So, Nik’s still out tomorrow. Nearing “week to week” status. Franzen’s still scheduled to return, though.
Also, Holmstrom is a game-time decision and Eaves is doubtful. But Miller’s supposed to play, so it’s not all bad.
You know, I’m finding it hard to work up the emotion any more. I watched the game on DVR after my dad and sister left and couldn’t restrain myself from finding out the score first. Knowing what happened, I still subjected myself to it. Interestingly enough, I didn’t feel angry. I watched this game with a kind of dark humor. This is a season out of a dark comedy.
Three more injuries, to forwards, no less, on the day the Wings trade a forward to clear up cap space. Defensemen passing pucks to the opposition like they’re Benedict Arnold in hockey pants. Pesky slow-moving pucks beguiling the honest efforts of sainted goalies to corral them with nobody around. Herds of white jerseys forming a hilariously ineffectual shield around one solitary part of the net, leaving the other open for easy exploitation. Speedy young forwards with their backs turned to a threat busily victimizing his goalie. New levels of fail reached in blowing three goal leads.
I still believe they’ll somehow manage to stumble drunkenly into the playoffs and at that point, anything’s possible. But whatever happens, this is going to be a regular season Wings fans are going to wincingly remember into their nursing home days. A season that will cause your arthritis to flair and your eyes to glass over. A season you’ll laugh incessantly about as they close the door on your padded room.
The Olympic Break cannot come soon enough. I only wish the team’s leaders weren’t going to Vancouver. Much like that guy who has to regain respect from everyone on an annual basis like no one else in the League apparently did last year, they seem to need a sabbatical. Maybe some kind of seminar on How To Do Their Jobs And Not Let Everybody Down. The guys that are working hard, the guys that aren’t disappointing on a nightly basis, are the guys who don’t need the break. The Lidstroms, Datsyuks, Zetterbergs, Rafalskis, Kronwalls, Stuarts, do. Fortunately, Stuart is getting a break, but the others aren’t. Maybe being around players who want to win desperately will inspire them and shame them into stepping it up into that extra level down the stretch for the Wings. Because they need it. This team needs it.
This comedy needs to stop. Can we switch from the low-budget indie dark comedy to a big-budget blow-em-up blockbuster? I want to see explosions, not be made to painfully laugh-cry.
Update (12:10 PM): St. James is all over this: she now says Tollefsen will be put on waivers today with the aim of sending him to Grand Rapids if he clears. If he gets taken, the Wings may not be too disappointed. They got rid of Leino like they had to do. Tollefsen was basically a bonus.
Meanwhile, where’s the rest of the Detroit print media? So far, Bruce MacLeod’s the only other writer to chime in. - Matt
Update (11:41 PM): Not sure if St. James is going off old news here, but if not, Franzen won’t be back today. - Matt
CBC’s Jeff Marek just tweeted that the Wings have traded Ville Leino to Philly for a fifth round pick in 2011 and defenseman Ole-Kristian Tollefsen ($600,000). No word from the Detroit media just yet (of course).
Whoa. Not exactly a high price. Ville may have better luck in Philly, with Laviolette something of a player’s coach, if I’m not mistaken.
This could mean Franzen’s back today, but more likely, he’s still scheduled for Tuesday. It’ll be interesting to see the answer on that question, though.
As for Tollefsen, I’m surprised the Wings took anything other than picks in return for Leino. He’s only played in 18 games for the Flyers. He has to be headed to Grand Rapids.
Keeping this real short because of lack of time this busy Saturday….
Yeah, the Kings have 74 points, a whopping nine more than the Wings have. That’s thanks to their 8 game winning streak, which has put them in 5th place. See what winning can do, Red Wings?
Get it? That’s a hint. Win this and keep on winning.
That is all.
A busy workweek is now over so here’s a bit of a mixer post.
… Kronwall’s out tomorrow, as you probably know by now. I don’t know if there’s an injury prognosis less encouraging than “day to day.” At least with Franzen’s 4-6 months, you have a goal. With Kronwall’s nebulous status, I find it really hard not to think “week to week.” I hope that feeling’s wrong because the Franzen return isn’t going to mean as much if Kronwall’s out and the defense can’t move the puck as well as it would with him active.
For the record, his saying he hopes to play Tuesday means nothing to me. Players rarely get it right.
… Kudos to Helene St. James for missing a pretty important bit of news like Franzen working in on the Zetterber/Datsyuk line. Yeah, that’s not important. Doesn’t mean he’s coming back tomorrow, but it does mean he’s on track.
… Howard’s starting again tomorrow. I dunno. I get that he gives the team the best chance of stopping the Kings’ win streak and that it’s true even if he’s tired. But the idea of his being tired doesn’t scare anybody? Point to the Break all you want, but if he’s tired now, his risk of injury due to fatigue is higher now. Even if a game or two wouldn’t get Osgood going, I wonder if there isn’t wisdom in resting Jimmy now. Why push it?
And before you start spouting off about how other goalies start even more than he does, stop. He’s a rookie playing more often than he ever has (even in GR, he rotated more than this) and facing more shots on a regular basis than he has before. Saying he’s not tired doesn’t make it so. There’s all kinds of evidence that he’s slipping, even if only slightly, and the most obvious culprit is fatigue.
… On Jimmy, it’s good to see that Ellen and I aren’t the only ones not worshiping at the Babcock Goalie Handling Altar.
… So, Kovalchuk’s a Devil now. Big deal (said simultaneously at face value and dismissively-can we move on now?). I said this on Twitter last night, but I’ll say it again here: my takeaway from that trade is that Patrice Cormier is now a piece of Thrasher property. Yes, that Patrice Cormier. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want that disgusting thug anywhere near any Wings’ prospects. Here’s hoping the Thrashers have a philosophy on his QMJHL suspension similar to that of the Devils: let him serve it, don’t put him in the AHL.
The Griffins play the Chicago Wolves six times a season currently. I don’t Tatar or someone else to have their brains scrambled by that pathetic excuse for a hockey player, a guy who shouldn’t play another game for that desecration of the privilege that is to play the greatest game on earth.
… How crazy is it that there’s a West Coast game and we don’t have to stay up until 1:00AM+ to watch it? What kind of miracle is it that the game starts at 4:00PM ET? I don’t remember that kind of scheduling quirk ever happening for the Wings. Can you tell that I’m more excited about that than I am worried that they’ll put on their usual afternoon showing?
… Lilja’s playing in Grand Rapids, in theory. Megan just tweeted that he dropped out of warm-ups early. If he does play, I’ll get some kind of report from her.
… Lastly, if you’re not checking out the H2H site, be sure do so.
False hope: Aren’t you glad you stayed up for that one? The effort was better, but it was still yet another depressing chapter in this depressing season. I had been thinking about calling it in towards the end of the second period. And then Pavel scored, providing false hope that they were staging a comeback. Oh well.
Jimmah again: Another night of Jimmy, as expected. I’ve grown numb on the issue, I’ve found. I feel Osgood should have started one of the two, like any backup in the League would have, but I’m finding it harder to work up emotion about it. Fact is, it won’t matter who’s in net if the Wings can put the puck between the posts and under the crossbar with greater regularity.
League BS: Why do they even bother reviewing these things any more? How can they justify what happened there? I’m not convinced there’s any way to do so.
Ericsson: You can log “message received” under his name. He had a heck of a game, I thought. At least relatively speaking. That’s what they need from him going forward.
Back in 9th: Yeah, the cutoff is 8th. You know that, right, Wings? You don’t have the luxury of losing any more. That goes double for games against teams as close to you in the standings as Anaheim is. Point to the 47 shots all you want. It’s not good enough. That’s all I have to say about this game. Not much, I know, but I was half-zombie during it from staying up for the Sharks game and parts of this one are fuzzy.
I’m very glad Saturday’s game is at 4:00.
Huge win: That goes without saying, but it’s not just about that they won. It’s how. They didn’t start out well and got down two goals pretty quickly. But they battled back to tie it up, and then didn’t look back as they went on to the win. Great to say. I hope it means something for what’s coming from them.
Jimmy: I thought he started out fairly shaky. His rebound control sucked on the Sharks’ two goals. You can blame the defense for the plays that led to those all you want, but the fact is Jimmy needs to have better rebound control. He seemed to gain confidence and become more steady as the game went on, though, which became important as the Sharks sought to come back.
Scary moment: How about Joe Thornton absolutely wrecking Jimmy on that drive to the net late in the game? And how about the classless Sharks fans booing the replay as Jimmy got up with Piet Van Zant’s help? Booing the penalty, I guess, but that was like textbook extreme goaltender interference. Classless move by Thornton there. I’m also annoyed that the Wings did absolutely nothing to slow him down coming in from center at a thousand miles per hour, but whatever. He still should have stopped.
Great pass: Rafalski’s fake sh0t pass on the Eaves goal was a thing of beauty. Nabokov was not in his best form all night, but he bit on that so hard his teeth probably hurt. Good to see Eaves’ excited reaction, too.
Great: Another Kronwall injury. How often has something minor turned into something major? Yeah. I won’t be anything but dreading the news until I see him back on the ice.
евтини мебелиSpeed: Also known as Darren Helm. His insane effort to negate that icing late in the game has me convinced he’s the fastest player in the League. We may never know, but I’d love to see him pitted against some of the other contenders.
Jump: Despite the events of the first period, I thought the Wings looked better over the course of the whole game than they have for a while. They had jump, they had drive and they didn’t seem to get down at any point. Ideally, they don’t go down two goals so quickly, but as long as they keep their chins up, I’m mostly happy.
Bum: As in Patrick Marleau is one. Nothing in particular brought that on. I just like trashing him for being pathetically heartless and utterly worthless in any sort of leadership capacity. Harsh? Maybe. But I have zero respect for the guy.
Tonight: The Wings need to follow that up with another strong effort tonight. They’re in much more direct competition with the Ducks for the bottom end of the playoff-bound standings and cannot afford to concede any points to them. They need to pull this out in regulation.
Here’s hoping they didn’t use up all their good game credits last night.
Be sure to check out the latest TOV, which features commentary from Kyle, Joe and Casey in addition to Chris and Brian. Good stuff.
(0)Slammed at work today so blogging much is out.
I will say: “huge game,” “hope they keep up their trend against the Sharks,” “need the points,” yada yada. “Time to kick it into gear,” and all that.
Mixed feelings: Since I secretly thought the Wings might get shellacked yesterday, I have some mixed feelings on this one. On the one hand, it sucks to lose to Pittsburgh. On the other, there is some cause for optimism in that they didn’t get blown out of the water.
Not all good, though: some of that optimism bleeds away when you look closer at the details, however. A 2-1 score is pretty good, right? Except when you consider how much goaltending had to do with that. The Wings’ defense again let Jimmy down and I can’t figure out why. Some excuses:
- Chemistry. With Kronwall back after so many games, the pairings and defensive flow has been disrupted and they’re currently working back to fluidity. I can see that, and I hope that’s all we’re dealing with here, but it’s still disconcerting. A top-level D-man’s return should be helpful, not detrimental, to the system.
- Opposition talent. Yeah, it explains yesterday, but it doesn’t explain Friday. You could expect to give up a higher than average number of shots to a team with the talent Pittsburgh has, but not Nashville. That’s more than disconcerting. It’s disturbing. With the talent the Wings have on the blueline, they shouldn’t be having any problems here.
- Something else. This is the second year in a row that team defense hasn’t been up to snuff. Injuries have played a huge part in that, but they don’t explain everything. There may be a coaching issue here. Don’t get too excited, Richter. I’m talking about McCrimmon. But we already knew that.
Point is, with the defense now healthy, there’s no excuse to be giving up this many shots. It’s one thing to not score as many goals with Franzen out, but the defense has got to be better.
All the positivity of holding the Pens to 1 regulation goal comes with that asterisk.
Jimmy: A strong performance and one without so much owed to last-second goalline stands and posts. It’s unfortunate he got so little support.
But there’s his shootout performance. World-class players, to be sure, but he still bit too easily and too early. Of course, it may not have mattered had the Wings’ forwards stepped it up and actually beaten MAF, but Jimmy looked outclassed there. I’m not going to fault him too much because he was the reason the Wings were in a position to get one point, let alone two, but…yeah. Let’s avoid shootouts going forward, shall we?
Huge week/trip: That’s all I have to say about that one. The rematch in March may be different. But before that, the Wings need to get through this week and this road trip. And by “get through” it, I mean “get some freaking points.” This past week was a disaster. They lucked out with Calgary’s tanking, but going forward, they need points. Very badly. However tough it might be to get them.
It’s time to do the tough thing, rather than the easy.
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