OT: Did you like it better when the Red Wings were in the western conference?

[Oddbob]

Hated all the late games against LA, SJ and company.

I like them being in the East more but I much preferred the old alignment/playoff format... 3 divisions of five teams in both conferences. Top eight in each conference make the playoffs.

I don't like the wild card thing and I find it hard to remember who's in what division.

Yeah, the Wildcard crap needs to go. 1-8 per conference in order of pts regardless of division.

 

[newfy]

In general I think the Red Wings got screwed over, more so than any franchise, by getting switched back and forth and all the conference realignments.

I feel like we are a team without a home, who has lost all their rivals.

We had a great thing with Toronto/Chicago. Then we got shuffled West (with Chicago) and built out great rivalries with St.Louis and Colorado and it seemed Columbus would eventually become a rival. (They hated us Atleast)

But now we are in a stupid division where all the Canadian teams naturally have become rivals.
Boston has always been natural rivals with Montreal and fierce rivals with Toronto in recent years.
The Florida teams rivalry seems tailor made to happen.

That leaves us and Buffalo…. Long term it would have been better if Columbus was still In our division over Buffalo.

We got the shaft in a lot of ways. But in the end, the travel is better for our players and the start times are better.

If Detroit was actually good right now we wouldnt even be having this conversation. In the east, the wings had a decent team for a few years and developed a pretty good rivalry with Tampa pretty quick.

The way Detroit and Ottawa are building, they have the makings for a rivalry on the way.

Toronto and Detroit with how rowdy the fans are in each others barn would be good as well but until this year, Toronto has just pumped Detroit a bunch.

Even games like a good Detroit team, in MSG against a good rangers team has potential. ut Detroit hasnt been good enough for teams to really develop bad blood with for a while through playoff series

 

[Retire91]

I liked facing the western conference teams but the 10 PM game start times were difficult

But more importantly the wear and tear on the team with long flights

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

I like them being in the East more but I much preferred the old alignment/playoff format... 3 divisions of five teams in both conferences. Top eight in each conference make the playoffs.

I don't like the wild card thing and I find it hard to remember who's in what division.

To be fair the league proposed going back to the 80s style playoff and the players countered with the wildcard. I love the divisional playoffs as long as you just make it top 4. I understand some years a really good division and bad division will make that look bad. However, that is where you actually play opponents a ton and learn to hate each other. Keep in mind they also did I think 7 or 8 divisional games because of pre-expansion but they did hate each other. We played people for multiple years, we won't approach that amount of games, but I still think playing a team 10 games one year 20 over 2 is much more likely to see the heated playoff series the fans like.

I would love to see it just go to top 4 in your division make it, welcome to the Thunderdome. That was the actual old alignment and what they initially proposed and I still completely agree with it.

 

[SpookyTsuki]

I’m more excited for a wings vs devils/bruins/leafs/bj series than a wings vs Vegas/Arizona/kraken

 

[Voodoo Glow Skulls]

I'll go with #5.

Doesn't matter.

 

[GMR]

Duh.

Back then we didn’t suck.

 

[PelagicJoe]

I miss the Chuck Norris division days. We had better rivalries in the WC with CHI, STL, and later on COL.

 

[The Zermanator]

We're in a division with 3 other original six teams, I love it. And most of them are close by. So the team plays the biggest chunk of their season's away games (in-division) either close to home or spending a few days in sunny Florida. And just generally within the densest area of the country in terms of hockey teams which makes travel easier and less tiring which is a tangible benefit. There's pros and cons to any conference/division alignment but that's about as good a situation as you're going to get. They just need to become a good team again, then it won't matter which conference they're in.

 

[Henkka]

Funny how all these new forwards from Western conference:

- Perron from STL
- DeBrincat old Hawk
- Kubalik was too
- Copp was a Jet
- Sprong came from Seattle
- Fabbri a Blues guy
- Compher Colorado Cup winner
- Kostin from Oilers, former Blues pick
- Fischer all career at Arizona
Rest of the forwards are own draft picks (Larkin, Raymond, Berggren, Veleno, Rasmussen)

Defence is more split even. Määttä was a King but had long East history from Pens, Holl was all Toronto, Gostisbehe history was longer at East, but came from West. Think Chiarot was more west, before traded to east. Walman all west.

 

[PelagicJoe]

I will say this. I live in the St. Louis area, so I used to catch a lot of crap from my friends who are hockey fans back in the 90s and 2000s. After the move East, the rivalry has died and we now bond over our hate for Chicago and Boston. Lmao.

 

[RRhoads]

I will say this. I live in the St. Louis area, so I used to catch a lot of crap from my friends who are hockey fans back in the 90s and 2000s. After the move East, the rivalry has died and we now bond over our hate for Chicago and Boston. Lmao.

Do you think that is because we have sucked or moved?

 

[PelagicJoe]

Do you think that is because we have sucked or moved?

Both

 

[aar000n]

I remember how much the playoffs sucked. I also remember one playoff with all the opposing teams being we're west coast teams.

 

[Ricelund]

I remember how much the playoffs sucked. I also remember one playoff with all the opposing teams being we're west coast teams.

2007... Calgary, SJ and Anaheim. Just a brutal run.