Do the Wings need to get tougher?

[Zetterberg4Captain]

But the focus of this thread is toughness, and if you don't have the skill to supplement it how valuable is the team?

A skilled team without a lot of toughness can have moderate to high success. A tough team without a lot of skill absolutely cannot.

yes that is the focus of the thread but its "toughness without skill" and nowhere is toughness being defined as "fighting" or a "goon"

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Compete or contend for a cup? We've made the playoffs each year, racking up winning seasons with 90+ points. Those are clearly teams that can compete with other teams.

So you think we are okay on skill?

The general consensus has been that we have not, and I think it is disingenuous to talk about making the playoffs every year and having multiple 90 point seasons as if that is the end goal for this team when it clearly is not. Toughness will not get us any closer to a cup because at the end of the day we don't have the talent to supplement that toughness with. We might get some more fights and some more entertaining physical play, but that's about it with this current roster.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

yes that is the focus of the thread but its "toughness without skill" and nowhere is toughness being defined as "fighting" or a "goon"

Where did I say toughness is being defined as fighting or a goon?

 

[Zetterberg4Captain]

Where did I say toughness is being defined as fighting or a goon?

"But the focus of this thread is toughness, and if you don't have the skill to supplement it how valuable is the team?"

well you said that

so to me it seemed like you were separating toughness from skill, as though they cant co-exist

what did you mean then, what are you defining as toughness and how if you're not defining it as a "fighting goon" is it something we dont need more of?

 

[ArGarBarGar]

"But the focus of this thread is toughness, and if you don't have the skill to supplement it how valuable is the team?"

well you said that

so to me it seemed like you were separating toughness from skill, as though they cant co-exist

what did you mean then, what are you defining as toughness and how if you're not defining it as a "fighting goon" is it something we dont need more of?

So in terms of toughness what do you think we need? More crashers and bangers? More skilled guys who are tougher?

How many elite players in this league are considered to be "tough" in the Jaime Benn mold? I feel we need elite talent because we don't have any, and that is much more important than guys who can crash and bang and help our bottom six (which has been a point of contention many times in this very thread).

 

[Lil Sebastian Cossa]

"But the focus of this thread is toughness, and if you don't have the skill to supplement it how valuable is the team?"

well you said that

so to me it seemed like you were separating toughness from skill, as though they cant co-exist

what did you mean then, what are you defining as toughness and how if you're not defining it as a "fighting goon" is it something we dont need more of?

I can't speak for him, but what I am speaking about is hockeyisforeveryone is talking about. Toughness like Yzerman had where he wasn't gonna win a fist fight with anyone or grind someone down over a 7 game series... but he wasn't gonna get ground down. Dudes with iron hearts who can soldier on and still be effective.

Or Datsyuk who played his game with an astounding edge whenever he got pushed by the other team. Hell, back from the 90s when you had the Russian Five all be truculent pieces of **** (except for maybe Fedorov, and that's because he was most talented player in the league left). The Fight Night at the Joe was sparked (that particular night) by Larionov fighting Forsberg. A couple of the series got testy when Kozlov threw Adam Foote into the boards when he was coming in for a crushing check. Vladdy was just a cheap son of a *****.

They need guys who stand up for one another and for themselves. They don't need to get in fights or go out of their way to finish checks... they should finish scoring chances. The toughness comes in when you have a guy like Perry trying to screw with Datsyuk that he drops his shoulder and charges into him. Show the other team that you won't be pushed around. You don't need to fight or have fighters to do that. In fact, I think a guy like Tatar coming out and smacking a guy like Lucic in the nose would do one hell of a lot more for the team than bringing in a Martin or similar.

And everyone is focusing on the fighting and checking part of toughness because that's what the OP is talking about.

 

[Zetterberg4Captain]

So in terms of toughness what do you think we need? More crashers and bangers? More skilled guys who are tougher?

How many elite players in this league are considered to be "tough" in the Jaime Benn mold? I feel we need elite talent because we don't have any, and that is much more important than guys who can crash and bang and help our bottom six (which has been a point of contention many times in this very thread).

I think the team needs an improved or increased "team toughness" literally from top down and that includes mgmt

from mgmt side of things I think they need to start showing a little less all encompassing loyalty and start making the tough decisions

from a player personnel side i think the DRW need bigger and stronger players in the top 6 who're able and willing to go to the front of the net, to go into the corners, to take and give a hit to make a play, who're not intimidated by big dmen, who battle through hits and who're not perimeter players

of course they have to be skilled but i believe their exists quite a wide spectrum between a rare milan lucic and a gus nyquist

i the bottom 6 and really the 4th line i would like to see more pure "bangers and crashers" the justin abdlekaders of the league

and overall i want to see us play with more passion and heart, and while i appreciate scoring on the pp as a deterrent to an overly aggressive team, I appreciate and value just as much guys who're willing to stand up for their teammates and have their back(brenden smith for example) rather then always just turning a cheek

 

[Winger98]

So you think we are okay on skill?

The general consensus has been that we have not, and I think it is disingenuous to talk about making the playoffs every year and having multiple 90 point seasons as if that is the end goal for this team when it clearly is not. Toughness will not get us any closer to a cup because at the end of the day we don't have the talent to supplement that toughness with. We might get some more fights and some more entertaining physical play, but that's about it with this current roster.

Of course not but I don't think we have enough toughness, either. We need to add both to varying degrees, and I think it's wrong to act as if adding one is mutually exclusive to adding the other.

And, yeah, right now I think just making the playoffs might be the end goal for management. They talk about how anything could happen once we make it, but we all know that's largely bull. At that point, yeah, adding a bit of sandpaper in the right spots could make us at least a second round exit instead of a first.

 

[PullHard]

No one disagrees that a talented player would help more than a "tough" player

The thing is, though, based on recent history we aren't really replacing the talent leaving, either. And it is easier to pay premium in UFA for a McGinn/ Lucic/ Backes/ etc than it is to replace a Lidstrom, Datsyuk, Rafalski, etc.

Absolutely the team should keep drafting for talent (why has the team been taking slugs in late rounds in recent history???) but the problem is we are losing guys like Franzen and (useful) Todd Bertuzzi and (useful) Cleary and elusive players like Datsyuk and plugging in Nyquist, Tatar, Larkin, Nielsen, etc. Absolutely those guys deserved and continue to deserve roster spots in the NHL over the players that they've replaced in terms of their impact with the puck on their sticks and orchestrating a puck possession strategy, but instead of helping out the roster balance by moving on from say Miller, Smith, Quincey (just finally moved on from him) for more specific types of players, the club usually hangs onto them.

They (Miller, Smith, Quincey) actually probably are three of the tougher guys from the team along with Abby and Glendening in recent seasons. That is pathetic when you consider that at any given moment one of Larkin, Tatar, or Nyquist is likely on the ice. We've seen those guys battle hard and definitely aren't your classic "soft" stereotypes, but in the grand scheme of the NHL those guys will get knocked off pucks pretty often and easily as we've seen plenty the last couple years.

There is no concrete answer to this question/ problem. I know we are at an all time hysteria in terms of adv stats being so important and puck possession being an emphasis. No one in this thread is saying "abandon puck possession to ice a team of slugs" or "we already have enough talented players! stop acquiring them and only sign Matt Martins and Brandon Prusts!" but this team got pushed around by TB in the playoffs, who is one of the younger and faster teams in the league. There is no excuse. The team isn't built to be able to hang with even lightweight physical opponents, and getting bigger is more feasible in the short term than becoming skilled. That takes a long time, and its going to continue to take a long time if we keep band-aiding old washed up players onto the team.

Detroit was on the forefront of pushing puck possession and will continue to be, it just strikes me that the team could use a bit more bite and pushback when the games get nasty. I think that is all anyone is saying in here.