New-School Red Wings.

[JmanWingsFan]

I just wonder what everyone thinks of Holland if everything actually went to plan...

-Suter doesn't hesitate and puts the pen to the paper before Parise can snatch him away...

-Detroit easily beats the Rangers offer for Nash (Which I wholeheartedly believe is true), and Howson realizes he can't be a beggar choosing his return and actually does the smart thing and take the "heluva" offer from the Wings...

And then our team, instead of in the messy state things are in, looks like this:

Valtteri Filppula/ Pavel Datsyuk/ Rick Nash
Todd Bertuzzi/ Henrik Zetterberg/Damien Brunner
Danny Cleary/ Darren Helm/ Mikael Samuelsson
Drew Miller/ Justin Abdelkader/ Jordin Tootoo

Ryan Suter/ Ian White
Niklas Kronwall/ Jonathan Ericsson
Brendan Smith/ Michal Rozsival*

Jimmy Howard
Jonas Gustavsson
*Just a throw in... I'm not sure how Holland would have gone the 6th/7th Dman route had he got Suter and likely traded Kindl to CBJ as part of a deal for Nash.

I bet there wouldn't have been any Holland haters if things actually went his way last offseason. It's not like he didn't have a plan. I'm wondering whether he came into the offseason with the expectations that Suter and Nash would have been in a Wings Jersey when all was said and done. Because of that, I'm starting to wonder if all these depth signings like Samuelsson and extending Bertuzzi were made with the idea that we'd be able to acquire Nash, which would obviously deplete our depth with guys like Franzen, Nyquist, and maybe even Tatar going the other way.


Of course we all know what happened....

-Suter was called by Parise and offered a boatload to play for Minnesota, and he bolted for the then better offer without giving anyone a chance to match.

-Howson wouldn't listen to Detroit even if they offered Zetterberg and Datsyuk for Nash. Instead, he did the stupid thing and destroyed what little market there was for Nash by making the NYR the only viable suiter for Nash. With what Sather gave up for Nash, I still have no doubt in my mind we could have topped that easily.

And then our team is left in the current state it was. Should Holland have put us in a better position so he wouldn't have to gamble on the offseason? Perhaps. I'm no GM. But were these legitimate risks to take? Absolutely. As we all know, Suter signing with us was incredibly close, IIRC pen almost on the paper close. I still want to know what that "helluva" offer was for Nash. We still don't know what that was.

 

[pdd]

I just wonder what everyone thinks of Holland if everything actually went to plan...

-Suter doesn't hesitate and puts the pen to the paper before Parise can snatch him away...

-Detroit easily beats the Rangers offer for Nash (Which I wholeheartedly believe is true), and Howson realizes he can't be a beggar choosing his return and actually does the smart thing and take the "heluva" offer from the Wings...

And then our team, instead of in the messy state things are in, looks like this:

Valtteri Filppula/ Pavel Datsyuk/ Rick Nash
Todd Bertuzzi/ Henrik Zetterberg/Damien Brunner
Danny Cleary/ Darren Helm/ Mikael Samuelsson
Drew Miller/ Justin Abdelkader/ Jordin Tootoo

Ryan Suter/ Ian White
Niklas Kronwall/ Jonathan Ericsson
Brendan Smith/ Michal Rozsival*

Jimmy Howard
Jonas Gustavsson
*Just a throw in... I'm not sure how Holland would have gone the 6th/7th Dman route had he got Suter and likely traded Kindl to CBJ as part of a deal for Nash.

I bet there wouldn't have been any Holland haters if things actually went his way last offseason. It's not like he didn't have a plan. I'm wondering whether he came into the offseason with the expectations that Suter and Nash would have been in a Wings Jersey when all was said and done. Because of that, I'm starting to wonder if all these depth signings like Samuelsson and extending Bertuzzi were made with the idea that we'd be able to acquire Nash, which would obviously deplete our depth with guys like Franzen, Nyquist, and maybe even Tatar going the other way.


Of course we all know what happened....

-Suter was called by Parise and offered a boatload to play for Minnesota, and he bolted for the then better offer without giving anyone a chance to match.

-Howson wouldn't listen to Detroit even if they offered Zetterberg and Datsyuk for Nash. Instead, he did the stupid thing and destroyed what little market there was for Nash by making the NYR the only viable suiter for Nash. With what Sather gave up for Nash, I still have no doubt in my mind we could have topped that easily.

And then our team is left in the current state it was. Should Holland have put us in a better position so he wouldn't have to gamble on the offseason? Perhaps. I'm no GM. But were these legitimate risks to take? Absolutely. As we all know, Suter signing with us was incredibly close, IIRC pen almost on the paper close. I still want to know what that "helluva" offer was for Nash. We still don't know what that was.

Holland tried to get Salo. So you can pull out Rosival and go with:
Suter/White
Kronwall/Salo
Smith/Ericsson

Quincey, not Kindl, is probably the defenseman to go if that happens (unless Kindl is in the Nash trade); there's no way Holland is still signing him to that deal if Suter and Salo sign.

 

[Lugaid]

Completely agree with this here. We are teetering, if not tumbling, towards utter infuriating mediocrity. It's so hard to get excited about guys like Cleary, Samuelsson, Bertuzzi, Colaiacovo et al. when they're just worn out band aids to keep the wheels ticking over. There's no point just topping up when we're going to be middle of the road anyway.

I can handle Smith's mistakes out there and his teething problems. I can't handle Quincey's. Why? Because Smith is a rookie with potential who is learning the ropes. He's got talent and he's worth pumping the time and the games into. Quincey just isn't. Replace Smith's name with Nyquist or Tatar and Quincey with Cleary or Samuelsson and it's the same point.

I'm sitting there watching Brunner fall down from the slightest touch and I'm giving him a free pass. Cleary does the same thing and I rage.

When I saw Nyquist get called up, it added a whole new element to watching the Dallas game - excitement. If we were throwing a team with a few rookies and veterans like Dats and Hank but we getting it handed to us, that's fine. But what about that game when it all clicks and we play some great hockey? An exciting brand of skilled hockey because our young, skilled guys have got it right?

I can go into every game of a 48 game season knowing the odds are that we'll lose because we've got a young team with potential and talent. I can get excited by the prospect that it will be this game that the team clicks. And if we lose, so be it. But we'd be making progress for the future and not pushing ourselves into stagnation.

Although, notice I did say a 48 game season..

Agreed. The thing I'm most excited about with the game against Minnesota is to see THEIR team, since I haven't seen them this year, and it's gonna be exciting to see what Granlund, and maybe an NHL-debuting Brodin can accomplish. Meanwhile we sent Nyquist down without properly giving him a chance.

I'm excited about Smith, but as much as he's a good prospect, in a "prospect team", he'd be quite average; that tells quite a bit about how I feel watching our dear Wings at the moment. I can't wait until Cleary, Samuelssons and Bert's contracts end. They all have moments where they shine and I rejoice, but those moments are every ten games or so.

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

Rather than quote the whole thing, waiting on that isn't realistic is what most people are trying to point out JMan.

I am very glad they didn't land Rick Nash, but seriously what parts do we have that are the same as Anisimov, Dubie, and Erixon? This helluva and offer stuff is pretty funny. I am not certain of the offer but I think a lot of people around here don't know much about the former Rags players in that trade.

I am not into the sky is falling but what you just did is me saying well the fix is just bringing in Perry and Getzlaf and they we trade the prospects for two good defenseman on good contract. It is a dream scenario and it didn't happen. You're graded on what happens and he is going to take a hit this year. Just like he will survive because of the fantastic job he has done over the years not that anyone of his detractors wants to hear that.

The truth is elite players or really even all-star to borderline that category caliber players rarely hit free agency anymore. That was an important part of the last CBA and the term limits as well for me. But we will live with the next decade of these mega contracts and that situation. It is hard to fix your team not from within, by the way Holland realized this from day one and has loaded the system and stopped giving away tons of picks. Now he might not play them like everyone wants, but make no mistake this is as deep as our prospect pool has been since he was the head scout and got promoted because of his fantastic work there.

You cannot paint yourself into just the free agent corner. It might work, but you always overpay there and it is uncertain. And believing a division rival will give you the players you want is an equally bad idea. Those are not acceptable excuses if he truly wanted to use them. I don't think he is close to losing his job and there isn't a single GM I would rather have. He does need to tweak the way he has been operating but I still have all the faith in the world in KH and think that he will. More importantly for those that still do he is absolutely no jeopardy of losing his job unless he actually makes the choice to go upstairs into a different role. It will be interesting to see what he does.

 

[JmanWingsFan]

I am very glad they didn't land Rick Nash, but seriously what parts do we have that are the same as Anisimov, Dubie, and Erixon? This helluva and offer stuff is pretty funny. I am not certain of the offer but I think a lot of people around here don't know much about the former Rags players in that trade.

A package of Franzen, Nyquist, Pulkinnen, Kindl, Andersson, heck throw in Quincey and a draft pick would have beaten the living daylights out of Anisimov, Dubie, and Erixon. You get a perennial threat for 25-30 goals in Franzen, a legit NHL ready top 6er in Nyquist, the prospect Howson tried to swindle us out of for Pahlsson last year that apparently he's been coveting, a former 1st rounder Dman in Kindl, and a solid bottom 6 center in Andersson. It was totally doable. For whatever reason, if Howson has to trade anything to Detroit, it would have been for a king's ransom, even for a depth forward. Anisimov is young, yes, but let's not kid ourselves, he's a third line center at best who could play on the 2nd line and put up some points. Dubinsky is 27 and has only put up 20+ goals twice. Franzen and Nyquist is better quality than Dubinsky and Anisimov. From there, you could just beat the rest of the deal with quantity that has slightly lesser quality.

I am not into the sky is falling but what you just did is me saying well the fix is just bringing in Perry and Getzlaf and they we trade the prospects for two good defenseman on good contract. It is a dream scenario and it didn't happen. You're graded on what happens and he is going to take a hit this year. Just like he will survive because of the fantastic job he has done over the years not that anyone of his detractors wants to hear that.

That's fine and all. People just act like he didn't have a plan and did all of these things just to tick him off. I'm just wondering out loud what would have happened if he had gotten his men as he should have. Let's not kid ourselves, he made an effort that should have gotten at least one of those players. Had he got both, we'd probably be planning the parade already.

The truth is elite players or really even all-star to borderline that category caliber players rarely hit free agency anymore.

Coincidentally, there were two, one on the FA market, and one on the trade block that at the time we had a demand for. I think that's a legitimate risk to take.

 

[Brick Top]

A package of Franzen, Nyquist, Pulkinnen, Kindl, Andersson, heck throw in Quincey and a draft pick would have beaten the living daylights out of Anisimov, Dubie, and Erixon. You get a perennial threat for 25-30 goals in Franzen, a legit NHL ready top 6er in Nyquist, the prospect Howson tried to swindle us out of for Pahlsson last year that apparently he's been coveting, a former 1st rounder Dman in Kindl, and a solid bottom 6 center in Andersson. It was totally doable. For whatever reason, if Howson has to trade anything to Detroit, it would have been for a king's ransom, even for a depth forward. Anisimov is young, yes, but let's not kid ourselves, he's a third line center at best who could play on the 2nd line and put up some points. Dubinsky is 27 and has only put up 20+ goals twice. Franzen and Nyquist is better quality than Dubinsky and Anisimov. From there, you could just beat the rest of the deal with quantity that has slightly lesser quality.

You're assuming that the Rangers wouldn't have upped their offer if Howson went to them and said he was leaning towards the offer from the Wings- I think the Rangers would have been willing to re-shuffle their offer and include more of their good prospects and young guys. And do we know for sure what Holland actually offered, other than the "helluva offer" rumored to include Franzen or Flip? Given his recent reluctance to make trades of any significance, I doubt he'd be willing to offer the package you tossed out.

And I'm not so sure that Franzen and Gus is a superior duo to Dubinsky and AA. Through no fault of his own, Gus hasn't had the chance to prove himself at the NHL level, and Franzen is signed for a LONG time- can't think that every team would want that term, knowing his production will decline. Dubi and AA are both versatile guys, good on both ends, Dubi is a great candidate to rebound with the Jackets and AA is only 24 yrs old. Granted, I liked both of those guys from their Rangers days and would have loved to see either wearing the Winged Wheel.