ICE the puck and not finesse it out of the zone.
This team is still going to try to win games with inconsistent efforts, i.e., taking full periods off.
Fantastic! I can’t wait to write about the same problems as last season.
On the bright side, it’s just two games. And St. Louis is a good team, a team that could have challenged, at least Chicago, all of last season if they got their act together sooner than January, for the third straight season. I think Andy Murray is a tremendous coach, and I think his “we may not be more talented, but we will work harder” strategy is very effective, especially considering they’re quite talented to begin with. But still, the sky is falling and such, and we need to panic, I guess.
What concerns me the most is both of our goalies blow. Sorry, I wish I could have been more delicate with that one. I was patient all of last season with Osgood letting in a lot of goals and Conklin looking rather bad but somehow not letting in as many goals, but I was hoping just one of our goalies would have had a good start to the season. Unfortunately, Osgood was busy letting in a lot of goals on very few shots, while Howard was busy letting in very soft goals at very bad times.
I was a little surprised to see that the consensus on other blogs and message boards was that Howard sucks, and I even saw people suggest Danny Cloutier. Ugh. While I wish Howard performed better, both goalies sucked equally. Osgood didn’t let in any weak goals, really, but anyone letting in 4 goals on 17 shots every night is not going to hack it in my Thursday night Aluminum adult roller hockey league (TNAARHL), let alone the National Hockey League (NHL). Osgood just has a problem making semi-difficult saves. He let up one bad rebound that led to a goal, but other than that, the shots weren’t that bad. But in a starting goaltender, you expect that he’ll make some saves to keep you in the game.
Howard, meanwhile, was rather good for about half the game. He didn’t have a lot of work in the first period — shots were 14-1 at one point, but at one point in the second they were 18-15 for St. Louis, and he made most of those saves. He had no chance on Tkachuk’s goal, which was just luck, but the rebound on the Andy Mcdonald goal was not great. So through about 18 shots, he had 16 saves — more than Osgood. Then he decided to show the entire NHL what it took the AHL a while to figure out — Howard has an exploitable five hole. Brad Boyes barely squeaked on by in, and 12 seconds later, Patrik Berglund blew a shot through him. A good shot, and he never should have had that mini-breakaway, but he did go five hole and it was a back breaker — Howard probably should have had it.
However, he did make 27 total saves. At Chris Osgood’s save percentage, Detroit would have lost 7.5-3. Howard sucked and there’s no getting around that, but I’m just suggesting that people calling for his head give him a chance, because what we need is a regular season goalie. Osgood is clearly the playoff guy, but both are going to need to be much better for Detroit to get to that point, not just Howard. Give it time, it’s two games under strange circumstances.
Now, in defense of both, the Red Wings in front of them enjoyed a leisurely skate around the ice while a professional hockey team on the other end outworked and embarrassed them. Really, Detroit controlled most of the play for both games. But St. Louis capitalized on their chances and took advantage offensively when the ice was tilted in their favor. Ugh. This is really not at all what I wanted to write about today. On the bright side, they probably outworked the Michigan Wolverines through about three quarters of their game. Garbage.
So what else to we know? Brett Lebda is really, really bad and was at fault for most of the goals scored this weekend — and that’s not even a joke. He took a hard jolt from Tkachuk and seemed to favor his ribs, but the Detroit News’ Chris McCosky suggests that Babcock used the injury as an opportunity to keep Lebda on the bench. I hope he realizes that Derek Meech is Lebda’s backup. Dammit. What’s the point of such a deep top 5 when that #6 is going to be that bad. Honestly. How bad would Darren Helm, Justin Abdelkader, Patrick Eaves, or any quick forward, look on the blueline. Sure they’ve never been trained to position themselves, or keep their composure, or read the play, but neither has Lebda. To his credit, he started last season this same way and was actually pretty solid for the final 55 games or so, though many people were already convinced that he sucked because of what they saw in the beginning of the year. Still, not cool.
The rest of the defense didn’t look too bad. For having more people there than anyone else, Niklas Kronwall was probably the worst. He had a hard time keeping pucks in the zone on the powerplay — I hope the J-Willy haters out there saw that as I did, because while I’m okay with Williams, I’m watching his play on the point like a hawk, and it’s clear Kronwall was the weak link on that unit. Nobody else on the blueline looked that bad.
Up front, Ville Leino, Pavel Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterberg, and Johan Franzen were really the only players with discernible hunger out there. Slick Kirk Maltby is tied for the team lead in scoring, but even he didn’t do anything after he somehow found himself with two points after the first 20 minutes of the season. I like the guy, and I like nothing more than seeing a guy like him go shelf on a shorthanded breakaway, but I hate how he only seems to have these games when his job is on the line. It’s no secret it was him or Eaves down to the wire for that final forward spot, and now that he won, it might be a while until Eaves is a regular, but I assure you it will be before Maltby records his third point of the season.
Bertuzzi looked.. okay, in spurts. Better today than yesterday. I don’t like him at all on the powerplay. I know he plays the “rover,” but I don’t think that fits on Detroit’s powerplay. He seems to stand too close to the puck carrier and it makes it really easy for a defender to cover him and the puck carrier, eliminating the advantage part of the man advantage. Speaking of powerplay, Filppula needs to be about 50x more noticeable than he was to stay on it over Ville Leino — I see no reason why he should be, right now, but I’d take both over Bert.
Anywho.. it was a very disappointing weekend overall. Neither game was even particularly enjoyable, because once St. Louis started pressing you just knew they’d take the lead soon, even when Detroit was up two goals. I just so wanted at least one of last year’s problem to be eliminated, but so far, no good. My heart goes out to brave souls like Drew who flew out to Sweden to watch that garbage in person. Hopefully the beautiful Swedish women made up for the ugly Swedish hockey. In much better news, my first Friday Prospects feature went up on Winging it in Motown on, you betcha, Friday. Give it a gander and let me know if that’s something you might be interested in.
So I’m just sitting here minding my own business, right? Reading for class tomorrow, but mostly getting distracted on the internets with things here and there. All of a sudden, I mouse over the time on my laptop, and WHAT! It’s October. October 1. Obviously I was well aware that yesterday was September 30, making today October 1, but it wasn’t until I saw the date that I realized exactly how that felt.
That inspired me to go on YouTube, and two and a half hours later, I don’t think I can sleep.
It’s time.
Say what you want about that video I posted, I can’t get enough of it. I don’t particularly like the band, or really most of that type of genre of music, but Holy Helm does that video get me JACKED or what? Maybe it has something to do with the Wings in it. Maybe it has something to do with it being roughly 38,000 times better than any other year the Wings had a pre-game pump up thing. Remember some of the stupid marketing things they’ve come up with, like “Let ‘em see Red!” and “Ride the Red Wave?” Maybe it has something to do with the fact that it the song sounds mind-blowingly awesome blaring out of the speakers at the Joe surrounded by 20,000 plus screaming and yelling fans with freaking fire coming out of the scoreboard. I’m not naturally a very excitable person. But, wow, I’ll never forget being able to see that in person three times this spring. You lose yourself. Watching it for me is a way to take me back there. Oh, how I want to go back there.
We all know how last season ended. We all know who is no longer a Red Wing. We all know the Chicago Blackhawks are supposed to unseat us this season. Best of all, we all know that doesn’t matter.
We’re the Red Wings. How great is that? We’re awesome. We’re spoiled. We’re the rich kids everyone hated growing up. Everyone’s gunning for us. Is this the year that the Detroit Red Wings fall? Everyone’s wondering, and I couldn’t care less. It’s not. You look at the roster, and you look at what these people are saying, and you laugh. We’ve lost several components from a 2008 Cup team, guys that weren’t a huge part to begin with. No one outside Detroit gave a damn about these guys before they left. Hudler? “He’s skilled, but he’s too small and too slow.” Samuelsson? “Guy looks like a damn house cat, how’s he going to burn us?” Kopecky.. “That big Slovak guy gets ice time?” Drake and Hasek.. “they still play?”
But now that they’re gone, they were the driving force behind a dominant team. Meanwhile we’ve picked up a slew of other damaged players who no one gives a damn about. Williams? Lazy. Bertuzzi? Lazy and broken. Eaves? Bust. Don’t they learn? These guys don’t have to be great for us. They can’t be terrible for us, but the roles they’re filling are not that big. They’re simply short-term options. They’re in the mix with Ville Leino, Darren Helm, Jonathan Ericsson, Justin Abdelkader. Players that people are so familiar with now from playoff action, they don’t even realize none of these guys were on the team last year. They were on the playoff team because they were so freakishly good. With the exception of Helm, who’s freakishly good compared to a group of freakishly good players, these guys barely saw ice time in the playoffs because they’re still new to the system. They’re all growing into it. They’ll probably all have setbacks. But the talent brought onto this roster this summer is scary. On paper, this lineup beats 2008’s any day, and it might just give 2009 a closer run for it’s money than some would like to admit.
But apparently we lost a lot of experience. At the same time, we’re too old. This porridge is too hot, this porridge is too cold, but I think this roster is just right. We’ve got the most veteran blend of rookies you could possibly imagine. Some of our old guys keep getting better with age, like Lidstrom and Osgood. Sure, Holmstrom’s a question mark. Nobody expects much from Draper and Maltby, either, it’ll be Helm and Eaves’ checking line before the year is over. Those names just aren’t the core of Detroit anymore. They’re the veteran leaders that drive through the rough patches and spit in the face of adversity. They’ve been through every situation you can imagine, and they’re not happy that they’ve been written off. Because they know, outside of them, you’ve got a team that is in it’s prime. Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Franzen, Kronwall, Stuart, Filppula, Cleary. All of these guys are smack dab in the middle of their playing days, with Cup experience, but no signs of breaking down.
It’s amusing. But alas, the team with the French “goalie,” a completely and entirely mediocre head coach, a cab-punching superstar, a slew of heavy contracts they need to get rid of to keep the team together, a front office member/ex-GM that alienated a star player and can’t operate a fax machine, and a Brian Campbell, who added a media-proclaimed playoff choke artist, his tennis buddy, and this guy, are apparently about to dethrone us. Are you starting to see why this is funny to me?
We know what we’re doing. We know what we’re playing for. We’re going to get back, because we’re mad as hell. Of all the season preview junk I’ve had to wade through, there is one media member that really gained a lot of respect in my book. Elliotte Friedman. His interview with Mike Babcock is a must see. But while he was making it, he talked to a few players and he felt the anger. I point you in the direction of his tweet:
“Was in Detroit yesterday, taping a piece with Mike Babcock and talking to some players. One of the best quotes ever given me, from a player: ‘I hate Pittsburgh. I hate the Pirates. I hate the Steelers. I hate the Penguins. Don’t get me wrong….I respect them. But I hate them.’”
Ah, yes, me too. Iffy on the respect bit, I try, depends on my mood.
“We’re pissed off,” one player said when I visited Detroit last week. “I still don’t know how we lost,” added another. The Red Wings are motivated and angry. What sets them apart is their sense of professionalism. It’s all business all the time. The only thing that matters is winning. Some teams say it but don’t mean it. This team means it.
…
In the words of one player, Mike Babcock is “even more intense.” Didn’t think that was possible.
More death starey? Ooooh, I can’t even begin to picture that. But this is the attitude I like. The word “complacent” was probably one thrown around a lot on this blog last year because that’s how this team looked for most of the season, and bits and pieces of the playoffs. They knew what was at the end of the rainbow and they knew they were good enough to get there. Too cocky? Probably. But they got where they needed to be, and they lost not for a lack of trying. But it’s been reinforced now that even when you’re giving it your all, you still need that extra push. That’s why hockey is so spectacular.
I don’t want to here these media-trained hockey robots that say all this “well we had a real good season last year, but we couldn’t get it done.” I want to hear “we should have won, and we’re pissed we didn’t” because that’s how I feel. I want to feel the fire in this team, because I couldn’t find it for long parts of last season. I want to feel it off the ice, and I want to see it on the ice.
The clock starts ticking tonight. Not the Wings, obviously, but teams that are gunning for the Wings. All I know is my TV will be tuned to Versus all night, my laptop will be tuned to CBC via NHL Gamecenter, and my fist will be tuned to anyone’s throat who tries to pry me away from it.
Just passing on a little bit of site news. I’ve been asked to join the team at Winging it in Motown for the upcoming season. I’ll be covering prospects, what else? Obviously if you read this blog you know that’s my favorite thing to write about. But I really only do rankings, just three times a season. It’s not enough to satisfy my nerdy prospect needs. I threw around some ideas for a weekly feature over here, so when the opportunity to join the WIM team and basically do the same thing arose, I jumped all over that.
WIM was one of the first Wings’ blogs I ever read, even before the WTF Holland days, so I’m really honored to get an opportunity to blog over there. They’re part of SB Nation, which is essential reading if you’re into sports at all because they’ve got over 215 blogs, not one covering a duplicate team. James Mirtle heads the hockey section, and I’ve long considered his From the Rink blog to be essential reading. Needless to say, I’m thrilled that I get to be a part of the best blogging community in the business.
But fear not, I’m not shutting down Babcock’s Death Stare or anything like that. In fact, this probably means I’ll be blogging more than ever, especially when you look at the archives on the left you’ll see that I disappeared the past two years while I was in school, but I’m not letting that happen this year. I actually have multiple readers now, so I’m determined not to disappoint.
My prospects feature will run every Friday over at WIM. I’ll link to a few of them from here, but most likely not every week. I intend to zero in on three or four prospects a week, whoever’s performing well, or maybe some who aren’t. The idea is to get people who might want to start following prospects, but don’t feel like wading through my six different versions of my 20-page rankings an opportunity to start following and really learn what these players can do and where they come from. I figure with 39 prospects, taking 3-4 a week over the course of a season probably won’t get too dry, right? But I’m always open to suggestions and feedback, quite honestly I’m sure I will change the format a few times. I’ll also handle the occasional Game Thread or Game Review over there, only a few for now. I still intend to do reviews over here as well, but as I get going with school I won’t have time to do one after every game like I did in the playoffs and pre-season, so some will be here, some will be there.
I’m joined by Michael from The Production Line and Drew from Nightmare on Helm Street. Michael will head up a weekly feature called By the Numbers that promises an uncomfortable amount of number crunching and Drew will post a daily Quick Hits feature, giving his take on the Red Wings press clippings of the day. And as always, Christy and Casey aka MrNorrisTrophy will head up the crew and keep the place looking classy.
Oh.. I also wanted to talk business! The Wings close out the pre-season tomorrow against Farjestad at 1 PM. The game will be streamed on NHL.com, so be sure to check that out. All the other NHL teams in Europe have taken on club teams already. St. Louis beat Linkopings (SEL), Chicago beat one Swiss club (Davos, 9-2), but lost to another (Zurich, 2-1), and Florida lost to Tappara (SM-Liiga) in a shootout. But that’s okay. Nobody beats the Finns in shootouts.
