Confirmed with Link: Holland signed to 2-year extension

[Heaton]

But time WON'T tell actually. Because the goal wasn't to have the 3rd longest playoff streak of all time. It was to have the 1st. We fell short. We can only speculate what it would have meant to the business and sports history if we had managed to break the all time record.

You only get one chance every million years or so to break that record. In my opinion, when you're that close, you have to try.

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

 

[Frk It]

They didn't have him for 12/14 games. The Wings won in the first round and built a 3-1 series lead before choking it away without Dekeyser playing.

He was also the #6 defenseman that year.

 

[TheOtherOne]

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

That's great.

I don't understand why people insist on playing stupid about this. Breaking an all time record is a big deal. Objectively. This is not controversial.

Even if you personally don't care about the record, that doesn't diminish it. It's still a record.

We fell short of the record. That's no secret. People try things and fail all the time. But if we HAD succeeded, the conversation would have been very different.

If we broke the record along with another Cup somewhere in the mix, history would have remembered it as the greatest era for a single sports franchise of all time.

But yea, we failed at it, so keep pretending the record meant nothing.

 

[kliq]

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

I don't think anyone would disagree that playoff success is what most Wings fans are most fond of, but without making the playoffs every year, you wouldn't have the success that they had. The streak was damn impressive, as it showed the Wings ability to stay relevant for such a long time. It not for the Wings just hanging on those last few years, I believe some fans wouldn't have turned on the streak like they have. Lets not let 2014-2016 define the streak.

 

[njx9]

but without making the playoffs every year, you wouldn't have the success that they had

If they'd missed in '13, '14 or '15, literally nothing would've changed about the success they'd had. If they'd missed in '05, it wouldn't have changed the fact that they were successful in '08 and '09. If they'd missed in '91, it wouldn't have obviated the next 20-some years. In short, I don't think that's even vaguely true, unless your sole measure of success starts and ends with 'playoffs'.

 

[ricky0034]

That's great.

I don't understand why people insist on playing stupid about this. Breaking an all time record is a big deal. Objectively. This is not controversial.

Even if you personally don't care about the record, that doesn't diminish it. It's still a record.

We fell short of the record. That's no secret. People try things and fail all the time. But if we HAD succeeded, the conversation would have been very different.

If we broke the record along with another Cup somewhere in the mix, history would have remembered it as the greatest era for a single sports franchise of all time.

But yea, we failed at it, so keep pretending the record meant nothing.

lots of things are records,just because somethings a record doesn't mean it's a big deal there's thousands of them out there and some matter more than others


how often do you see people actually talk about that record Boston has? because I literally never see it even mentioned outside of talking about the Wings thing

even if the Wings had broken it it would have swiftly become an all but forgotten minor footnote of history like the Boston one is

I don't think anyone would disagree that playoff success is what most Wings fans are most fond of, but without making the playoffs every year, you wouldn't have the success that they had. The streak was damn impressive, as it showed the Wings ability to stay relevant for such a long time. It not for the Wings just hanging on those last few years, I believe some fans wouldn't have turned on the streak like they have. Lets not let 2014-2016 define the streak.

blame Holland for that one

when a teams GM spends several years publicly using the streak thing as a justification for making stupid moves to prop up an obvious corpse of a team people are gonna get resentful of it awful fast

 

[Heaton]

But yea, we failed at it, so keep pretending the record meant nothing.

I didn't say it meant nothing, but I don't think it meant as much as how you're portraying it. How many people actually knew the Bruins held the record for the longest playoff streak? When people think of their accomplishments, how far down the list is that?

 

[ArGarBarGar]

I don't think anyone would disagree that playoff success is what most Wings fans are most fond of, but without making the playoffs every year, you wouldn't have the success that they had. The streak was damn impressive, as it showed the Wings ability to stay relevant for such a long time. It not for the Wings just hanging on those last few years, I believe some fans wouldn't have turned on the streak like they have. Lets not let 2014-2016 define the streak.

Even having the streak at 20 years is impressive when you couple it with the number of deep runs and championships the team enjoyed. The last few years didn't make the team look any better in the history books.

 

[jkutswings]

Speaking of playoffs and this team going forward, several of the players seem to think they could return to playoff hockey as soon as next season:

‘Next season’: Red Wings confident of quick return to playoffs

“Our goal is to try to get back there next year. Give ourselves a chance to get back to the playoffs.” (Helm)

“Next season,” said Abdelkader, of how quickly the Wings can re-enter the playoff picture. “We’re real close as a team. We’re going to have some young players who’ll get an opportunity to play on the team. We’ll have growth from within, (if) veteran guys maintain their levels (of production), young players will an opportunity to play and help the team,”

“There’s not a lot of difference,” DeKeyser said. “If you swing some of those one-goal games, just score a few extra goals here or there, your special teams improve a little bit, that all can make a big difference and add up points, for sure.”


I know they're not really going to say anything contrary to that, but it's better to just not comment, rather than appear so delusional.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Speaking of playoffs and this team going forward, several of the players seem to think they could return to playoff hockey as soon as next season:

‘Next season’: Red Wings confident of quick return to playoffs

“Our goal is to try to get back there next year. Give ourselves a chance to get back to the playoffs.” (Helm)

“Next season,” said Abdelkader, of how quickly the Wings can re-enter the playoff picture. “We’re real close as a team. We’re going to have some young players who’ll get an opportunity to play on the team. We’ll have growth from within, (if) veteran guys maintain their levels (of production), young players will an opportunity to play and help the team,”

“There’s not a lot of difference,” DeKeyser said. “If you swing some of those one-goal games, just score a few extra goals here or there, your special teams improve a little bit, that all can make a big difference and add up points, for sure.”


I know they're not really going to say anything contrary to that, but it's better to just not comment, rather than appear so delusional.

I don't care if the players talk about it. They aren't in charge of personnel decisions. They just go out and try to win the games. I would prefer a locker room with players who want to win and believe they can win than a bunch of guys with no team motivations.

 

[jkutswings]

I don't care if the players talk about it. They aren't in charge of personnel decisions. They just go out and try to win the games. I would prefer a locker room with players who want to win and believe they can win than a bunch of guys with no team motivations.

Wanting to win is a good thing, and feeling confident inwardly or even within the locker room is fine. But players advertising to the general public that they think a bottom feeder is a few lucky bounces away from returning to the playoffs just makes them sound ignorant.

 

[TheOtherOne]

lots of things are records,just because somethings a record doesn't mean it's a big deal there's thousands of them out there and some matter more than others


how often do you see people actually talk about that record Boston has? because I literally never see it even mentioned outside of talking about the Wings thing

Here's the "how often people talk about it" argument. Fun.

How often do people talk about who won the Cup in '85?

My guess is somewhere between rarely and never. I don't even know who it was. Nor do I care.

Does that make it irrelevant in the world of hockey and sports history? Cups are important, right?

But but but nobody talks about it daily around the water cooler 30 years later!

If the hockey fans of next century are on the topic of turn of the millennium sports franchises with great longevity, it would probably come up. Aside from that, expecting people to randomly be talking about a decades old record is absurd. By that standard nothing is important.

 

[ricky0034]

Here's the "how often people talk about it" argument. Fun.

How often do people talk about who won the Cup in '85?

My guess is somewhere between rarely and never. I don't even know who it was. Nor do I care.

Does that make it irrelevant in the world of hockey and sports history? Cups are important, right?

But but but nobody talks about it daily around the water cooler 30 years later!

If the hockey fans of next century are on the topic of turn of the millennium sports franchises with great longevity, it would probably come up. Aside from that, expecting people to randomly be talking about a decades old record is absurd. By that standard nothing is important.

quite a few actually considering it's part of the Oilers dynasty

anyways unfortunate choice of years in that example aside,cups are something aimed for and all that but ultimately in the context of history a single cup isn't really a big deal you're right,someone wins it every year after all


you're the one that said this was a record and big deal

people remember the records that are actually a big deal

Gretzky's records such as his points record and how he has more assists than anyone else even has points,Howe's 20 consecutive top 5 scoring finishes and playing in the NHL at 52,Glenn Hall starting 502 consecutive games mostly without a mask,even single season stuff like Montreal putting up 132 points in 80 games in 1976-77 in an era that still had ties or Selanne scoring 76 goals as a rookie

the streak thing? when it's all said and done that's just a minor footnote that nobody really remembers or cares about,at best it's nothing more than something the team that has it can use as a marketing gimmick for a short while

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

Good, but that doesn't mean some of us can't appreciated the whole thing. I loved the peaks but also really enjoyed having a team that was good enough to be in the dance every year and gave me tons of enjoyable wins season after season. I don't need it to be all or nothing, I enjoyed the entire run, hopefully we can start another one soon. I want to watch playoff hockey every year if possible, it means I get to watch more Wings hockey, I am always in favor of that.

I think through natural ebbs and flows we are in a down period, even if we did a phenomenal job of staving off those odds, they caught up with us. Hopefully we can get back to the heights we just witnessed it was an incredible run.

 

[Heaton]

Good, but that doesn't mean some of us can't appreciated the whole thing.

Why would you think it meant that others couldn't appreciate it differently? Did I say that in my post?

I loved the peaks but also really enjoyed having a team that was good enough to be in the dance every year and gave me tons of enjoyable wins season after season. I don't need it to be all or nothing, I enjoyed the entire run, hopefully we can start another one soon.

The last great post season memory was when we almost beat Chicago, because it was unexpected. But other than that, we don't have much to write home about after the 2009 season.

 

[Ezekial]

That's really sad. I enjoyed the series against Tampa and Chicago that we lost in 7 games, they were plenty exciting for me, even though we lost. I got to watch Pavel Datsyuk's last playoff goal in person, that's not much, but it's something.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Wanting to win is a good thing, and feeling confident inwardly or even within the locker room is fine. But players advertising to the general public that they think a bottom feeder is a few lucky bounces away from returning to the playoffs just makes them sound ignorant.

I mean, I don't watch these guys for their nuanced takes on team management or who they think will make the playoffs. They are hockey players. A lot of them aren't exactly geniuses. I don't think it is worth worrying about, honestly.

 

[TheMoreYouKnow]

Sure.

Stars generally don't get better as they advance into their mid 30s and beyond. Retiring stars need to be replaced in order to maintain performance levels. Middling prospects rarely turn into players who can replace Hall of Famers. Those views are not controversial or particularly original yet our organization acted like they could defy them.

Our Cup-winning D was Lidstrom, Rafalski, Kronwall, Stuart, Lebda, Lilja and Chelios. Lidstrom was 38 when we won the Cup, Rafalski was 35, Chelios was 46 and basically done. A fairly obvious fact then that those 3 guys wouldn't be playing for much longer and that their performance level was likely on the way down as well. What's the solution? (1) Try to sign elite FA D-men or trade for them. Risky, difficult to pull off. (2) Develop elite D-men from within your org. But you obviously need prospects who actually have that high a ceiling though.

What did the Wings do? Develop D-men and stick with them even if they level out as average players. Supplement them with 2nd and 3rd tier FA signings.

Our D in the 2012/13 playoffs was Kronwall, Kindl, Quincey, Ericsson, Smith, Colaiacovo, Lashoff and Dekeyser.

At this point you might think, hmm, well we haven't really been able to replace our departed defensive core, and our players coming up aren't as good. Might be time to concede that our days as a Cup contender are over and try to build the next great team. Nope. Let's drag this out for as long as possible, so we can then, surprise, surprise, say 5 years later when the Wings are a basement team "Oh but who could have seen it coming? Hindsight is 20/20"

Hint: Any reasonably astute observer.

 

[Bench]

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

Ask St. Louis fans about their streak and how great that felt. For those unaware, they had 25 straight years of playoffs with 0 Cups.

 

[Nut Upstrom]

I tend to agree that the streak is not much of a big deal, but here's the thing - the streak meant a lot to the owners of the team and the streak meant a lot to the people managing the team. Maintaining and adding to that streak was a big deal to them and many people in the organization are on record having said as much.
So while we find it little more than a cool footnote, we don't really have a say in whether the team gets started on a rebuild or tries to squeeze out another and another playoff berth.
Ownership/management decided to add to the streak in lieu of rebuilding a few years earlier, that's really the end of the matter. I'm not sure why it is still such a hot topic here.

 

[kliq]

If they'd missed in '13, '14 or '15, literally nothing would've changed about the success they'd had. If they'd missed in '05, it wouldn't have changed the fact that they were successful in '08 and '09. If they'd missed in '91, it wouldn't have obviated the next 20-some years. In short, I don't think that's even vaguely true, unless your sole measure of success starts and ends with 'playoffs'.

You're taking things too literally, of course if they didn't make the playoffs in '05 nothing changes before that, who's saying it does? What the streak really represented was the fact that the Wings were contenders pretty much every year from '92 to '12. Unfortunately because they really tried to hang on to it near the end a negative context has become associated with it. That's what I take out of the streak, the fact that from when I was a kid to my 30's, the Wings provided me with a chance at a run every single year.

 

[kliq]

Even having the streak at 20 years is impressive when you couple it with the number of deep runs and championships the team enjoyed. The last few years didn't make the team look any better in the history books.

Agreed.

As far as the bold, what I am saying is actually the opposite. I think that the last few years of making it and not being contenders put a sour taste in some people's mouths and unfortunately "the streak" leads to bitterness from some. Personally, I choose not to look at it that way.

 

[kliq]

Ask St. Louis fans about their streak and how great that felt. For those unaware, they had 25 straight years of playoffs with 0 Cups.

Well and that's the thing, what makes our streak so impressive is the fact that it included 4 cups, 6 finals appearances, and being legitimate contenders every year up to 2012. I was an impressive feat.

If a team made the playoffs 25 years in a row but were 8th seeds every year and got bounced 1st round every year, nobody would be celebrating that.

 

[Red Stanley]

quite a few actually considering it's part of the Oilers dynasty

anyways unfortunate choice of years in that example aside,cups are something aimed for and all that but ultimately in the context of history a single cup isn't really a big deal you're right,someone wins it every year after all


you're the one that said this was a record and big deal

people remember the records that are actually a big deal

Gretzky's records such as his points record and how he has more assists than anyone else even has points,Howe's 20 consecutive top 5 scoring finishes and playing in the NHL at 52,Glenn Hall starting 502 consecutive games mostly without a mask,even single season stuff like Montreal putting up 132 points in 80 games in 1976-77 in an era that still had ties or Selanne scoring 76 goals as a rookie

the streak thing? when it's all said and done that's just a minor footnote that nobody really remembers or cares about,at best it's nothing more than something the team that has it can use as a marketing gimmick for a short while

I'm not sure why this subject keeps coming up as if there's some kind of mathematical formula that determines how much everyone should and does/doesn't care. That's not how emotion works. Anyway, the streak will never have to stand on its own like Boston's. It will always signify an era of Red Wing dominance. If the NHL continues down this path of parity and expansion, there may never be another one like it. I'm glad to have been a fan through most of it.

 

[Pavels Dog]

I don't know about anyone else, but the memories I have of the Wings over my life have to do with playoff success, not a playoff streak where most of it had no playoff memories.

I feel a little sad for you. I have hundreds of great memories from the Wings in my life. A few of the best are from cups, sure, but there is so much else. It seems very american to only care about cups or "playoff success" (I'm guessing you define that as at least being in the final 4). If that was all I cared about I wouldn't even watch the regular season, would just tune in for elimination games in the playoffs. That's all that matters, right?

If they'd missed in '13, '14 or '15, literally nothing would've changed about the success they'd had. If they'd missed in '05, it wouldn't have changed the fact that they were successful in '08 and '09. If they'd missed in '91, it wouldn't have obviated the next 20-some years. In short, I don't think that's even vaguely true, unless your sole measure of success starts and ends with 'playoffs'.

You can't look at a streak as being just a streak, what it signified in every season was that the team was either a contender or close enough that a few tweaks was all that was needed (up until 2012 at least). 05-06 was a dominant regular season, change that to a playoff miss and it says something very different about the team. Maybe it causes Holland to pull the trigger on a Datsyuk trade. Maybe it makes him think the team needs an honest rebuild. As long as you're a playoff team most general managers will go with tweaks and attempts to make minor changes. Because even if the core is getting older and the team looks a little weaker, you can still get it done like Washington this year. Miss the playoffs and the circumstances start looking very different. So while you're right that not much would have changed if the streak started a little later or ended a little earlier, you can't just change a 120+ point team to one that misses the playoffs in a pivotal season and pretend like that wouldn't have had massive implications on what happened next.

how often do you see people actually talk about that record Boston has? because I literally never see it even mentioned outside of talking about the Wings thing

Because it started in the 60s and had zero cups in their last 25 years (and only 2 cups total)..

But any successful run will be "forgotten" to some extent when it becomes past history. What do you expect, main board threads every week discussing the greatness of a streak? Nah, people discuss what's happening right now. That's sports. What you should judge is how was the Wings streak judged when it actually happened.

I know they're not really going to say anything contrary to that, but it's better to just not comment, rather than appear so delusional.

Tell me you're not that delusional yourself that you think players are just going to "no comment" softball questions about playoff hopes when asked in f*cking May... and athletes ARE to some extent supposed to be delusional. They have to be. You think f*cking Steven Bradbury was realistic to think he could win Olympic Gold?

You think you push your body to the limit for 3-4 months of summer training because you're sane? You think Vegas players were realistic in their aim to make the playoffs this season? Delusion is what sports is about. If you think you have no shot, you have no shot.