Detroit Redwings Downfall

[FriendlyGhost92]

5 vs 6 years, hardly a difference. Yzerman. Excellent player, one of many not so effective in management.

Yeah bud, Tampa was nothing until JBB came over and completely transformed them.

 

[FriendlyGhost92]

Leafs when they first started their current playoff streak.

I'm sure everybody wants to emulate the Leafs...

 

[Bank Shot]

That’s cool, happy for you.

Try and find rankings that don’t have them as having one of the top prospect pools in the MHL right now.

I’ll wait.

And it counts for what?

I remember when Matha, and Frk, and Veleno, and Smith, and on and on were all the next big thing. Nyquist was the next Zetterberg. The system is always stacked in Detroit.

It never seems to pan out as advertised though.

The Wings have a lot of prospects, but I dont see any that look like franchise altering players.

 

[Dotter]

I believe your rebuild hasn’t started until you get an elite center or elite dman. Centers are almost exclusively found in the top 3, usually top 1-2. Elite dmen can be found elsewhere, as they did with Seider. Larkin-Danielson-Kulich could be an excellent center by committee, but Larkin isn’t that game breaking talent, and by the time the kids are ready, Larkin may be falling off.

The only way they could have gotten the elite C is to tank hard or get lottery luck. Maybe if they'd not gone for Debrincat and then tanked hard in 2023 and gotten one of the big 3, or Smith, but they’d have needed to be much, much worse give. How poor Chicago, SJ, Anaheim, CBJ, and MTL were that year.

Look at this list of top 20 centers in the NHL published in August and tell me if you agree.

NHL Top Players: Top 20 Centers | NHL.com

NHL Network reveals best of current crop

www.nhl.com

If you do at least somewhat agree with that list, then look over where a majority of those centers were drafted.

For example:

• Aho (2nd round)
• Hintz (2nd round)
• Suzuki (13th overall)
• Thomas (20th overall)
• Zibanejad (6th overall)
• Larkin (15th overall)
• JT Miller (15th)
• Elias Pettersson (3rd round)
• Point (3rd round)

That's a pretty good list from mid 1st to 3rd round. Less than half of the top 20 were top 3.

 

[Oneiro]

I think it's more that their young players are growing in fits and spurts, at different paces all over the lineup and the only consistent guys around them are Larkin and DeBrincat.

It's not pretty but they really remind me of Chicago's base before Kane and Toews. I think accumulating a lot of these quality depth guys and easing Larkin and Cat to lesser roles over time will pay off when they get 2 lights out stars up front to add to Raymond. And maybe MBN or someone like that will surprise.

I don't think it's nearly as dire as people make it out to be. I just think their veteran depth is identity-less, soft and not all too complementary inside of a growth process. And they need those truly elite, top 25 player in the game forwards.

As a hypothetical, if McDavid hit UFA and signed there, I think a cup would be inevitable with what's coming from the pipeline.

 

[Stive Morgan]

Don’t see much wrong that he has done unless you blame Yzerman for lottery luck.

Yes, the Walman trade was bad- I can’t imagine Grier would have passed Walman on waivers given the state of the defense- we’ve since added Ceci and Liljigren as well. Maybe going for Debrincat was the wrong timing, but they didn’t give up too much and got a young first line winger who grew up rooting for them. He’s hit on most of his early picks- Seider, Raymond, Edvinsson, ASP, Danielson, Cossa, and MBN have proven good, or look like very good picks. Kasper looks solid too.

I believe your rebuild hasn’t started until you get an elite center or elite dman. Centers are almost exclusively found in the top 3, usually top 1-2. Elite dmen can be found elsewhere, as they did with Seider. Larkin-Danielson-Kulich could be an excellent center by committee, but Larkin isn’t that game breaking talent, and by the time the kids are ready, Larkin may be falling off.

The only way they could have gotten the elite C is to tank hard or get lottery luck. Maybe if they'd not gone for Debrincat and then tanked hard in 2023 and gotten one of the big 3, or Smith, but they’d have needed to be much, much worse give. How poor Chicago, SJ, Anaheim, CBJ, and MTL were that year.

That's how I've felt, too. Yzerman has made the right moves in my eyes. All I really see is bad luck. I think a weak 2018 Draft really screwed up a lot of teams' rebuilds (namely Detroit and Montreal)

 

[Michael Brand Eggs]

Two top pairing defensemen is a pretty good start.

 

[Hockeyfan2390]

you dont even make sense . i already explained the task isnt to get back into playoffs as quickly as possible at the cost of greater long term success . the task is to create a depth chart today that will lead to long term success and as many chances at a championship as possible which is best for redwing fans . but you continue to have to cry about missing playoffs 6 years when that has ZILCH to do with yzerman , that was the mess he inherited . but your in a rush to have bragging rights so you can get your motor mouth running and announce how smart and wonderful you are by being a fan of a good team . and right off the bat when somebody is whining about grammar at a hockey forum you know theyve got issues . then theres your babbling about prospects whivch are obviously needed to build a team being untested / unproven as if everey great hockey player hasnt been an untested prospect , and like its impossible for a teams fans to judge how good a prospect might become by their performances in lesser leagues , lol . just pack it up

Didn’t read, lol.

Again, if you're going to actually attempt to have a discussion, you might want to start by demonstrating a better grasp of basic grammatical skills.

I’m not combing through another jumbled mess that looks like it was written by an Yzerman fanboy 24 Miller Lites deep.

 

[nbwingsfan]

And it counts for what?

I remember when Matha, and Frk, and Veleno, and Smith, and on and on were all the next big thing. Nyquist was the next Zetterberg. The system is always stacked in Detroit.

It never seems to pan out as advertised though.

The Wings have a lot of prospects, but I dont see any that look like franchise altering players.

Can you show me when the Wings had a top 3 rated prospect pool before now…?

 

[Peasy]

Look at this list of top 20 centers in the NHL published in August and tell me if you agree.

NHL Top Players: Top 20 Centers | NHL.com

NHL Network reveals best of current crop

www.nhl.com

If you do at least somewhat agree with that list, then look over where a majority of those centers were drafted.

For example:

• Aho (2nd round)
• Hintz (2nd round)
• Suzuki (13th overall)
• Thomas (20th overall)
• Zibanejad (6th overall)
• Larkin (15th overall)
• JT Miller (15th)
• Elias Pettersson (3rd round)
• Point (3rd round)

That's a pretty good list from mid 1st to 3rd round. Less than half of the top 20 were top 3.

Youre lookin at the wrong Elias Pettersson. The C was taken 5th overall.

 

[Negan4Coach]

The Cult of Yzerman is finish???

 

[matt trick]

Look at this list of top 20 centers in the NHL published in August and tell me if you agree.

NHL Top Players: Top 20 Centers | NHL.com

NHL Network reveals best of current crop

www.nhl.com

If you do at least somewhat agree with that list, then look over where a majority of those centers were drafted.

For example:

• Aho (2nd round)
• Hintz (2nd round)
• Suzuki (13th overall)
• Thomas (20th overall)
• Zibanejad (6th overall)
• Larkin (15th overall)
• JT Miller (15th)
• Elias Pettersson (3rd round)
• Point (3rd round)

That's a pretty good list from mid 1st to 3rd round. Less than half of the top 20 were top 3.

Not saying you can’t get a good center outside the top 3-my sharks got 1b guys in Couture and Hertl outside the top 5, but an elite center?

If I wanted to win a cup in the next 5-10 years, here’s the centers I’d want:

1st overall: McDavid, McKinnon, Matthews, Hughes, Hischier, Bedard, Celebrini
2nd overall: Barkov, Carlsson, Eichel
3rd overall: Fantilli, Stuzle

Everyone else: Petterson (5th overall), Aho (2nd round), Point (3rd round, for the next couple years), and of course, if you count him Draisaitl (4th). Hintz, Suzuki, Thomas, may end up better than a few of the young guys, but more than 2/3rds the league’s premier centers come from 1/2 overall. If you go back 20 years you’ll find Getzlaf, Bergeron, Backstrom, and Kopitar as franchise centers outside the top 3, but then you’ve also got Thornton, Malkin, Crosby, Staal, and Toews in the top 3.

Franchise dmen are similar but not quite to the degree- the #1 dmen drafted top 4 (didn’t want to exclude Makar) are Dahlin, Hedman, Doughty, Pietro, Heiskanen, and Makar. Half of those six still have good years ahead, but are aging out. Seider, Sanderson, Hughes, Dobson, Werenski, and Bouchard were high draft picks, but not the coveted top 4. Fox, Slavin, Forsling, Josi, Morrisey, McAvoy, Theodore, Faber, Anderson, and the aged out Karlsson, Burns, Letang, and Karlsson were drafted outside the tank zone.

If you have a franchise C and a franchise D/G you’re in business as long as the GM does a half decent job of surrounding those two with good talent. Detroit may be able to thrive with a Larkin-Danielson-Kaspar provided their young D and goalies perform well, but I’d argue nothing drives team success like a premier center, as much as I love Seider.

You can’t just say, no franchise center, blow it up, we give up, time to tank, but damn it’s tough to win without one.

 

[SirloinUB]

It’s remarkable that yzerman has chosen a slow, methodical, long term approach and yet this thread and others like it are filled with jabronis criticizing the short term results.

And yet despite that disconnect, over the short term, Yzerman has literally improved the team every single season up to this point. They had as many points as a playoff team last year and unfortunately lost out on a tie breaker. They were An empty net goal away from the playoffs.

It would seem that many people want yzerman to fail for whatever reason. Whatever the reason, continuous, year over year improvement while building a deep pipeline of prospects is the opposite of failure.

I see some similarities to the lions tbh. Holmes and Campbell went something like 4-18-1 over their first 23 games. They ignored the haters and stuck to their vision and now are a god damn wagon.

Football turns over faster than hockey so yzerman’s project is a slower burn but he’s absolutely on the right track.

 

[The411]

It’s remarkable that yzerman has chosen a slow, methodical, long term approach and yet this thread and others like it are filled with jabronis criticizing the short term results.

And yet despite that disconnect, over the short term, Yzerman has literally improved the team every single season up to this point. They had as many points as a playoff team last year and unfortunately lost out on a tie breaker. They were An empty net goal away from the playoffs.

It would seem that many people want yzerman to fail for whatever reason.

That’s not why people are being critical. Most teams try to do a slow methodical rebuild, but a decent part of a successful rebuild involves building a core that includes a franchise or better 1C, 1D, and Goalie and the surrounding them with high quality talent that fits with the other players.

No one hates Stevie Y, but this iteration idle going to struggle because it lacks a franchise 1C and it lacks a Goalie.

Prospects fail all the time or even prospects don’t live up to expectations.

So while SY drafted well he was unlucky in the sense that idle some of those drafts the good draft was a good player but not franchise or even high end player.

It also doesn’t help when you jettison a Jake Walman and 2nd round pick and Walman has 17pts in 21 games is a +7 and has a CF Rel of 8.1. This is still one of the most mystifying trades of the 10-15 years.

 

[Sentinel]

It’s remarkable that yzerman has chosen a slow, methodical, long term approach and yet this thread and others like it are filled with jabronis criticizing the short term results.

And yet despite that disconnect, over the short term, Yzerman has literally improved the team every single season up to this point. They had as many points as a playoff team last year and unfortunately lost out on a tie breaker. They were An empty net goal away from the playoffs.

It would seem that many people want yzerman to fail for whatever reason. Whatever the reason, continuous, year over year improvement while building a deep pipeline of prospects is the opposite of failure.

I see some similarities to the lions tbh. Holmes and Campbell went something like 4-18-1 over their first 23 games. They ignored the haters and stuck to their vision and now are a god damn wagon.

Football turns over faster than hockey so yzerman’s project is a slower burn but he’s absolutely on the right track.

Literally NOBODY wants Yzerman to fail. But we want our team to make playoffs and become competitive again. "Slow, methodical, and long term" has an expiration date. And his steadfast refusal to fire underperforming coaches is particularly infuriating.

 

[nbwingsfan]

Literally NOBODY wants Yzerman to fail. But we want our team to make playoffs and become competitive again. "Slow, methodical, and long term" has an expiration date. And his steadfast refusal to fire underperforming coaches is particularly infuriating.

Lalonde, the Walman trade and not adding a single piece at the deadline knowing Larkin was out for a while were major blunders.

One can be fixed at any moment but for some reason he refuses to do it. I can’t comprehend why

 

[Our Lady Peace]

Not saying you can’t get a good center outside the top 3-my sharks got 1b guys in Couture and Hertl outside the top 5, but an elite center?

If I wanted to win a cup in the next 5-10 years, here’s the centers I’d want:

1st overall: McDavid, McKinnon, Matthews, Hughes, Hischier, Bedard, Celebrini
2nd overall: Barkov, Carlsson, Eichel
3rd overall: Fantilli, Stuzle

Everyone else: Petterson (5th overall), Aho (2nd round), Point (3rd round, for the next couple years), and of course, if you count him Draisaitl (4th). Hintz, Suzuki, Thomas, may end up better than a few of the young guys, but more than 2/3rds the league’s premier centers come from 1/2 overall. If you go back 20 years you’ll find Getzlaf, Bergeron, Backstrom, and Kopitar as franchise centers outside the top 3, but then you’ve also got Thornton, Malkin, Crosby, Staal, and Toews in the top 3.

Franchise dmen are similar but not quite to the degree- the #1 dmen drafted top 4 (didn’t want to exclude Makar) are Dahlin, Hedman, Doughty, Pietro, Heiskanen, and Makar. Half of those six still have good years ahead, but are aging out. Seider, Sanderson, Hughes, Dobson, Werenski, and Bouchard were high draft picks, but not the coveted top 4. Fox, Slavin, Forsling, Josi, Morrisey, McAvoy, Theodore, Faber, Anderson, and the aged out Karlsson, Burns, Letang, and Karlsson were drafted outside the tank zone.

If you have a franchise C and a franchise D/G you’re in business as long as the GM does a half decent job of surrounding those two with good talent. Detroit may be able to thrive with a Larkin-Danielson-Kaspar provided their young D and goalies perform well, but I’d argue nothing drives team success like a premier center, as much as I love Seider.

You can’t just say, no franchise center, blow it up, we give up, time to tank, but damn it’s tough to win without one.

Agree with you post and you're right about your final point, it's damn tough to win without an elite #1C. Detroit got screwed in the lottery when they officially bottomed out, and that year was where they could've drafted Stutzle and been set there

The question begs - does it come down to the luck of the draw on the "bottoming out" years to draft a elite #1C that only might be available in the top 3?

I do think that you have to have the perfect storm if you're going to be Boston/St. Louis/Vegas winning the cup. The following I think are part of the recipe:

Coaching (all-situations)
Selke-esque play from #1C
A brute #1D
A hot goalie previously capable of play as at least a 1A starter
A complete lineup full of depth that wins matchups (can usually be coached into a lot of guys)

The reality of Detroit losing spots in half the lotteries since 2017 when they were in the top 10 sucks and we've all accepted that

At this point, the drafting has shown great returns for those in the NHL thus far. The remaining top picks are looking up as well. Since these players need more time to develop than top 3 picks usually need, well have to wait and see if they're worth their draft spots. Detroit's cup window may not be for another 5-6 years if at that

 

[Golden_Jet]

Agree with you post and you're right about your final point, it's damn tough to win without an elite #1C. Detroit got screwed in the lottery when they officially bottomed out, and that year was where they could've drafted Stutzle and been set there

Yep Ottawa fell in every lottery as well, during the rebuild. Fell from 1 to 4 one year, like Detroit.

Also fell during the Stutzle year, That bumped Ottawa’s from second to fifth. Luckily they had SJ’s pick.

 

[Pavels Dog]

And it counts for what?

I remember when Matha, and Frk, and Veleno, and Smith, and on and on were all the next big thing. Nyquist was the next Zetterberg. The system is always stacked in Detroit.

It never seems to pan out as advertised though.

The Wings have a lot of prospects, but I dont see any that look like franchise altering players.

Can you write a list of franchise altering players? How many exist? Do all good teams have one?

And sure, Marty Frk hype was the same thing as excitement about Simon Edvinsson, Lucas Raymond and Nate Danielson. Sure. Extremely shrewd analysis.

 

[Dotter]

Not saying you can’t get a good center outside the top 3-my sharks got 1b guys in Couture and Hertl outside the top 5, but an elite center?

If I wanted to win a cup in the next 5-10 years, here’s the centers I’d want:

1st overall: McDavid, McKinnon, Matthews, Hughes, Hischier, Bedard, Celebrini
2nd overall: Barkov, Carlsson, Eichel
3rd overall: Fantilli, Stuzle

Everyone else: Petterson (5th overall), Aho (2nd round), Point (3rd round, for the next couple years), and of course, if you count him Draisaitl (4th). Hintz, Suzuki, Thomas, may end up better than a few of the young guys, but more than 2/3rds the league’s premier centers come from 1/2 overall. If you go back 20 years you’ll find Getzlaf, Bergeron, Backstrom, and Kopitar as franchise centers outside the top 3, but then you’ve also got Thornton, Malkin, Crosby, Staal, and Toews in the top 3.

Franchise dmen are similar but not quite to the degree- the #1 dmen drafted top 4 (didn’t want to exclude Makar) are Dahlin, Hedman, Doughty, Pietro, Heiskanen, and Makar. Half of those six still have good years ahead, but are aging out. Seider, Sanderson, Hughes, Dobson, Werenski, and Bouchard were high draft picks, but not the coveted top 4. Fox, Slavin, Forsling, Josi, Morrisey, McAvoy, Theodore, Faber, Anderson, and the aged out Karlsson, Burns, Letang, and Karlsson were drafted outside the tank zone.

If you have a franchise C and a franchise D/G you’re in business as long as the GM does a half decent job of surrounding those two with good talent. Detroit may be able to thrive with a Larkin-Danielson-Kaspar provided their young D and goalies perform well, but I’d argue nothing drives team success like a premier center, as much as I love Seider.

You can’t just say, no franchise center, blow it up, we give up, time to tank, but damn it’s tough to win without one.

Someone can correct me on this, but I do believe Yzerman is aware of this and even mentioned it in one of his pressers. I'm pretty sure he was really interested in Stutzle when they lost the lottery luck that year. No question Raymond has been a wonderful consolation prize.

Yzerman recently spoke out and said he was building through the draft and also mentioned he was building a PIA team to play against, I think he mentioned building something similar to Vegas as an example. I could be wrong tho-

Landing the McDavid's of the world is more difficult than winning the cup itself, and despite having McDavid on your team, there's no guarantee his team will win the cup. It seems more practical to win the cup with strong (none generational) depth and good contracts.

While an elite #1 center would be nice, it takes longer to develop defensemen and goalies. And it's not like Yzerman has avoided picking centers, his draft selection allowed him to pick Seider, Raymond, Edvinsson as BPA (best player available) in their respective drafts. We might learn that is true for both Kasper and Danielsson at some point as well.

When the time comes (when is the time?, not now apparently as prospects are still developing and dmen and goalies aren't near entering their prime) Yzerman can trade for a top centerman if one doesn't develop from the system. The chances of finding an Eichel or Forsberg trade is more likely than drafting your next Nathan MacKinnon. -- I mean could you imagine a Larkin and a Forsberg along with Raymond and another similar style scoring winger on the same team; having both Larkin/Forsberg for a smidge over one McDavid?

 

[Dotter]

It also doesn’t help when you jettison a Jake Walman and 2nd round pick and Walman has 17pts in 21 games is a +7 and has a CF Rel of 8.1. This is still one of the most mystifying trades of the 10-15 years.

Yzerman is known to have zero tolerance for bad apples. Pretty sure he was healthy scratched on his new team. Something went bad with him on the Wings... but all we have is speculation.

 

[matt trick]

Yzerman is known to have zero tolerance for bad apples. Pretty sure he was healthy scratched on his new team. Something went bad with him on the Wings... but all we have is speculation.

His scratch was punishment for missing a treatment. Based on Walkman’s comments and our best writers, it sounds like there was some misunderstanding on expectations for the treatment. Maybe slightly unprofessional, but doesn’t seem like a bad apple. It’s also worth pointing out that he missed the subsequent 4-5 games with an injury so the ‘punishment’ doled out likely would have had the same result as no punishment.

Maybe he’s a bad apple, but the team seems to like him so I don’t think there’s anything to substantiate that in SJ. As a fan I love em

 

[Dotter]

His scratch was punishment for missing a treatment. Based on Walkman’s comments and our best writers, it sounds like there was some misunderstanding on expectations for the treatment. Maybe slightly unprofessional, but doesn’t seem like a bad apple. It’s also worth pointing out that he missed the subsequent 4-5 games with an injury so the ‘punishment’ doled out likely would have had the same result as no punishment.

Maybe he’s a bad apple, but the team seems to like him so I don’t think there’s anything to substantiate that in SJ. As a fan I love em

He was getting healthied' on the DRWs a lot towards the end of last season, when they really needed him most. Something went awry. There are plenty of rumors and speculation, but whatever happened, it doesn't seem good.

As far as Sharks healthied' him, we have his side of the story. That's all we have. As the ol' saying goes... "where there's smoke, there's fire."

 

[matt trick]

He was getting healthied' on the DRWs a lot towards the end of last season, when they really needed him most. Something went awry. There are plenty of rumors and speculation, but whatever happened, it doesn't seem good.

As far as Sharks healthied' him, we have his side of the story. That's all we have. As the ol' saying goes... "where there's smoke, there's fire."

I mean, there’s definitely fire. 22:30 a night and on pace for 50+ points and a positive player…on the sharks!

 

[matt trick]

Someone can correct me on this, but I do believe Yzerman is aware of this and even mentioned it in one of his pressers. I'm pretty sure he was really interested in Stutzle when they lost the lottery luck that year. No question Raymond has been a wonderful consolation prize.

Yzerman recently spoke out and said he was building through the draft and also mentioned he was building a PIA team to play against, I think he mentioned building something similar to Vegas as an example. I could be wrong tho-

Landing the McDavid's of the world is more difficult than winning the cup itself, and despite having McDavid on your team, there's no guarantee his team will win the cup. It seems more practical to win the cup with strong (none generational) depth and good contracts.

While an elite #1 center would be nice, it takes longer to develop defensemen and goalies. And it's not like Yzerman has avoided picking centers, his draft selection allowed him to pick Seider, Raymond, Edvinsson as BPA (best player available) in their respective drafts. We might learn that is true for both Kasper and Danielsson at some point as well.

When the time comes (when is the time?, not now apparently as prospects are still developing and dmen and goalies aren't near entering their prime) Yzerman can trade for a top centerman if one doesn't develop from the system. The chances of finding an Eichel or Forsberg trade is more likely than drafting your next Nathan MacKinnon. -- I mean could you imagine a Larkin and a Forsberg along with Raymond and another similar style scoring winger on the same team; having both Larkin/Forsberg for a smidge over one McDavid?

Think this is fair. If an elite center becomes available, I’d be pretty surprised if Minnesota, Detroit, and Montreal didn’t offer a fortune. Not many of those guys seem likely to ever be available- maybe Petterson? If they are though, I’d imagine it would be a bloodbath as those three teams are loaded with young assets.