Big Red Machine

I don’t know if it was just because it was a late game, or what, but I felt just as wiped out as the Wings looked.  I half paid attention in the second and third periods, and may have spent a little more time slinging “Super Troopers” quotes around the Twittersphere.  That kind of says something about the Wings’ level of play last night.

The Wings did look tired, especially in the first, though they still managed 47 shots.  Let’s not kid ourselves, they could have won it if Hiller hadn’t been playing lights out.

Quick recap from me today, as it’s a bit busy at work.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Pavel Datsyuk (pp; Rafalski)
Anaheim: Ryan Whitney (Getzlaf, Ryan); Kyle Chipchura (Eminger, Marchant); Bobby Ryan (Getzlaf, Perry)

This whole Fighting After A Clean, Hard Check thing is absurd. Ericsson had a great hipcheck, and Bodie decided he needed to be dealt with? McKenzie had a very good piece on this the other day.  It’s just stupid.  I also had an instant fear that he was going to break his hand or something again.

That Chipchura goal was a load of shit.  He batted the puck in, but it still counts?   Did they change the rule book again when we weren’t looking? The puck can bounce in off a leg or torso (or face, in Draper’s case), but Chipchura waved his hand at it.   You cannot hand pass in the offensive zone, so I fail to see any circumstance in which he took his hand off his stick to reach for the puck as legal.  Especially not when the explanation was that “the batting motion happened after the puck was in the net.”  George has video of the goal.

Ducks announcer described Pavel going end to end as “coast to coast like buttered toast.”  Yeah, I know.

Oh Pavel.  His first break away attempt ended with a great save by Hiller.  Tried it again later in the period and pops the water bottle.  Awesome.  He’s now tied at 15 with Homer and Bertuzzi for most goals.  That thought depresses me.  Moving on…

Flip had a great game, even though he couldn’t score.  7 shots on net, he had some of the best chances out of any forward.

Brad May’s going to be gone once everyone gets back.  He has to be.  If Babcock wants to carry toughness for the playoffs should we make it, he need look no further than guys like Eaves, Ericsson, Abdelkader who will be brought up for the postseason, and even Maltby.  They’ve shown more grit and willingness to stand up for themselves than May has all season.

I hate Corey Perry.  Just sayin’.

It’s Festivus!

And part of the traditions of celebrating Festivus is the “Airing of Grievances”–a declaration of how you’ve been disappointed by those in your life the past year. We may be only 30+ games into the season, but I’ve still got enough grievances to share…

Chris Osgood: You really let me down, Chris. I’ve been in your corner for a long time, defending your ability to actually be a number one goaltender, and then you go out for your first start in like, 40 games, and can’t even save the marshmallow-soft goals from 50 feet out. I know that’s typical for you, but you swore up and down during the summer that this season wouldn’t be like the last one, and that you’d be mentally ready this time around. Well sorry, Chris, but I didn’t see it in Sweden, and I haven’t seen it recently either, when Jimmy has been pushing you to improve your game. I thought after losing last season you would come out on fire, ready to prove your critics wrong once and for all, and it’s sorely disappointing to see otherwise.

Ville Leino: When Kenny went out and picked you up for pretty much nothing, we all crowed about how we got the Finnish Elite League MVP, laughing that we weren’t going to end up like the Dallas Stars, winners of the Fabian Brunnstrom sweepstakes, who has since failed spectacularly to live up to expectations. You were being lauded for your offensive capabilities, and in your first NHL game you scored on that beautiful spin-around backhand. I thought that you were well-suited to pick up some of the slack in terms of scoring. Last year you threatened to return for Finland if you didn’t get a spot with the big club, so when you did, I assumed that meant you were ready to roll. But you’ve clearly proven me wrong with your inability to finish, refusal to skate hard, and utter indifferent attitude.

Brett Lebda: You are not a forward, Brett, you are a defenseman. Please stop moving up with the offense on the rush.

Brad May: At the beginning of the season it was a novelty to have a pugilist back on the team, and you fought like 5 times in your first 5 games.  But now it’s just getting silly, with the most glaring example being that of the “fight” with Kry Barch of the Dallas Stars.  You’re supposed to “keep the flies off,” but I have to say that I haven’t seen much of that recently.

Kirk Maltby: Same goes with you, Malts.  Sometimes you look like a real NHLer again, like at the start of the season when you scored a shorty, had some chances, and got a few points.  Now you’re back to floating around and occasionally blocking lanes and shots.  You’ve given Detroit a lot, and they’ve given back by keeping you on the roster.  But you are slowly being replaced by Justin Abdelkader.  Please don’t overstay your welcome.

Todd Bertuzzi: You know, Todd, I honestly can’t find too much fault with you right now.  You’ve backchecked, and hustled, and now you’re finding chemistry with Pavel to regain that scoring touch.  So I just have one grievance with you, and that’s to please, for the love of all that is holy, stop with the spin-o-rama.  I understand that you scored with it earlier this year, but I know, deep down, you were just as surprised as I was to see that puck actually go in the net and not sailing wide.  But why don’t you just put that move away for a while–you don’t want to become Brian Campbell.

Jonathan Ericsson: It’s not entirely your fault, kid.  Part of it was the inevitable letdown from a strong playoff performance by a rookie defenseman to figuring out the grind of the regular season. But I was disappointed to see very little to none of the confidence and poise you exhibited in the post-season.

Pavel Datsyuk: Yeah, Pavel, you.  Until recently you simply haven’t looked like yourself out there.  I didn’t see the usual Pavel Datsyuk that we’ve been privilege to the last several years.  Where were the Datsyukian Dekes and the dangle dangle?  I’ll be honest, I was getting very close to being frustrated with you.  I know, I know, notoriously slow starter, you had some problems finding a good stick, Bertuzzi couldn’t finish on an open net, whatever.  I’m glad you seem to be getting things going now, there was a time when I was Not Very Happy with you.

Well, those are my grievances for the year so far.  Feel free to share yours in the comments.

The Red Wings also share some of their grievances with each other at the Freep, which are honestly pretty hilarious.

What about the “Feats of Strength”?  Well, news has arrived that Rafalski may not play due to the flu, so for the Red Wings, their feat will be trying to beat a largely complete Blackhawks club, with an insanely depleted roster.

As for the rest of us?  Well, our feat of strength will likely have to do with how long you can deal with abdominal pain from the dry heaves as you cling to the toilet bowl all afternoon.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Kris Newbury (Draper, Miller); Patrick Eave (sh; unassisted); Derek Meech (Abdelkader, Stuart)
Phoenix: Taylor Pyatt (Lang, Jovanovski); Radim Vrbata (Hanzal, Jovonovski)

Pluses
+ Eaves was named first star of the game, and rightly so.  He was everywhere.  Babcock’s talked about his underrated shot recently, and he showed off with it quite a few times.  His shorty was just perfect; a laser coming off the wing.
+ The first and most of the second periods were like old Red Wings hockey that we’re used to.  It’s unfortunate they sort of sat back after they had a 3-1 lead.
+ The Red Wings absolutely dominated Phoenix on draws, 21-12.  I know Phoenix is never very good on faceoffs, but still.  Winning draws means puck possession, which means Red Wings hockey.
+ Datsyuk looked more like himself.  He made a couple nifty dangles and takeaways, and looked all-around more enthusiastic than we’ve seen recently.  I don’t know if maybe he finally found a suitable stick, or whatever, but I hope he keeps it up on Thursday.
+ Beautiful toe-drag by Maltby.  Like Mick said, “there’re the old 50 goal hands.”
+ Overall it was nice to see the kids getting it done.  Again, Eaves was a force out there, and Meech got his first goal of the season, and the game winner on a nice shot.

This is really in the middle for me.  Kris Newbury had a very eventful first period, with 2 penalties sandwiching the first goal of the game.  Out of the box, he redirected a beautiful pass from Draper that missed Miller and connected with Newbury.  But both of his penalties, particularly the second for tripping, were pretty boneheaded.

Minuses
- I was feeling great about the way the first period was going, and then suddenly all of that optimism and excitement were just sucked out of me when Ericsson crumpled to the ice.  Ericsson went off the ice putting zero pressure on his left leg, and the thought of him being out long term just makes me want to throw up.  It’s getting completely insane.  But The Chief put it best:

“Name me one team in the NHL that could withstand that kind of carnage and still be only six points out of the conference lead.  You can’t because there can be only one and it’s the Wings.”

Word is Helm might be back for Thursday’s game.  And Filppula by the end of December.  Then J. Williams.  Slowly, the team will come back.  And the rest of the conference better get ready.
– And then ensuing Phoenix goal.  Which brings to mind an utterly bizarre rule that I both understand, yet don’t get at all.  So because the Coyotes had possession when Ericsson went down, the play doesn’t get blown dead.  I didn’t know this, but Petrella explained it’s to prevent guys from rolling around on the ice if they’re not actually injured.  That much, I understand.  But my opinion is, if a guy clearly doesn’t look like he’s faking it, then maybe the whistle should be blown, no?
– Still don’t really notice Leino.  At least, not unless he’s falling down, which is something he seems to do with alarming frequency.  I’ve seen him take a shot and fall down.  Scratching him didn’t really seem to help a whole lot.
– Tip for Tampa Bay: if you don’t want the Red Wings to score on you, just stay in the box to keep them on the power play.  No frigging joke, we couldn’t buy a power play goal at this point.

Lastly, I just need to rant about how much I dislike NHL GameCenter Live this year.  I understand the want to have HD quality feeds, but with all the video “upgrades” they pretty much bricked my laptop for the purpose of watching games.  There’s a lot more buffering than I remember last year, and they know there are issues with the Neulion plugin on Macs, yet there’s no solution.  It really infuriates me when I can’t watch the end of  a game because GameCenter decided to shit itself.  I’d love the option to play the video at a bitrate that works on my laptop so I can actually watch the game.  Which is, oddly enough, what I thought I was paying for.

Well that was vomit inducing.  I missed most of the first period running home from work, and it turned out I didn’t miss much at all.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit: Dan(ny) Cleary (Bertuzzi, Lidstrom [with a ridiculous pass])
Edmonton: Lubomir Visnovsky (unassisted); Robert Nilsson (Stone, Stortini); Patrick O’Sullivan (Jacques); Patrick O’Sullivan (Souray)

Pluses
+ Ken Holland with the Quote Of The Year.  Talking in the 2nd intermission about injured players he said, no friggin joke, “You can put your finger in the dyke.”  I know he meant it as a metaphor regarding a construction dyke, or a levee, in terms of picking up another player to temporarily fill a slot, but come on.  I almost fell off my couch laughing.  Yes, I’m capable of thinking like a 13 year old.
+ Another plus, it looks like Jonny Ericsson didn’t get hurt too bad when he fell awkwardly (looked like maybe he caught a rut?) and should play Saturday in New Jersey.
+ Didn’t really notice Kindl much, which I’m taking as a good thing because it means he didn’t make an egregious error along the way.  He played 14:18.

Minuses
- Oh, but where to we begin.  I don’t want to really consider the fact that Howard just might have some sort of Turco-type affliction when it comes to playing against the Oilers.  Two games this season and he’s let in 9 goals.  I’m overreacting,but next time, try Osgood, please?
– Zero puck luck, to channel my inner Babcock.  I didn’t see the first, but I heard it bounced in off Lebda.  And the third that pretty much rolled off Pavel’s blade and through Jimmy’s 5-hole.
– Speaking of Pavel, he had an off game.  But then again, so did everyone.  The general Twitter consensus seems to be that the Red Wings simply suck during the seasonly dads’ trip.

Short re-cap from me, because I’m tired of harping on about all the negatives.  And there weren’t very many pluses at all.

Play better this weekend, boys.  I’ll be at both games.

I unfortunately wasn’t able to watch the game live and had to DVR it.  Which led to me finding out the score ahead of time.  Oh well, at least I knew we won…

Goals were as follows:
Detroit – Nicklas Lidstrom (pp; Williams, Zetterberg); Draper (Maltby, Ericsson); Franzen (pp; Holmstrom, Datsyuk)
Chicago – Patrick Sharp (Versteeg, Seabrook); Kris Versteeg (pp; Sharp, Barker)

• Which, I have to say, made that 5-3 much less nerve-wracking.  At least a little.  Let’s just say that was a reaffirming moment for special teams.
• Kronwall had a solid game, as did Stuart.  According to the boxscore Kronner had 2 blocked shots, but he was great on that 5-3 PK.
• Ozzie looked pretty good, out on top of the crease and challenging shots.
• I really hope Ericsson isn’t hurt too badly.  Really unfortunate that he got hit in the same foot as in Sweden.
• I know it’s kind of a subjective stat, but Detroit had 18 giveaways?? Chicago had 16.
• Detroit got outshot 34-23.
• Loved seeing Bertuzzi and Williams buying into the Red Wings way and making an effort to backcheck and be defensive.
• That goal by Draper was a helluva shot.  Looked like it went straight through Huet.
• Great to see Lidstrom get point number 998.  Here’s to hoping he hits 1000 soon.
• Unsurprised to see Brad May get into a fight.  What was surprising was how articulate he was in the intermission interview.  He was clear, succinct, and most importantly, doesn’t mumble!  (I’m looking at you, Dan Cleary).

Let’s take a quick poll:

Is anyone concerned that the Red Wings have only won 2 out of 7 pre-season games thus far? And that they’ve dropped the last 5 consecutively?

I’ll be honest: it’s a little disturbing to see the same trend that plagued the Red Wings last year rear its head again. That trend was playing 20 to 40 minutes of a game, usually either starting slow or falling asleep in the middle, and cranking it up in the third.

The goaltending I’ve seen so far also hasn’t done a whole lot to inspire confidence. Howard has been what I expected–inconsistent and not extremely solid. Larsson looked to be fighting pucks a bit the two games I’ve seen him in. McCollum looked nervous in the one I saw. Pearce has yet to play, as far as I’m aware, which is a little odd since he hasn’t been cut, either. Greg Eno wrote a piece on the promise Osgood made to never have as season like 08-09 again, and to be better prepared this year. Oz isn’t looking awesome so far. He’s certainly not playing like he did just a few months ago during the Finals, but does anyone really expect that? He knows this is pre-season, and he’s not going to blow his groin out to make a save now. But I think he’ll be ready when the puck drops for real. I believe in Oz.

What concerns me more is the defense. I watched the game they played against the Leafs on Friday, and while they iced mostly regulars, it was not Red Wings defense that I saw. Kronwall’s played about 4 or 5 games, but he still looks like he’s figuring a few things out. As is Ericsson, but that’s more expected given that he’s had fewer years of experience. Meech and Lebda are absolutely killing me and I fear for the third pairing on the back end.

Babcock knows all this, but still he’snot freaking out–too much:

“You always wonder, ‘Geez, what’s going on?’ But you just watch and see how things go.”

And Kirk Maltby makes a blindingly obviously, yet still astute comment that basically sums up what they need to do:

“…we need to start getting into regular-season mode now and not wait until a month into the season.”

Yes it’s just the pre-season, but I’m still upset that we lost. The Red Wings had a fairly atrocious first period, but got it back together in the 2nd and 3rd. The finishing isn’t quite there yet.

Goals were as follows:
Detroit – Leino (Filppula, Ryno); Maltby (Abdelkader, Delmore)
New York – Prospal (pp; unassisted); Lisin (pp; Gaborik, Sanguinetti); Callahan (Grachev); Anisimov (empty net)

I was at MSG for the game last night, and did a decent amount of twittering. You can check my twitter page, and most of my recap will be from those same tweets.

• Pavel Datsyuk is stupifyingly amazing, even just watching him warm up.  The things he can do with the puck are really ridiculous.
• The Rangers scored stupidly early into the start of the game (1:34), but it was waved off due to a penalty by Ericsson. This pretty much set the tone for the rest of the game.
• PIMs were 18 to 10, Detroit, but I will tell you that I have a hard time recollecting New York even getting 5 penalties all game. Absolutely way too many trips to the box. I don’t care if the refs were calling ticky-tack penalties, they need to be aware of what’s being called and play accordingly.
• Marian Gaborik is a beast, and bulldozed his way around the Detroit net for Vinny Prospal’s goal, the first of the game.
• The PK was not good. The first two Rangers goals were on the power play.
• Along those lines, Larsson didn’t look incredible. I thought he was shaky and looked to be fighting the puck a bit.
• I also still cannot believe that I actually saw Dan Cloutier in a Red Wings uniform with my own eyes. He managed to get a holding penalty shortly after taking the net over, and also got into a bit of a scrum with Aaron Voros.
• Meech was absolutely brutal on defense. As was Andy Delmore–they don’t call him “Any Elmore” for no reason. I cringed every time I saw them out on the ice.
• The first period shots were 18-4, New York. That also led to 3 goals for the Rangers, and 1 for Detroit. Hey, at least Detroit had a better shot:goal ratio, right? Right…
• Matt Gilroy is the real deal, and I will be stunned if the Rangers do not sign him with the big club for this season. They look like a different team with a puck-moving defenseman. They finally have a quarterback for the power play.
• No, seriously. Dan Cloutier. He really played. He only faced 8 shots, but at least he saved them all. There were a few overly dramatic moments, but oh well.