News Article: The rise, fall, and stalled rebuild of Ken Holland’s Red Wings

Frk It

Mo Seider Less Problems
Jul 27, 2010
36,201
14,683
Personally, I wouldn't expect us to find Crosby+Malkin or a Karlsson even if we draft #1 for the next decade. You do your best with what you have. Z and Dats were not Crosby and Malkin but we did alright with them. Lidstrom was special but we got beaten by teams that didn't have a Lidstrom. Kopitar isn't Crosby and Doughty isn't Lidstrom, but LA won a couple of Cups. And no one knows what will be succesful 5 years from now. Of course we need special players, but that's so beyond obvious that it's not worth discussing. We're not going to win with a bunch of 2nd liners. Rasmus Dahlin is an elite level talent, maybe he doesn't turn into something as good as Karlsson, but to say we wouldn't become a decent team with him added to the roster seems overly pessimistic. I'm sorry to say it, but we will not be drafting Dahlin+the next Crosby+the next Malkin within the next 5 or even 10 years. Even getting one prospect of that caliber is a massive longshot under the current lottery system. Why that would make you sit around thinking we're doomed to never compete I don't understand though.
I didn't exactly say we are doomed to never compete. I am pointing out why it is difficult, and what types of players you would need.

As I said in the thread I made regarding lottery odds and draft pick odds, re-building a team is maybe the hardest it's ever been in the NHL. I don't want everyone to think it's an impossible task, but I do want people to try and wrap their head around what we're stacked up against.

I think our current GM is too conservative to defy the odds with what he is tasked with. That's my opinion. I hope we get a more progressive GM that is willing to take risks, and then Holland sticks around to weigh in on the scouting and hiring front office personnel. I think that is the best thing for the future of this team.
 
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Redder Winger

Registered User
May 4, 2017
3,700
730
Randomly,
Say you have four bad years.
You pick 9th, 5th, 2nd and 7th..
over the last 4 years, here's who went there
Lias Anderssson
Patrick Laine
Noah Hanifin
Nicholaj Ehlers





Let's try it 5 years ago
Dumba
Landeskog
Niederreiter
Cowen


Let's try that again, but 10 years ago
Voracek
Staal
Price
Smid

So there are some hits and misses. But generally, if you're picking top 10 for 4 straight years, you should land 2-3 core or near core pieces.
Add that to the group we have in Larkin, Athanasiou, Mantha, and maybe some of the other prospects, and there's definitely the ability to build a competitive team.
 

Redder Winger

Registered User
May 4, 2017
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Nah, maybe at their peaks they were equals (even that's a stretch) but Crosby and malkin maintained a higher level of play for most of their careers

Close enough.
Point is, they were among the very best in league.

They weren't just good. They were great. They are Hall of Fame talents.
 

Flowah

Registered User
Nov 30, 2009
10,249
547
Pulks was not very good in the NHL. He was terrible at getting his shot off, and was not effective in any other facet of the game. He can only blame himself for not having an NHL spot right now.
Frk has shown more than just his shot too. I've been pleasantly surprised by his board battling and vision. He made that one pass to Daley in the game against the Canucks that was a goal 90% of the time. He just seems harder on the puck that Pulks ever did.
 

jkutswings

hot piss hockey
Jul 10, 2014
10,842
8,564
Close enough.
Point is, they were among the very best in league.

They weren't just good. They were great. They are Hall of Fame talents.
And while Pittsburgh definitely got the duo with the higher ceiling on offense, I'll take the offense/defense combination of Datsyuk and Zetterberg any day. Neither Crosby nor Malkin has the chops to backcheck and make your opponent look foolish when stealing the puck like Pavel did when at his best.

But potato, po-tah-toh. Two different types of a truly elite pair of draft picks.
 

Redder Winger

Registered User
May 4, 2017
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Frk has shown more than just his shot too. I've been pleasantly surprised by his board battling and vision. He made that one pass to Daley in the game against the Canucks that was a goal 90% of the time. He just seems harder on the puck that Pulks ever did.

He is harder on the puck.
He's also slower than Pulkinnen. And Pulkkinen is also a better passer.

You know Blashill.
And you know that barring injury, Frk's time in the lineup is about to end.

Adding Athanasiou means Frk probably gets stuck on line four with Glendening and Witkowski and Booth and whoever. And he won't fit there for very long at all.

Then Bertuzzi gets back and he'll play there and someone will have to go through waivers.
 

Redder Winger

Registered User
May 4, 2017
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And while Pittsburgh definitely got the duo with the higher ceiling on offense, I'll take the offense/defense combination of Datsyuk and Zetterberg any day. Neither Crosby nor Malkin has the chops to backcheck and make your opponent look foolish when stealing the puck like Pavel did when at his best.

But potato, po-tah-toh. Two different types of a truly elite pair of draft picks.

Until last year, I would have agreed with you. Crosby has manned up on defense. It's pretty hard not to respect the way he's honed his defensive game.

Overall, though, you are exactly right.
Datsyuk and Zetterberg might as well have been #1 overall picks.

Datsyuk will go down as one of the best players I ever saw - regardless of point totals.
Zetterberg might be just a little bit below - not so much on substance - but on style. Datsyuk's mind-bending flashy skills just made hockey so f***ing enjoyable for 15 years.
 

Henkka

Registered User
Jan 31, 2004
31,077
12,078
Tampere, Finland
Adding Athanasiou means Frk probably gets stuck on line four with Glendening and Witkowski and Booth and whoever. And he won't fit there for very long at all.

Then Bertuzzi gets back and he'll play there and someone will have to go through waivers.

Booth is the easy pick. Frk and Witkowski as spare forwards.
 

Reddwit

Registered User
Feb 4, 2016
7,696
3,418
He is harder on the puck.
He's also slower than Pulkinnen. And Pulkkinen is also a better passer.

You know Blashill.
And you know that barring injury, Frk's time in the lineup is about to end.

Adding Athanasiou means Frk probably gets stuck on line four with Glendening and Witkowski and Booth and whoever. And he won't fit there for very long at all.

Then Bertuzzi gets back and he'll play there and someone will have to go through waivers.

I wouldn't rule out Helm on the 4th line. Blashill surprisingly had him there for long stretches last season too.
 

TheMule93

On a mule rides the swindler
May 26, 2015
12,466
6,512
Ontario
Nyquist and Tatar problem is that they are both soooo slow. Neither can win a foot race, and Tatar has some of the worst edge work in nhl history, can't make a cut without falling over. Couple this with also being small and extremely weak - they're both useless on a rush, on a forcheck, and during a cycle. Nyquist used to have decent speed idk what happened. Neither have the iq to play without speed like Z does.

they can produce some offense because they have decent hands, vision, and a shot but they cant produce on their own. Theyre both Sam Gagner clones.
 
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