Next stop: Sveeeeden

I was feeling rather lazy (also, rather homeworky) this morning so I didn’t talk about last night’s game. However, the Wings lost to Toronto for the second straight night 2-1. This afternoon, the Wings forced a decisive Game 9 beat the superstar-less Pittsburgh Penguins 4-1. And a good time was had by all.

The Toronto game was basically the Jonas Gustavsson story. The Wings got a taste of him as he played the first period of Friday’s game, but he came in Saturday for the final two periods and was nothing less than spectacular. Currently the internet-hype for him is at an all-time high, but he didn’t have too many difficult saves. Although we do now know what happens when a Rhino meets a Monster. Despite the fact that many people are fawning over how he hasn’t let up a goal in North America, I think Gustavsson showed everyone that he’s legit. There’s no doubt in my mind that Detroit played well enough to win — I think they would have if Vesa Toskala stayed in net. I don’t think it’ll be too many games before Gustavsson unseats Toskala.

This afternoon’s game against Pittsburgh was a much better effort from Detroit. They were on their heels early but Jimmy Howard played lights out all night and maybe silenced a few doubters on the way. Just a few though, because he wasn’t exactly facing a powerful lineup. What Pittsburgh did have in the lineup was a lot of sour grapes. As soon as he could, Matt Cooke had words with a surly Kris Draper, and Draper had some words of his own when he gave Fleury and unnecessary snow shower on the following shift. In the third period, the Penguins seemed more concerned with gooning it up, highlighted by Kunitz jumping on Franzen and Guerin throwing punches after the altercation was broken up. Shortly thereafter, after a weak and routine hit by Derek Meech, a cluster of Pengapes started throwing punches at a line that included noted fighters like Mattias Ritola and Kris Draper. Yes Pittsburgh, we’re all very, very impressed. All this certainly supports the theory that Pittsburgh is less enjoying their victory and more ensuring Detroit knows that they won, but I digress.

These notes will be more comprehensive, reflecting both yesterday and today’s game as well as the pre-season as a whole on some of these guys.

Chris Osgood — He played the first half of yesterday’s game and came up with his best pre-season performance. He gave up a few strange rebounds early, but only let in one goal. A blast from the point, low, but there was traffic in front.

Jimmy Howard — He was pretty strong in relief of Osgood last night, only letting up a slam dunk in front, and he was very good today. Only goal against came after a big post-to-post save that left him slightly overcommitted. Pascal Dupuis had a whole side of the net to shoot at, and he was further helped by Derek Meech who decided to stand in front and let the puck bank in off his stick instead of getting low in any attempt to block a shot. Howard stopped Jordan Staal on a breakaway and then a penalty shot, and probably stopped about five other solid chances by Staal. He looked great tonight, he made me a little more confident in him going into the season.

Logan Pyett — Played today after a bunch of games off. Looks intimidated and overmatched. I can’t see this guy ever playing in the NHL.

Andy Delmore — He’s a nightmare in his own zone, but he played decent today. He put a hook on Jordan Staal — or what looked like a clear one — but he didn’t actually tug on him. So Staal got a good shot off and then got a penalty shot anyway. I’m not saying it was a bad call, because it looked like Delmore was going to hook the hell out of him. I’m just saying if you’re Delmore, either let the guy go or tug him to the ground.

Derek Meech — Much stronger today than he has been all pre-season. Looked like someone who could maybe challenge a very struggling Brett Lebda eventually.

Jonathan Ericsson — Again, much better tonight than Friday’s quadruple minor penalty game. Made some strong defensive plays, and seems to have a very good idea of when to join the rush or jump in the zone. His shot is something amazing, I can’t believe he didn’t score more in the AHL.

Jakub Kindl — Just when you think to yourself, “man, he’s not having a great game,” you see him work his magic on the powerplay. He had a pretty long shift there today, one of his first of the pre-season, and was much more confident and in control than at any other point this pre-season. Almost invisible other than that, which is both good and bad.

Brad May — I got to thinking last night, who would I rather have, May or Maltby? I felt like May was all over the ice last night, and I was astounded to see he played only 8 minutes. I felt like Maltby played 3 minutes tonight, and I was astounded to see he played 15. I get the Maltby argument — he’s savvy, he’s got experience. I agree. I like Maltby. But I also like 4th liners to have that kind of impact when they come on the ice. If I had the choice, I’d take the guy making the most of his minutes in May. But I know May will at least start in Grand Rapids. I hope he gets a contract, I like his game.

Jason Williams — I can’t help but notice that everyone who made him out to be the worst player ever hasn’t said a word about what’s been a very impressive pre-season for him. I like him with Leino and Filppula. Today he made not one, not two, but three impressive keeps at the blueline. He got shots through traffic. His goal was luck, but still a smart play as he drove into traffic. I’ll take him over Sammy any day if he keeps this up.

Johan Ryno — Still impressed. Wasn’t great last night, but he’s shown enough where I’m intrigued. I commented here that I don’t buy Ryno’s comments, and based off the fact that Ryno is still playing a lot and the Wings seem to think he’ll report to Grand Rapids, I think he’ll show up. He’s officially down now. He’s skilled, but if he got aggressive and a little stronger he could be a force. People don’t really understand how rare this blend of skill and size is. You don’t just throw it out because you’ve heard a few comments through the grapevine. Give him a year in Grand Rapids and see how he acclimates.

Evan McGrath — I noticed both last night and tonight he came out with a lot of jump. He’s a much improved skater from where he was in the OHL. He seems to be the only guy on the Wings who’s trying to “make” the team still, even though there’s no spots available. Some of that could have to do with the fact that he was playing in Toronto last night, not too far from his home town of Oakville. Auditioning for the hometown Leafs maybe, now that he’s on waivers? Probably not, but I really think he’s a 4th line player in a pinch. I don’t know what he has to learn from another year in the AHL.

Patrick Eaves — Had a quiet pre-season, but I felt he came on in his last two games. It’s easy to notice his speed, I felt today he was around the puck a little more. He’s definitely a useful 4th line player for now, hopefully he can continue doing things with the puck.

Jan Mursak — Still not great, but I think he’s in for a much better sophomore season in Grand Rapids. Like Ritola, he looks like the type of player that does well on the Red Wings. Smart with the puck, good speed, and a surprisingly well-developed two-way game. He didn’t play a whole lot, but I noticed him a little more today.

The Wings are now down to 23 players. Bruce MacLeod tweeted that Johan Ryno, Mattias Ritola, Francis Pare, Jakub Kindl, Andy Delmore, and Evan McGrath were sent to Grand Rapids (UPDATE: Jan Mursak, Doug Janik, Jeremy Williams, Kris Newbury, and Thomas McCollum, too). Brad May was released, but only so Grand Rapids could sign him because I’m assuming you can’t send a tryout player to the minors. It looks like they’re still going to make a decision on him.

So here is the 23(ish) man roster headed to Sweden.

Forwards (13): Abdelkader, Bertuzzi, Cleary, Datsyuk, Draper, Eaves, Filppula, Franzen, Holmstrom, Leino, Maltby, Williams, Zetterberg.

Defensemen (7) : Ericsson, Kronwall, Lebda, Lidstrom, Meech, Rafalski, Stuart.

Goalies (3): Howard, Larsson, Osgood.

Injured: Axelsson, Emmerton, Fournier, Helm, Lilja

Obviously, Axelsson and Emmerton are going to the AHL when they’re healthy, and Fournier’s going to the QMJHL. You just can’t send down injured players.

Larsson will go down no matter what when Detroit gets back, he’s Grand Rapids’ starter (though McCollum narrowed the gap this pre-season). Also, I heard that the NHL is letting teams take 24 players to Europe just in case. I’m not sure who Detroit intends to have along as the reserve. Zetterberg and Bertuzzi are definitely a little banged up. Meech can slide up front, but I wonder why they sent a guy like Ritola down when they could bring him to Sweden without the cap. Maybe something’s in the works, I’m not sure. Lastly, with all these slight injuries, I wonder if Abdelkader will ever even be sent down. This just has the makings of a season of injuries. Not a bunch of guys at one time, but consistently at least one or two injuries all season. Abdelkader definitely staked out an NHL job with his impressive pre-season.

Swede vs. Swede

Hey look, Detroit tried to play a 20 minute game and win again.

A pretty sloppy game overall. For entertainment value, it’s fun when Detroit does something like this. But this is the kind of thing that killed them last season, and something you’d think they would work on. Obviously, third period comebacks happen, and you want that to happen if Detroit goes down 3-0 early in the game. I just don’t find the stat that Detroit led the league with 21 come from behind victories last season to be impressive. They just come out flat too often. Granted, this is the pre-season. As Ken Holland said when he was in the booth for part of the second, the veterans really get tired of the pre-season. I’d hope that’s part of it, more than the idea that they just haven’t learned and this is going to happen again all season long.

So that’s basically the story of this one. Johan Franzen being an uncontrollable beast was promising, but the way that Detroit got run over in the first two periods by a bunch of rookies is not good. However, all credit goes to Toronto because they’ve got some downright scary young talent right now. I’ve seen a handful of Leafs pre-season games and Viktor Stahlberg is a guy who’s been impressive, but I was still on the fence to whether or not I think he should be in the NHL. After yesterday.. yes, Stahlberg should be in the NHL. Not just because he scored two goals, because neither were that impressive. The first was a strong shot, but Osgood really should have had that. The second goal was more impressive for the way he hounded Lebda behind the net. I have no idea where Lebda thought he was going, and why he thought it would be a good idea to try to shake someone who’s all over you instead of just clearing it, but still big props to Stahlberg. Kadri should probably stick too, but it sounds like he might get sent back.

Quick thoughts on a few guys. Anyone who I don’t mention was about the same. Bad in the first two periods, good in the third.

Chris Osgood — Not a strong enough effort tonight. If he’s not taking the pre-season seriously he should start. The Stahlberg goal and Kadri goal should have never gone in. He needs to be better because I’m still nervous on Howard.

Jonathan Ericsson — 8 PIM, I don’t think I need to point out how many mistakes he made tonight. He hasn’t had the best pre-season. He did the same thing last year, I suppose, so maybe it’s nothing to worry about. But last year he had the guarantee that no matter how good he was he wasn’t making the team. I suppose this year, he’s in the situation that no matter how bad he is, he’s making the team. I hope so, for his sake, because he hasn’t done much to secure a big spot in the lineup.

Niklas Kronwall — Better today than any other game in the pre-season. He needs to jump up in the play all season, he seemed to do that a lot yesterday and he got a goal out of it today.

Brett Lebda — It’s official, I miss Lilja.

Brad May — Very strong for a guy without a home a week ago. Didn’t play a whole lot, but he was one of the only guys on the team that made an impression with every second he was on the ice. It sounds like he’ll go to Grand Rapids on his tryout and then Detroit will make a decision. 46 contracts, the potential loss of a Griffin (more on that later), I say burn one on him. He even impressed in his post-first period interview. Great character guy. I’d prefer young guys for most callups, but I wouldn’t mind giving May a few games and then a playoff recall.

Todd Bertuzzi — Looked a lot better to me, missed the end of the game as a precautionary measure. I’ll never understand why other fans complain about a guy being pulled as a precaution. Bertuzzi’s injury-prone, they’re not going to risk a tender feeling groin for a pre-season game against the Leafs. Why complain? I don’t want him in there, I want him in the lineup for the season.

Detroit’s in Toronto tonight, with a much weaker lineup. Osgood gets the start, but Howard’s coming in eventually according to Ansar Khan. This one’s on CBC at 7 PM, so it should be easy to find a stream if you’re not in the Metro Detroit area.

Ville Leino – Valtteri Filppula – Patrick Eaves
Mattias Ritola – Justin Abdelkader – Jason Williams
Johan Ryno – Evan McGrath – Kirk Maltby
Brad May – Kris Newbury – Jan Mursak

Niklas Kronwall – Brad Stuart
Brett Lebda – Jakub Kindl
Derek Meech – Andy Delmore

Chris Osgood
Jimmy Howard

Good cuts and bad cuts

A little late on the update tonight, but it’s been a long day and I’m trying to sort out my weekend. So by now this is old news.. but whatever, deal with it, I need to smile and write about how happy this news makes me.

For starters, Dan Cloutier has officially been cut. Sigh. What a bullet we dodged there, eh? I feel like I’ve gotten to know Dan quite well over the past few weeks. I’m very impressed with the things he had to say about Detroit and I feel a significantly less amount of hatred toward him than I did several weeks ago. But needless to say, I still didn’t see him as a useful acquisition and Detroit did the right thing in letting him go. I will admit, for the 30 minutes he was wearing the Red Wings uniform he did okay. Eight saves, not including two saves by the iron, but no goals against. Whatever. Hopefully he scared Jimmy Howard into a competent season. As a prospects geek, I just didn’t think it was a good idea.

Continuing off that same article, according to Ansar Khan, Detroit’s looking at a slightly smaller roster as they’ve finally made another round of cuts. Nothing too terribly shocking, I suppose. Travis Ehrhardt, Sergei Kolosov, Sebastien Piche, Jamie Tardif, and Tomas Tatar have been sent to Grand Rapids. Additionally, Griffins-contracted John Vigilante and former Griffin (but contract possibility) Francis Lemieux were released from their Red Wing tryouts and assigned to Grand Rapids.

I guess the only big name in there is Tatar. I would have liked to see him get another game, but I suppose it’s not a big deal that he doesn’t. I’m just not sure what these guys do in Grand Rapids for a week since the Griffins don’t actually play pre-season games. Tatar definitely looked good enough in Detroit to earn a roster spot in Grand Rapids. But most of his future will depend on guys like Vigilante and Lemieux. Neither of them have tremendous futures, but both of them are established AHL veterans who can make immediate impacts. Both of them could force Tatar off the top two lines, which would result in a likely move to the Plymouth Whalers. Tatar can play nine professional (NHL and/or AHL) games without burning a year off his contract, meaning they could send him to Plymouth, he wouldn’t count towards the roster limit, and he’d come back next year with three years on his contract. Of course, they could send him to Plymouth at any time, but it would waste a contract year for him.

We’ll see what happens on that front. I intend to see as many home games as I can while Tatar is a Griffin. I saw the skill he has, he’s a game breaker. I just want to see how far away he is, because I’m pretty certain he jumped ahead in his development about three years with the insane camp he had. The Hockey News predicted him at NHL ready in 2014-15, but there’s a very distinct possibility he’s among the Wings top 5 NHL ready prospects right now.

Travis Ehrhardt could also be sent back to the WHL if needed. That’s unlikely though. Grand Rapids has 7 defensemen slated for action, and it seems either Ehrhardt or Piche will spend some time in Toledo. Neither saw pre-season action so who knows what’ll happen. Kolosov finally played against Philly on Tuesday but I missed that game and heard nothing about him. But I do root for him to get called up if, heaven forbid, we needed someone besides Kindl to come up over Janik and Delmore.

On the docket now is a back-to-back with Toronto. Here’s tomorrow’s lineup:

Johan Franzen – Pavel Datsyuk – Tomas Holmstrom
Todd Bertuzzi – Valtteri Filppula – Dan Cleary
Kris Draper – Justin Abdelkader – Mattias Ritola
Brad May – Kris Newbury – Francis Pare

Nicklas Lidstrom – Brian Rafalski
Niklas Kronwall – Brad Stuart
Brett Lebda – Jonathan Ericsson

Chris Osgood – Jimmy Howard

No idea if Osgood gets the full game or not, but that’s our top six going into the year, so there’s no excuse for either goalie to have a poor showing.  Penalty kill should ideally be a lot better too, even though we’ll be missing Zetterberg, Helm, Maltby, and other mainstays on the line. May will be interesting to watch as well, Babcock said today that it was his idea to invite May so maybe he really likes him. He’s definitely got a good shot to win a contract if that’s the case. Also, Ritola and Pare will be very interesting to watch as this is the best lineup the Wings have iced so far. Both of them are close to NHL ready, maybe they’ll move up the charts a bit if they don’t look too out of place.

The game is on FSN+ (corrected) so most of you should be able to watch it. Anyone looking for a stream should check out MyP2P or ATDHE as usual.

Cloutier wears funny gear, gets a shutout

Ha HA! Look how BIG that puck is !!

Rangers 4, Red Wings 2

The triumphant NHL return of Dan Cloutier was soured ever so slightly this evening because Daniel Larsson is a sieve. I never thought I’d write that.

Also, that’s not true. Detroit really mailed it in in the first period en route to being outshot 18-4. Hopefully they decided they wanted to make Larsson look good and then turn it on in the 3rd so Cloutier only saw the difficult shots.

Unfortunately, they forgot to help Larsson at all, and the quality of shots that Cloutier saw actually made him look good.

Penalty kill was the story in the 1st, as Detroit took six straight minor penalties leading into the second period. Most were really questionable calls, but not all. Either way, these penalties weren’t the cause of all the Ranger offense, the penalty kill felt the need to clear the puck softly up the middle. None of the goals really fell entirely on Larsson’s shoulders, and in fact, after the 3rd goal he actually straightened out and made a few nice saves.

Early in the game, on the Rangers’ first or second shot, Detroit caught a big break. Ericsson was legally tying up Aaron Voros’ stick and both were battling for the puck. For some reason, the ref decided to call a phantom hook on Ericsson. Ericsson touched the puck briefly, but Voros took it right back and fired a shot that Larsson should have had right over his glove. But the play died when Ericsson touched it. Even the Rangers’ broadcasters didn’t think Ericsson committed a penalty, so Larsson got let off the hook on the only goal that he should have actually had.

On that note, in both of these games against New York I’ve noticed they’ve had a hell of a time containing all the big forwards on the Rangers, Voros, Brian Boyle, Donald Brashear, etc. Those guys just dominated on the cycle for two full games. I’m not sure if this is something to be concerned about. Am I concerned when the line of Cory Emmerton, Francis Pare, and Tomas Tatar get hemmed in their own zone? No. Even if those guys make the NHL, that’s not a likely line combination just because they’re all small. But am I concerned when it’s Kronwall and Stuart? Yes. Guys like Voros and Boyle don’t really have the skill to rag the puck the way they did. As our physical defensemen, it should be easier for them to get positioning, put them into the boards, and get a takeaway. Anyway.

But soon after Larsson took the first of two minor goaltending penalties Detroit racked up, where he was standing up and a Ranger tripped over his stick, Brad Stuart pulled a Derek Meech and softly lofted the puck up the middle to a waiting Vaclav Prospal who wired a shot high over Larsson’s glove. Larsson was set and probably should have had it, but It was a well-placed shot and that Stuart turnover was worse than his Game 7 turnover.

Minutes later, with Tatar in the box this time, Marian Gaborik decided that the Rangers needed another goal so he made it so. That’s pretty much all there is to it. He ran around the Wings zone for what seemed like days, with Stuart chasing after him, then centered a wicked backhand pass past a snoozing Kronwall onto Enver Lisin’s stick. Ideally, Kronwall knows that Lisin is coming, but not many guys can make that strong and accurate of a pass on their backhand. No chance for Larsson.

Before they could even announce that goal, Andy Delmore decided to flip a week pass over to Jakub Kindl, who was unable to generate the cognitive process needed to just get the puck the hell away from Andy Delmore and out of the zone. The puck was centered to Ryan Callahan, and Larsson committed early as Callahan fought off Delmore and stuffed a shot past Larsson. I thought he was really too far off to the side of the net, but Callahan made a great move in tight, it’s a tough call.

So this all happened.. And there was 9:30 left in the first. Yikes. But Larsson was actually solid the rest of the first. He seemed to let up some bad rebounds early, but he was fine after he realized he’ll be getting no help from Delmore this season.

Anyway, notes time!

Dan Cloutier — Didn’t let in a goal, but only saw 8 shots. He had Kronwall deflect a puck up off the post, saw a point shot ring off the crossbar, and had a wrister from the blueline trickle between his legs, but he was alright. No weak goals, but nothing special.

Jakub Kindl — Talented and just fun to watch skate, but man, this guy needs to get angry or something. He’s got a big problem with softly tapping the puck behind his own net when he’s in danger. Sometimes his partner will be there, and they get wrecked because they can’t handle this pass or it just goes directly to a Ranger. I’d say he did this three times tonight. Just get angry and when you’re in danger rip it off the boards hard so at the very least, you give it away at the blueline instead of behind the net to a guy who’s uncovered.

Andy Delmore — If it came down to it, I’d take Doug Janik over him as a callup. I’d like to see Kindl or Kolosov (who is mysteriously not playing in the pre-season) over either, but Delmore is a mess defensively. You’d think after so many years of doing the same thing, you might do it right.. But the Any Elmore jokes are, sadly, accurate.

Derek Meech — Quickly playing himself out of the lineup. He looked great in 2007-08 when Detroit was missing all of those defensemen and Meech was playing 27 minutes a night. What happened? His confidence looks shot. As average as Kindl’s looked this pre-season, he’s blowing Meech right out of the water.

Niklas Kronwall — Not making me feel comfortable as the go to guy in the post-Lidstrom era. Still makes poor defensive decisions on a pretty regular basis. But somehow, he looks great when he’s the #3 guy.

Ville Leino — He’s looked outstanding to me this pre-season. There’s a certain star quality in some of the smart, subtle plays he makes. I saw the same thing in Franzen for years, but I never thought we’d see the player he is today. Does that mean Leino is gonna score 70 points right now? No, but good things are coming. He looks a lot quicker, he’s been backchecking hard, and he seems to always make the right play with the puck. I think he’s got a ways to grow, but he is looking like a very good top six forward two years down the line if he doesn’t get too cute with the puck like he did a few times tonight and doesn’t sleep his way through the second half of the season the way he did in Grand Rapids last year.

Pavel Datsyuk — He’s gonna get another Hart nomination this season. Count on it.

Tomas Holmstrom — I’m no longer worried about him. He claims to be healthy, and it shows on the ice. Not on the scoresheet yet, but he’s looked much better than he did in the playoffs. I’ve considered bumping him down to the 3rd or 4th line, like I think a lot of fans have, but I think he’s still good for 20 on the top line and powerplay.

Kris Newbury — I can’t see this guy ever wearing the Wings’ jersey. A lot of “those” people who just claim the Wings’ need toughness loved this signing and have tossed around the idea of him as the 13th forward (before we signed all those other guys). But he’s just.. bad. He’s not a great skater, he’s not really a factor on the forecheck, not a whole lot of offensive touch.. What’s the point? The Wings don’t have a whole lot of NHL ready forwards in GR right now, but I can think of a lot I’d rather see up than Newbury. Not winning me over so far, but he is only playing about 8 minutes a night.

Tomas Tatar — Didn’t play much today, but he had one awesome shift in the second period. He had a few takeaways, made a few quick, clever moves, and had two really good scoring chances. He had a shot blocked and missed on the other, but still, he’s just one of those guys that finds those places on the ice. I think he may have played himself onto Grand Rapids, I really think he’s just a difference-maker.

Johan Ryno — Very impressive. He’s much quicker than he was two years ago, and he’s coming off a broken leg. He’s got the skill. There’s definitely something there. I really hope he stays in Grand Rapids because I think he could put up some very solid numbers. I don’t think I saw him at all in the 1st period because of all the penalty killing, but he eventually took Ritola’s place on the line with Leino and Filppula and really looked good. He was out on the ice in the last minute of the game for a reason. He looked very confident, a far cry from the player I saw two pre-seasons ago lumbering around the ice and falling down when people skated too close to him.

Detroit plays Philly tomorrow. That game will be seen on Comcast in Philadelphia, so it should be webcast over at the same place as tonight’s. I, however, will be in class, and I’ve already poured over my syllabus 100 times looking for any reason I can to skip, but it looks like I need to attend. So most likely, no pre-game or post-game reactions.

Groin injuries spread like wildfire

Tonight’s lineup for the re-match against the NY Rangers, which is supposed to feature a debuting Marian Gaborik who is not at 100%, was a slight let down. Not only is Henrik Zetterberg sitting again for a groin injury, but apparently, Todd Bertuzzi, Jason Williams, and Dan Cleary are all sitting tonight with groin injuries. What the hell? Chris McCosky of the Freep offers this nugget which I think it’s supposed to be comforting, but it makes me want to burst into tears:

Those three players, plus forward Jason Williams, have mild groin injuries and did not travel. Zetterberg’s injury, by far, is the worst. Bertuzzi and Williams skated Monday morning, Cleary did not.

With an already weakened lineup, Babcock is taking this opportunity to make a funny joke by telling Dan Cloutier he’s going to play tonight. Oh wait, that’s happening.

Johan Franzen – Pavel Datsyuk – Tomas Holmstrom
Ville Leino – Valtteri Filppula – Mattias Ritola
Johan Ryno – Cory Emmerton – Kirk Maltby
Kris Newbury – Justin Abdelkader – Tomas Tatar

Niklas Kronwall – Brad Stuart
Derek Meech – Jonathan Ericsson
Jakub Kindl – Andy Delmore

Daniel Larsson – Dan Cloutier

Larsson’s first taste of televised pre-season action this year. He’s a real treat to watch and if you haven’t I suggest you get on that. I’ll be watching Leino, Emmerton, Ryno, and Tatar very closely as well. The game’s at 7 PM and will be shown on the Canadian NHL Network, and it will be streamed at MyP2P. One of those streams requires SopCast, which is exceptional quality, but the other is great quality for a stream as well.

Ryan Miller’d

Any hopes of going perfect throughout the pre-season and the regular season went out the window today as Detroit dropped their pre-season record to 2-1 with a 3-1 loss to Buffalo. Oh well, they’ll complete the regular season part of that deal.

Honestly? Not too displeased with the team’s play. I was more displeased with last night’s win than today’s loss. But admittedly, with college football on and the big Mayweather/Marquez “fight,” which started something like three days late, my attention wasn’t 100% on the game tonight. But from what I saw, Detroit played much tighter and cleaner defensively, and the offense (mostly, the Datsyuk line) seemed to generate enough chances to win, but Ryan Miller played like he was playing in a must win to get Buffalo into the playoffs. To cap things off, Jimmy Howard was, as usual, solid but not spectacular, making some big saves and having little chance on both goals. What are you gonna do?

My goal this year is to be able to write less about each game so I can find time to do updates about each game and not just weekly semi-novels like I did last year. But for the pre-season, I’m watching more players on an individual basis so this might be longer. But this year I plan on running through players in note form so it won’t take as long to write. Any complaints? Suck it. Sorry, I didn’t mean that. I’m normally very polite.

Jimmy Howard — Good I thought, but as I said, not spectacular. I think people doubt him too much unfairly. But at the same time, all my eggs were once in his basket to be Detroit’s savior and I’m doubting that more and more. Detroit has had the luxury of above average backup goalies for a number of years and I fear that streak may end with Howard. He will be okay, and he won’t cost us too many games, but he’s not going to win too many on his own either. He did in Grand Rapids, but thus far, not in regular season or pre-season action, he’s not been able to show this ability. We’ll see. Still rooting for him.

Pavel Datsyuk — It’s silly how good he was tonight. Mickey Redmond made multiple mentions of how veterans take training camp off. But Datsyuk looks like a guy who just plays the same way regardless of the game situation because he just loves to play. His assist was just stupidly good, every other player in the league (including Franzen, who tried that earlier) shoots that puck. You’d think eventually Datsyuk will run out of sick things to do, but he hasn’t yet. He tried the flip move over the net, it looked like this time instead of trying to get it (like he did against Anaheim) it may have been a pass, but it was also damn close to hitting Miller in the back of the head and potentially rolling down his back into the net. Interesting to see how much he’ll try that, I’m not necessarily opposed to it.

Johan Franzen — I think I’m more comfortable with him on Datsyuk’s line. Hossa is a player that needs a lot of space. Franzen just gets open and waits, and shoots whenever possible. I’m not at all suggesting he’s better than Hossa, and I don’t think he’ll score 40, but I think with Datsyuk he’s a great fit. I’m ready for them to stay together all season.

Nick Lidstrom — Ridiculously perfect. You can’t even go into detail and bring up specific instances because it seemed like he just did the right thing all game.

Jonathan Ericsson — Less than perfect. Complacent, even. Few bad giveaways, missed a lot of his passes. But it happens. He’s ready for the NHL, but he’s still raw. If he can get quicker on his decisions with the puck and learn to move it out of his zone a little quicker, he’ll make that jump to a legitimate top 4, maybe top 2 defenseman. But if today (and his playoff performance) is any indication, he’ll have some ups and downs.

Jakub Kindl — More noticeable tonight than last night. But he doesn’t yet scream NHL ready like a few of Detroit’s prospect forwards to (Abdelkader is, Ritola and Emmerton are close). Waiting for him to take that next step, hopefully it happens in Grand Rapids this season.

Jeremy Williams — Impressed me a lot more than Kris Newbury did. Thought he was more involved offensively and honestly, more physical too. He’s the top veteran callup in my mind, but still not overly impressive. I would be surprised if he was the first overall callup over Emmerton or Ritola.

Francis Pare — Ken Daniels said it, the puck just follows this guy around. Doesn’t do anything extremely well, but you notice him when he’s on the ice. A very interesting player who I can’t quite figure out. I think he gets an NHL tryout in the next two years, but I just don’t know what he could make of an NHL career. Not useful enough to be a 4th line player, but not quite skilled enough to be a good top nine forward.

Tomas Tatar — Really impressed me. Another player who was always around the puck, and definitely showed on a few shifts that he has a very high skill level. Seemed to always be in a good spot for a rebound even if he didn’t get many glorious chances. Previously I only saw him play in the WJC (and I re-watched a few of his games targeting him once Detroit had drafted him) and he looked very good, but today confirmed to me that I think he can play in the AHL. Still on the fence as to what my preference is, though.

Patrick Eaves — He wasn’t extremely impressive, but he looks like he belongs. Probably wasn’t as fast as advertised. I did like him on the penalty kill, he seems to be a smart player who does work hard, but I’d like to see him in a higher gear more often. Not a bad first impression, though.

Justin Abdelkader — Not nearly as good as yesterday. He seemed to be much hungrier and much more involved, but he was also on a better line with a lot better minutes. Oh well. I still think he’s an NHL player.

John Vigilante — Much better than I expected he’d be. He’s a player I watched a ton as he was an OHL star with Plymouth. He’s going to play a very big part for Grand Rapids this season. I don’t think he has much NHL promise, but he works hard and he’s a smart player. Wouldn’t be the worst fourth liner in the world in a few years if he can prove that he can bring that same effort from game to game.

Logan Pyett — Pretty bad tonight, looked lost. I had high hopes for him coming out of junior but I don’t expect he’ll establish himself as the force that he needs to be in Grand Rapids. Took a bad penalty and had a really hard time against players of all sizes.

See you all Monday at 7 for a Rangers re-match. Game is on the Canadian NHL Network. It should be easy to find a stream, so check this place out around game time and I’ll have a link for it.

Tatar’s in tonight

Ansar Khan posted tonight’s lineup. They play Buffalo, and it’s going to be on FSN. It’s a pretty veteran heavy lineup, complete with both free agent camp tryouts, recent Griffin signee John Vigilante and, as it stands, ex-Griffin Francis Lemieux. But they might bring Lemieux back if they can find a spot.

Johan Franzen – Pavel Datsyuk – Tomas Holmstrom
Kris Draper – Justin Abdelkader – Patrick Eaves
Tomas Tatar – Kris Newbury – Francis Pare
John Vigilante – Francis Lemieux – Jeremy Williams

Nicklas Lidstrom – Jakub Kindl
Logan Pyett – Brian Rafalski
Jonathan Ericsson – Brett Lebda

Jimmy Howard – Thomas McCollum

Not a whole lot in the prospect front, but I’m stoked to see Tatar tonight. Also, you can get a first look at Patrick Eaves, Jeremy Williams, and Kris Newbury. Kindl with Lidstrom is an exciting prospect, and an interesting prospective pairing for next season. Logan Pyett struggled as a rookie in Grand Rapids and I don’t like the idea of him with Rafalski, but whatever, we’ll see. In net, Howard needs to step up to finally quite some doubters, and I’d love to see McCollum repeat his performance from last night.

Lastly, Dan Cloutier is apparently going to get into a pre-season game, either Monday or Tuesday. But the article doesn’t make it sound good for his chances at getting a contract. I’ll never root against the Wings, but I won’t be upset if he gets lit up (and then Detroit mounts a miraculous comeback).

The Wings of Old

I was delighted today that the MSG stream decided to cooperate, and I got a (mostly) steady broadcast save for bits of the end of the first period that my apartment’s internet decided I didn’t need to see unscrambled.

But alas, hockey’s back. I love training camp, but hockey’s not back until I see the Wings play. And tonight I did. And it was 40 minutes of utter disappointment, followed by 20 minutes of excitement, followed by more disappointment when I realized what I had witnessed. And then I saw The Informant. But that’s not important.

The Wings were flat and uninspired for forty minutes. Somehow, perhaps due to the threatening demeanor of their head coach, they came out with fire in the 3rd period and put up four goals. It was exciting. They played well. Then I realized that this was the same old junk that we saw last season. The penalty kill sucked. They could not clear the puck. They could not contain the line of giants the Rangers put together in Brian Boyle, Aaron Voros, and Donald Brashearr. They put together a 20 minute effort and were rewarded with a win. They did that all last season and somehow got to the Finals. But it was the same kind of sloppy mistakes that they made all last year.

On the bright side, this team was scrub central. With no Zetterberg, it was Detroit’s 3rd line, middle three defensemen, and starting goalie and then a mish mash of Griffins. The Rangers didn’t exactly ice a full lineup, but something tells me if Henrik Lundqvist played the whole game and Matt Zaba didn’t come in, we would have been done for.

Clearing the puck, I had some kind of thought on that. I watched Kindl decide it was a good idea to try to flip the puck out the middle of the ice on his backhand, when he had time to do something else with it, only to give it out in the slot to a Ranger. Then, Maltby took it away from a Ranger, wound up, and tried to turn around and slap it out of the zone as hard as he could. He didn’t know this, but he didn’t have the time to do this, so he ended up clearing it right into the shins of a Ranger. Then they were able to sustain pressure on a tired line. Now, as a hockey player I think I’m finally understanding the mentality. Someone has a lazy half-ass attempt at a clear, it doesn’t get out, then you somehow end up with the puck, and you think to yourself “fuck this, I’m getting this out of here” and you do so by punishing the puck down the ice as hard as you can, as if to prove some kind of point. Detroit did this kind of thing all the time last season. It’s almost always easier to stay calm and get the puck out off the boards. Kindl had the time to turn around, but at the very least if he felt pressure he should not have tried to flip the puck up the middle on his backhand. Just wire the puck around the boards, and keep it airborne. Not many defenseman are going to be able to handle a puck rimming around the glass when it gets the blueline. But they will block the middle of the ice, especially when you’re the Red Wings and you want to continually clear it there.

Anyway, getting kind of tired tonight, but I wanted to write a little about a lot of guys. I’ll try to be brief, in note form.

Chris Osgood — No chance on the first goal, great move on a well placed shot. Second goal just trickled in, hard to say what he should have done differently.

Thomas McCollum — Not as busy as Osgood, but made probably four very strong saves in the last minute of the game, he definitely earned the win. It was just pre-season, but he probably had some jitters. This is definitely a performance he can be proud of, he looked very quick and very confident.

Derek Meech — Awful, awful performance. Terrible giveaway leading to the third Ranger goal, where he tried a drop pass in his own end to Cleary, it was taken away by Ryan Callahan who was already going 100 miles an hour and just had to put a quick move on a not quite set McCollum. Meech at no point looked like a defenseman I want to see on the Wings this year.

Doug Janik — Seems to have just horrible balance, he’s a big guy who ends up on his back every time he goes into a corner. He was taken down (cleanly) moving the puck up the ice in the turnover that led to the second Ranger goal.

Jakub Kindl — Was pretty invisible, which is usually a good thing for a defenseman. I would have liked to see him handle the puck a little bit more. For some reason, he saw no powerplay time. You’d think a guy that’s guaranteed to be on the Wings next year and is mostly an offensive defenseman would get powerplay time over Meech and Stuart, but he didn’t.

Brett Lebda — Pretty bad start to the game. Stupid holding call, not great positioning on the Rangers first goal, and just sloppy with the puck. His goal was flukey, but he did look a lot calmer after he scored it.

Jason Williams — Williams was pretty good. His goal was beautiful, rang it right off where the post meets the crossbar. That’s gotta deflate a goalie. Didn’t screw up on the point on the powerplay, seems to be a good enough fit on the 3rd line, but it definitely seems like the Leino and Filppula show and Williams is just kinda there.

Valtteri Filppula — Showed some of the flash I knew he had in him today. He scored the Wings first goal on a nice pass from Kronwall, Filppula put it upstairs over the blocker. I’ll take it, because Filppula is guy who shoots more when he’s scored recently. Even though he had an open lane, I think the Filppula of last year hesitates or passes off the great chance he capitalized on today.

Dan Cleary — Holy hell, we’re in for a treat if we see this Dan Cleary all season. Canadian Olympic invite has his motor running. He was creative and held on to the puck a little more than he did previously. He looked like a guy who was told that he would need to bring a little more to the table this season. I think he can do it, he looked fantastic.

Todd Bertuzzi — Didn’t do a whole lot but didn’t really screw up either. Seemed ancillary to the second powerplay unit because he was playing kind of high with Dan Cleary a little lower, and usually in front. I’d much prefer Ville Leino (but I think Johan Franzen gets the job ultimately). Rangers broadcaster said he told him before the game his back feels better than it has in four years, and he seemed to be skating well, so hopefully he’s healthy.

Justin Abdelkader — Scored a beautiful goal off a Ville Leino pass. He was fired up all night, really looked like the only guy who was truly playing for a job, even though he’s secure as the first forward callup. He was calling for the puck all night and doing a good job getting open in front. It’s nice to see that he gets such a warm reception from the rather meek JLA crowd, he’s going to be a fan favorite if he isn’t already.

Ville Leino — I heard all summer how this guy won’t replace Hudler, or how he really didn’t score that much in the AHL, and I don’t believe it. He’s the same as Hudler in that he scores points because he’s smart. He seemed to be around the puck all night creating the best scoring chances. Despite his AHL numbers, when he’s playing a team with the skill of Detroit his numbers will skyrocket.

Francis Pare — He quietly had a decent night even with limited minutes, coming into the lineup at the last minute for Johan Ryno (don’t know why). Sadly, he just isn’t an NHL skater and he just looks so tiny. But he is a smart player who has heard these things all his life and still put up big numbers. Sooner or later, he’s going to need a stint in the NHL. Very smart player, great positioning.

Mattias Ritola — I’ve kind of fallen off the Ritola train after a few average performances in Grand Rapids, but he looked pretty good tonight. Strong on the penalty kill. Looked great handling the puck and cycling along the boards. Red Wings style player.

Cory Emmerton — The strongest of all the youngsters, in my mind. Looked about a half step quicker than everyone around him. Shot from everywhere and had no trouble going into traffic. I hope he can step into a bigger scoring role in Grand Rapids this season.

Jan Mursak — He was raved about in prospect’s camp, but he looked pretty poor to me tonight. Seemed to shy away from physical contact and actually lost the puck and missed a pass on two separate occasions when he was ducking away from an oncoming player. Hopefully just bad timing, he needs to get tougher.

Those were my only thoughts. Everyone else was pretty unnoticeable, which can be both good (in the case of a guy like Brad Stuart) and bad (in the case of a guy like Evan McGrath, who needs to make an impression). Tomorrow night the game is on FSN. No lineup yet, but I expect it will largely be the one that took the ice against Philadelphia. I would absolutely love to see Dick Axelsson and/or Tomas Tatar, but we’ll see what happens.

Detroit/Philadelphia, Detroit/NY Rangers

I’m a little late on this one, to the point where it probably isn’t even interesting. But I did listen to this game over the radio, and there are thoughts to be had, so I’m going to have them.

As you’re probably very aware of, Detroit took this one by a score of 3-1. Kris Draper, Jeremy Williams, and Jamie Tardif scored for Detroit. Former 2nd overall pick James van Riemsdyk, making a strong push for himself as a regular Flyer this season, scored on Jimmy Howard for the lone Philly goal.

I listened to the Flyers’ broadcast.. which was pretty much the story of the game in itself. Obviously you don’t expect a couple of radio guys to have extensive knowledge of the other team’s exhibition roster, but I thought these guys could have done a little better. Jakub Kindl, Andy Delmore (in all ways negative), Jamie Tardif, Pavel Datsyuk, Nick Lidstrom, and Cory Emmerton sounded like the only players on the ice. I heard Franzen’s name one or two times. I did not hear Tomas Holmstrom’s name once, despite the fact that the Wings were on the powerplay the entire game and Holmstrom played with Datsyuk and Franzen. Good or bad, who knows. I’m not going to make really strong assertions about the game based on what a couple of Flyer guys chose to say because they were mostly talking about how good Ray Emery is and how they take people calling Chris Pronger “dirty as a compliment and how handsome Mike Richards looked next to Gordie Howe. But a little half hour pre-game prep session would have been nice, because this guys were blissfully ignorant.

Jimmy Howard is taking some flak for his performance in this one, because he only made 6 saves on 7 shots. Yawn. People, this is a Detroit Red Wings goaltender. When you outshoot a team 23-7 at the halfway point of the game, it’s not the goalie’s fault if the score is 1-0. That’s typical Red Wings hockey — outshoot by a hilarious margin and lose. Luckily, Kris Draper scored immediately after a powerplay (meaning he was on the ice for a powerplay — love pre-season hockey, eh?) so it was 1-1 when Howard came out, maybe even 2-1. Daniel Larsson came in to the delight of an educated Flyers color commentator and former traffic cone, Chris Therien. Ever the quick-thinker, when Larsson came in Therien quipped something like “if I knew anything about Larsson, I might have something to say about him” or something along those lines. As he was chuckling, the Flyers’ play-by-play guy did come to his defense that “well, he did win 22 games in Grand Rapids last year.” Therien then starting talking about how the Griffins’ GM told him the Wings aren’t sold on Howard, which sounds untrue, but hopefully between that and Larsson blanking the Flyers he realized the Larsson is actually note-worthy.

Therien’s commentating prowess didn’t stop there, as an unusual hatred for Andy Delmore kept re-surfacing throughout the game, which was actually pretty funny. Therien was actually teammates, and from the sounds of it, linemates, during Delmore’s stay in Philadelphia. Before I realized it was actually Chris Therien talking, he made some comment about how Delmore still holds the record in Philly for playoff goals by a defenseman (in a series or game, or both). Therien commented how they “thankfully” got rid of him the following season. Later in the game, he said this, which I immediately tweeted for hilarity. “Boy, Andy Delmore is doing everything he can to make sure the Flyers get on the scoresheet again. I played with this guy for a year, no wonder I’m not in the league anymore — my god!” Clearly not a great relationship between the two. However, the fact that it was Chris Therien calling someone else a bad defenseman made me fear for the Griffins’ goaltenders this season.

Lastly, my hatred for Philadelphia sports fans was restored when Therien and the PBP guy had a little back and forth meathead-fest about toughness. They were talking about Pronger and did honestly say that it should be a compliment when people call him “dirty” (yes, I’m sure that’s exactly what the NHL is saying when they suspend him) and blah, blah blah, throughout most of the game. Meanwhile, Detroit had 14 powerplay minutes to Philadelphia’s 8 (and 4 of those came late in the 3rd) and the Philadelphia crew couldn’t have been more confused as to how that happens. I think things like that tend to happen when you surround yourself with pieces of shit. Scott Hartnell, for example, a certified goalie runner and long-time dick to the Red Wings, apparently started punching somebody in the Red Wings’ bench and he drew a 4-minute powerplay for Detroit for roughing and unsportsmanlike conduct. Yes, that’s right; it wasn’t even some AHL scrub, it was a guy who, despite AHL skill, has an NHL job pulling a stunt like this in the pre-season.

Anyway, as you can see Scott Hartnell and I don’t get along. Somehow, after various grunts about Chris Pronger, they got to talking about Pavel Datsyuk; particularly, Pavel Datsyuk’s four straight Lady Byngs. Chris Therien was in rare form. I’m paraphrasing, but I think honestly this makes it sound better than it actually was. “I don’t know if a hockey player is proud to win that trophy. The Lady Byng. For gentlemanly play?” First off, this feeds into that whole notion that PIM = toughness; an argument that I absolutely despise. Scott Niedermayer is not a tough player. He gets 80 PIM a year in hooking and holding minors from when someone beats him to the outside. Somehow he’s developed a tough reputation, maybe for sucker elbows like this. I can assure you, that cowardly act was the toughest thing Niedermayer’s ever done in his career. Datsyuk, on the other hand, may be one of Detroit’s toughest players.  The fact that he racks up 20 PIM a year and has more highlight reel hits on YouTube than Scott Niedermayer (“Pavel Datsyuk hit” draws 230 videos. “Scott Niedermayer hit” draws 16, including three where he’s on the receiving end of a big hits, and one where Niedermayer hits someone with his stick) should be a compliment, and yes, I think Pavel Datsyuk and the Detroit Red Wings are very much proud of having to kill 30 fewer penalties per year. Perhaps, Chris Therien, the prevalence of Detroit, combined with the absence of Philadelphia, in recent years on a list like this indicates that it’s quite alright to win the Lady Byng if it helps you win hockey games. But sure, I’m confident Pronger will make a wonderful Flyer.

Ah, that was fun. It’s posts like these that make me hate the offseason. There’s no Chris Theriens out there spewing stupid comments for me to feed on during the offseason. But the Delmore hatred did make up for some of the stupid Lady Byng comments.

Anyways, tonight Detroit takes on the New York Rangers! The game is not on TV in Detroit, but it is on MSG in New York. I would say there’s a pretty good bet that if you checked out MyP2P or ATDHE.net, you might be able to find yourself an MSG stream of this game. I’ll be watching for sure.

The news today is that Henrik Zetterberg is out with a groin injury. I see some complaining about this, and honestly I don’t care. I want him healthy for the season. I don’t want him playing if he’s even 99.8%. He needs to be 100%. So don’t stress this injury, everyone, it’s not really a big deal. So based on these lines and Babcock’s comments to Ansar Khan in that last article about changes now that Zetterberg’s out, these are what we can expect.

Todd Bertuzzi | Justin Abdelkader | Dan Cleary
Ville Leino | Valtteri Filppula | Jason Williams
Johan Ryno | Cory Emmerton | Kirk Maltby
Mattias Ritola | Evan McGrath | Jan Mursak

Niklas Kronwall | Doug Janik
Brett Lebda | Brad Stuart
Derek Meech | Jakub Kindl

Chris Osgood | Thomas McCollum

First second looks at Bertuzzi and Williams, and a lineup to get excited about if you love prospects. Thomas McCollum’s first taste of pre-season action. Jakub Kindl gets to play with a bunch of guys all ahead of him on the depth chart (except Janik, who is probably right behind him). Let’s see if we see some of this star quality that people rave about with him. Abdelkader gets to play a bunch on a good line. The Filppula line scored the most through camp, with no Zetterberg they’ll need to score a lot tonight. Johan Ryno seems to have delusions that he can make the Red Wings, maybe he’s right? Cory Emmerton has had a great camp, the Wings love him and Dan Cleary says he looks like an NHL player. That 4th line is just full of guys who all need to have a big season to stay in the long-term plans of Detroit, so I expect all of them will see significant minutes, probably shuffled on to different lines to get them different looks. The only thing I’m bummed about is there’s been no Dick Axelsson or Tomas Tatar through the first two pre-season games. Hopefully they’re just saving them for tomorrow, on the televised Buffalo game.

The last note of the day, it looks like every remaining Wings pre-season game is going to be televised. This list does not reflect that MSG is showing tonight’s game, Comcast Sports Network is showing the second Philadelphia game, and some Swedish station will surely show the Swedish Red Wings taking on the SEL champions. I would take a look at those two links I posted earlier in this post and it shouldn’t be hard at all to find streams of those games when the time comes.