Cleary won't bounce back because he will need another surgery two weeks after the season starts. He just can't stay healthy any more. His style of play is very physically demanding and unfortunately age has caught up to him.
If that's the case then yeah our offense will probably be worse. It depends on how Brunner and Nyquist do. I'm a huge believer in Nyquist.
I don't think they are good. I already mentioned smith.
White is incredibly average along with the rest of the wings defense.
Now kindl is a good PMD.......absolutely laughable. You either have low standards or no standards at all.
Wings are adding rejects to the roster like CC.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WingedWheel1987
Cleary won't bounce back because he will need another surgery two weeks after the season starts. He just can't stay healthy any more. His style of play is very physically demanding and unfortunately age has caught up to him.
I guess you could just start posting this since you can see the future and already know everything about how this team turns out.
I mean honestly is it actually possible for everyone to fail as you are predicting? Won't one or two guys disappoint and one or two guys surprise? I understand a lot of us are too plucky at times with what is going on this off-season but come on. Cleary is healthy right now, he does have a history of injury but why should I expect it. He finally says he is healthy, like when Bert said the finally fixed his back a couple years back. Cleary has had knee problems him having no discomfort is kind of a positive sign. Do you think every D-man will fail or a couple will while a couple others rise to the occassion?
That sounds about right. Wings in their prime post lockout had two with rafi and lidstrom and kronwall still maturing. Now the wings have one with kronwall and smith still a ways off. I have said this before but not letting smith play last year was awful. I would feel way better about the defense if smith had been able to play last year.
I guess you could just start posting this since you can see the future and already know everything about how this team turns out.
I mean honestly is it actually possible for everyone to fail as you are predicting? Won't one or two guys disappoint and one or two guys surprise? I understand a lot of us are too plucky at times with what is going on this off-season but come on. Cleary is healthy right now, he does have a history of injury but why should I expect it. He finally says he is healthy, like when Bert said the finally fixed his back a couple years back. Cleary has had knee problems him having no discomfort is kind of a positive sign. Do you think every D-man will fail or a couple will while a couple others rise to the occassion?
I think the grand sum of over achieving and under achieving will end up being in the negative. As in the bad will outweigh the good.
Why shouldn't I expect a 34 year old player who has a history of always being hurt to not get hurt next season? It's not like he gets flukey injuries. He gets hurt because his physical style of play wears down his body.
That sounds about right. Wings in their prime post lockout had two with rafi and lidstrom and kronwall still maturing. Now the wings have one with kronwall and smith still a ways off. I have said this before but not letting smith play last year was awful. I would feel way better about the defense if smith had been able to play last year.
So when Kronwall scored over 50 points, he still wasn't a good PMD?
Or how about this one? Was Vladimir Konstantinov a good PMD?
He addressed depth needs and made homerun swings for the top free agents... Came close, but did not get them. The reason I give a C and not lower is because Holland did not panic after losing out on Suter/Parise and sign any long term bad contracts to compensate. It's the lack of crippling contracts which makes me give him a pass. The worst contract I see is Samuelsson, and that is only 2 years.
He still has cap space and assets to make a deal later in the season but in the meantime I look forward to seeing which of our depth signings and promotions make themselves irreplaceable.
Last edited by RabbinsDuck: 09-16-2012 at 02:50 AM.
Realistically, if Kenny had snagged Suter, we'd all be saying A.
The only moves I find questionable are Sammy (but, you can mediate that with the thought that he's Hudler's replacement) and signing Bert for two more before the season ended last year. Monster and TooToo are good signings, but not enough to be a centerpiece of the off season. Colaiacovo is a legitimate "best of the rest" signing.
The problem is that now we have 3 legitimate top 6 forwards (with Franzen being a legitimate one only if he feels like showing up that day) and 1 top 4 defenceman. Someone needs to step up and fill those remaining spots from a questionable pool of borderline past it vets and a few promising young 'uns.
I'd give the owner, Holland, & mgmt team a B+ for effort, but rate what they accomplished a C. Soetimes you put a ton of effort w/o seeing any benefits
Which school did you attend where the only way to earn a failing grade was to answer every question incorrectly?
Eh, I'm not sure about that comparison. If I'm grading an NHL GM, I'm grading him strictly relative to his peers. So a guy who gets a bunch wrong (and who would maybe get an F in 'school'), should be graded higher than a guy who gets significantly more wrong. And, despite some peoples' rush to give an F grade, this off-season could have been significantly worse, imo. I'm considering long-term implications here, not just short-term (i.e. this coming season, whenever it may be). Again, disappointing off-season, but this is the salary-cap era, and parity has arrived. Some people will seemingly take longer to adjust than others.
A "C" is average. In other words "did not improve, but did not get worse". Yes, Lidstrom retired. But everyone has been expecting that the past few years; Holland should have been more prepared instead of having to bet on the one UFA defenseman who could do something about the gap left by Nick.
I'm grading the off-season, as the title implies, not Holland's work on replacing Lidstrom over the past 2-3 years.
Eh, I'm not sure about that comparison. If I'm grading an NHL GM, I'm grading him strictly relative to his peers. So a guy who gets a bunch wrong (and who would maybe get an F in 'school'), should be graded higher than a guy who gets significantly more wrong. And, despite some peoples' rush to give an F grade, this off-season could have been significantly worse, imo. I'm considering long-term implications here, not just short-term (i.e. this coming season, whenever it may be). Again, disappointing off-season, but this is the salary-cap era, and parity has arrived. Some people will seemingly take longer to adjust than others.
What did Bowman do in Chicago?
Oh, he signed Roszival, which led to calls for Holland's firing.
I'm grading Holland on what needed to be done.
That's why he gets an F.
He failed to address any major needs, despite having the ability to trade assets and more cap space than ever.
And to make it worse, he blocked the development path for our youngsters by signing mediocre fill-ins who you know Babcock will play.
i still wait for the QUALITY replacements for rafalski, hossa, lidstrom, hudler and defense god draper.
our replacements so far are fringe or garbage player and themselfs.
i add helm as a part time draper.
but other then that kenny failed big time replacing this losses.
compared roster to only 4 years ago when we were on top of the game.
defense 4 years ago quality wise:
Nicklas Lidstrom +40
Brian Rafalski +27
Niklas Kronwall +25
Chris Chelios 12 +11
Brad Stuart 2 points +6 (only 9 games)
Andreas Lilja
other
Kyle Quincey
Jonathan Ericsson
defense now with +/-:
X for lidstrom (fail)
X for rafalski (fail)
White -stuart (uncertain due to be a lidstrom partner) +23
Kronwall -Kronwall (downgrade) -2
Ericsson - Lilja (upgrade) +16
other
Kyle Quincey +0 -minus a first pick
Kindl/Cola
so from our top4 was 2 players not replaced in 4 years of ufa market and one is -2 +/- wise. so we lack of 3 top4 defense man.
offensive department the last 4 years.
we lost hossa (replacement none), hudler (replacement none), sammy (sammy), bert (bert), draper (replacement none - lets wait for helms development).
from 5 core player we replaced 2 with themself and 3 not at all.
the only thing we added are bottom 6 player. i have to admit some of them are not that bad. i like miller, eaves and maybe tootoo in that department.
so to me the first round exits are no coincidence.
I'm grading Holland on what needed to be done.
That's why he gets an F.
He failed to address any major needs, despite having the ability to trade assets and more cap space than ever.
And to make it worse, he blocked the development path for our youngsters by signing mediocre fill-ins who you know Babcock will play.
I know nobody is ever going to convince you off your positions and I gave him a D+ so I am far from happy.
But no needs?
I am sorry a backup goalie that is actually capable of the job should grab 25-30 starts, keeps Howard fresh and actually wins unlike Conklin. Is it a huge signing? No, it is nothing like the top 6 winger and #1 D-man. But it does fill a need and in my opinion, a major need if you're going to need every game to make the playoffs.
I know nobody is ever going to convince you off your positions and I gave him a D+ so I am far from happy.
But no needs?
I am sorry a backup goalie that is actually capable of the job should grab 25-30 starts, keeps Howard fresh and actually wins unlike Conklin. Is it a huge signing? No, it is nothing like the top 6 winger and #1 D-man. But it does fill a need and in my opinion, a major need if you're going to need every game to make the playoffs.
He plugged a coupled cracks in the ship, but ignored the giant gaping holes. They are irrelevant additions in the grand scheme of things. A backup goalie is not going to turn the Wings into contenders. A 4th line grinder wont turn the Wings into contenders. A 35 year old Mikael Samuelsson.........you get the picture. He fixed the easy problems, but failed to address the hard ones. I gave him a D aswell, but i dont disagree with Bob's logic. Keep in mind that needing Suter and Parise were Holland's fault. His inactivity during the past three off seasons forced him to hit a home run. We all remember the excuses and press quotes from Holland. "We like our team", "The price was too high"...........blahh blahh blahh.
Imagine if the Wings had signed Ehrhoff and let Smith play all of last year. How much better would our defense look right now? Still would have had plenty of money to lowball Suter and Parise too.
He plugged a coupled cracks in the ship, but ignored the giant gaping holes. They are irrelevant additions in the grand scheme of things. A backup goalie is not going to turn the Wings into contenders. A 4th line grinder wont turn the Wings into contenders. A 35 year old Mikael Samuelsson.........you get the picture. He fixed the easy problems, but failed to address the hard ones. I gave him a D aswell, but i dont disagree with Bob's logic.
Talking about Samuelsson, when do forwards tend to "peak," on average? It would be interesting to see a bell curve plotted out sometime measuring the career progression of different forwards in relationship to their age. Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Iginla, Selanne, and Martin St. Louis all seem to have had their best year sometime between 26 and 31, but who knows how the rest of their career will turn out. And some players seem to "age more gracefully" than others, maintaining a level of performance close to their peak performance for years after they pass their prime...
Talking about Samuelsson, when do forwards tend to "peak," on average? It would be interesting to see a bell curve plotted out sometime measuring the career progression of different forwards in relationship to their age. Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Iginla, Selanne, and Martin St. Louis all seem to have had their best year sometime between 26 and 31, but who knows how the rest of their career will turn out. And some players seem to "age more gracefully" than others, maintaining a level of performance close to their peak performance for years after they pass their prime...
Players with incredibly high hockey IQ generally tend to produce for a longer period of time in my opinion. I fully expect Z and Dats to be productive into their mid to late 30's.
Sammy.........ehhh he is a complimentary player who's career high is 50ish points. Assuming Sammy does "age gracefully", he will probably be a 40 point player, which doesnt really strike me as a bargain at 3.3 million dollars.(especially with the cap going down)
Imagine if the Wings had signed Ehrhoff and let Smith play all of last year. How much better would our defense look right now? Still would have had plenty of money to lowball Suter and Parise too.
Ehroff never hit free agency so I don't see how that's Holland's fault. He signed White who worked out great. There really hasn't been much available there the last couple years. Trading on the other hand, he could've done something there.
Ehroff never hit free agency so I don't see how that's Holland's fault. He signed White who worked out great. There really hasn't been much available there the last couple years. Trading on the other hand, he could've done something there.
I think four different teams traded for his rights. Holland just couldn't afford to give up that 99th round pick. Twenty years from now, that pick might have been a 4th line grinder on the Wings.
