What the f— just happened? We’ll know more at 6

The Detroit Red Wings were able to trade Tomas Tatar to the Vegas Golden Knights for a 2018 1st-round pick, a 2019 2nd-rounder and a 2021 3rd-round pick, but the Red Wings did not trade Mike Green, did not trade Gustav Nyquist, did not trade Xavier Ouellet, and we’ll have to wait until this evening to find out why:

I’m not sure what exactly Holland will say, and I’m sure that whatever he does say won’t satisfy the fan base–which is fine and just in my opinion–but a Tweet told quite the tale about Green not being moved in an environment where Erik Karlsson (who didn’t move) and Ryan McDonagh (who did move) were available:

I don’t feel good about the fact that Green didn’t get moved. That was Kenny’s “one job,” and he didn’t get it done, in part because Green was hurt, in part because of the other players on the market and in part because he had a no-trade clause.

Nyquist remained because the Wings chose between #14 and #21…or may not have been offered a significant return…

And Ouellet will get his fresh start somewhere, somehow.

In the interim, you as a Red Wings fan have every right to be upset, and upset because it appears that there will be no regime change this spring:

Holland may not have saved his job by trading Tatar for those picks, but I just don’t get the feeling that Chris Ilitch is in the mood to go searching for a new GM–or a new coach–and I believe that we’re going to see the same people behind the bench and in the front office come next October.

Take that for what you will. I hope some answers will be forthcoming at 6, but until then, these are the guesses I can make.

Update:

 

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George Malik

My name is George Malik, and I'm the Malik Report's editor/blogger/poster. I have been blogging about the Red Wings since 2006, when MLive hired me to work their SlapShots blog, and I joined Kukla's Korner in 2011 as The Malik Report. I'm starting The Malik Report as a stand-alone site, hoping that having my readers fund the website is indeed the way to go to build a better community and create better content.

21 thoughts on “What the f— just happened? We’ll know more at 6”

  1. Because Kenny is an idiot?

    But yeah, fully expect a BS response about the injury, the injury. And then how view Green as a great potential mentor to guys like Hronek and Cholowski so we decided to try and keep him. No actual mention how we’ll make room for these kids. Nor how Dekeyser and Daley and Kronwall and Ericsson are also great mentors. Add Mike Green to that group and we have room for one more guy. Cool. Nice re-tool Kenny.

  2. I truly hope you are wrong George, I don’t know how much more of this sideshow I can deal with.

  4. 1) We talked to a lot of teams about a lot of players.
    2) We kicked a lot of tires.
    3) We were open for business. I was even using 2 different phones today. One time I accidentally dialed myself and almost traded for Quincey.
    4) I tried to move Green but who could have ever, ever predicted he would get injured. Like what can you do? It reminds me of when we signed Stephen Weiss. Like he would have been a dominant force, but he got injured. Same with Erik Cole. Like I know he had a couple of neck surgeries in the past, but c’mon, we trade for him and then he injures his neck again. Crazy right folks? Anyway, so yeah the injury just killed our plans for Green. But, now the door is open to bring him back. He loves Detroit. And we love him. He makes our 2nd PP unit better than the 1st unit with Kronwall.
    5) So that’s my last question on Green, can we move on to Tatar. I actually did good here. Let’s stay on this topic.
    6) Yeah we also looked at some other pieces but these things tend to happen at the draft…even though I had a chance to trade Nyquist at the draft and didn’t, thus allowing his NTC to kick in, but NTCs aren’t a problem, well maybe just in the case of Mike Green. But didn’t you hear, we want Green back.
    7) Anyway, we’re going to be open for business for the next year. Nyquist, Kronwall, Howard, Jensen, Witkowski will all be UFAs at this time next year. So a major chance to sell for some assets, well assuming Nyquist, Kronwall, and Howard are willing to waive their NTCs? Otherwise we think Jensen and Witkowski can get us the rights to Quincey.

  5. -I feel that Tatar was the player most teams wanted. Nyquist too soft especially in the playoffs. Maybe Nyquist balked.
    -XO no idea (not good for XO)
    -Green appeared to have caps and lightning as potential teams to go to. Caps did nothing all day, Lighting got a D man (ex Captain) from the Rangers that is far above Green. Green had the UFA to fall back on. Hopefully KH won’t resign him.
    Injury concept from HSJ and talk about Green being able to play vs NYR. Medical reports are available. Someone not being straight up.
    -One trade of arguably your best player, Duh, won’t save a GMs job, hopefully

    1. Washington added 2 depth d-men a week ago. I said it back then…they are done. They obviously didn’t have confidence using a couple of those young guys in a playoff run, so they added Kempny and Jerabek to likely battle for the 6/7 role. Some were adamant that they would make another big move on defense…but as expected, nothing else.

      I never believed the Toronto rumours. Already have guys like Zaitsev and Hainsey and Polak on the right side. They wanted to upgrade the left, hence the pursuit of McDonough.

      As for Yzerman, he played Kenny like a cheap fiddle. He led him on that they were interested in Green, likely to use in negotiation with the Rangers. Hey New York…I can balk at any moment because we really, really like Mike Green and I have a great relationship with Kenny to get this done. I’m guessing Kenny sat around waiting for Yzerman to call back.

      This is precisely why you trade Green far earlier. I mean look at Chicago. I know they have some cap issues, but they fell out of the race and look how they acted…Panik out for young Duclair. Kempny out for a 3rd (Green gets nothing!). Hartman out for a 1st, 4th, prospect. Just quietly getting things done. 2 of those 3 moves happened far earlier than today…

      1. “I said it back then…”
        “I never believed the Toronto [rumors].”
        “I’m guessing Kenny sat around waiting for Yzerman to call back.”

        Fatty,
        You need to not take yourself as seriously as you do. I wager you will live a more profound life.

  6. ESPN paywall:
    “However, that is quite the haul for what’s probably a third-line player. Detroit was also selling low, considering Tatar’s points per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 has gone down big time this season compared to last, from 1.85 to 1.01, while averaging essentially the same ice time.

    Overall, we can’t really find anything bad to say about this deal. The only thing we can criticize the Red Wings for is for not moving Green and Nyquist as well.”
    Wonder how much Holland and Yzerman talked,….

  7. “”. He is close to returning. The Red Wings have informed Green, 32, they would like to re-sign him in the off-season. ”

    WOW

    1. They will have the cap space now to resign Green. It is a good sign that he wants to stay in a place that is barely treading water….I wonder why that is?

    2. Again. Totally predictable. Losing Green for nothing is an embarassment for Holland. Signing him to an extension saves face. Just like when we held onto Helm for a playoff run. You knew right then that he would be getting a big extension rather than walk away for nothing as a UFA.

      1. “Again. Totally predictable.”

        sigh. someone needs to find just a smig of humility.

        Fatty,
        Can I ask you a very serious question?

        Do you have any friends?

        [I know you will say, yes, that is easily predictable too]

        1. Wow so this shit followed to the new site. Leave fatsavage alone, ignore him and simply stop replying to what he says. Geez its freaking high school and im ready to walk away again.

  8. TSN tossed a grenade out there during their broadcast in that they wondered aloud if Yzerman tying up Karlsson negotiations wasn’t a red herring all along to then not only get McDonagh, but hinder others from improving their teams.

    if that’s the case, that could have in fact also hindered any efforts to trade Green. Heck, it almost hindered Tatar being traded, given that he was where they went next at the last second.

    1. It’s not a grenade. Yzerman played this brilliantly. He used the possibility of adding Karlsson and Green as leverage in his negotiations with NYR. This also left everyone else paralyzed.

      Toronto didn’t address their blueline and instead added a washed up 4th line center. Big mistake.

      Boston added Nick Holden rather than McDonough. And then overpaid for an overrated Rick Nash. Not a huge improvement in my opinion.

      Washington made minor depth moves.

      Pittsburgh is the only other top contender to improve their roster. I like New Jersey’s additions, but I don’t think Tampa is worried about them.

      Tampa and Pitt appear set for a collision now…

      1. “This also left everyone else paralyzed.”

        Fatty,
        Not really. NYR could have accepted other trades if they were similar to TB’s. They held the cards on this one, not StevieY.

        It wouldn’t be a great idea for NYR not to be talking to other teams right up to the last minute.

        1. Well of course NYR was listening to other teams. But those other teams were paralyzed with Karlsson. If Tampa gets Karlsson then we better strike back with an overpayment for McDonough. We like Green, but if Tampa gets Karlsson then adding Green isn’t enough. So let’s put Green on hold and see what happens with Karlsson. Uh oh, this game of musical chairs is coming to a close. Sounds like Karlsson isn’t moving after all. Should we make this move for McDonough? No that’s a big asking price, especially since it looks like the only thing Tampa might do is add Mike Green.

          And then whammy. Yzerman finalizes McDonough at the last minute, leaving teams like Toronto, Washington, Boston, Pitt, Philly without even enough time to respond.

          1. Fatty,
            The Rangers could say yes to an offer whenever. They aren’t waiting on StevieY. The Rangers would have been smart to use Stevie’s offer and were expresses it through counter offers to other teams. The other GMs interested were either saying yes to NYR’s counter offers or no. It makes more sense that the NYR were holding back reporting the trade hoping another team would counter offer TBs.

            The only leverage StevieY could have used was to offer a sweetener to keep the Rangers from reporting the trade until the last minute. We will never know if that was the case or not.

            I don’t believe any offer for Karlsson was ever serious and probably no GM was thinking they’d land him either. The price for a player of his level is very high. IMO, the idea of shopping him now was to gauge which teams were seriously interested. A player of his skill is rarely moved during the trade deadline when they aren’t a UFA (no McD is not even close to Karlsson’s skill). Ottawa now knows who to talk to at Draft day and over the summer after they have had to chance to fully examine those team’s assets. They also now have a chance to resign Karlsson by making other moves to improve their team. They have $18 million in cap space this summer. If they brought in Tavares, that might keep Karlsson around. So, if anyone was using Karlsson to gum up the process it was probably Ottawa.

  9. TSN’s Scott Cullen:
    “Detroit needs to re-stock the cupboards and these three picks will certainly help in that effort. The first-round pick from Vegas is going to be late in the round, which tends to be a little better than 50% proposition that it turns into an NHL player. A second-round pick has about a one-in-three chance in becoming an NHL Player and a third-rounder has nearly a 28% chance of playing 100 NHL games.

    Now, it’s going to be some time before those picks come to fruition, if they ever do, but the Wings have 11 picks in the first three rounds of the next two drafts. For a team that needs to inject talent in the organization, that’s a good way to go about it. (Not trading pending free agent Mike Green is not necessarily the right way, but that’s another story.)

    With Tatar departing, that could open up more playing time for a young winger like Tyler Bertuzzi.

    Verdict: It’s not like the Golden Knights got Tatar inexpensively; they paid a significant price in terms of picks, but they are also a team that had accumulated a lot of picks, particularly in the future, and Tatar being under contract effectively gives them insurance against any potential losses in free agency. Nothing wrong with the rebuilding Wings making this deal, but credit the Golden Knights for using their draft pick currency to provide immediate help to their surprising playing team.”
    I think Craig Custance said that the Wings told Mike Green to not rush back for the neck injury. Good more for Green, good move from a class standpoint, bad move from a trade standpoint.

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