Month: October 2018

Tweets from Wings practice: Lines appear to be set as Wings prepare for Columbus

The Red Wings hit the ice at the BELFOR Training Center just before 11 AM on Wednesday morning, per Fox 2’s Sky Kerstein…


The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan said, “Hello”…

As did MLive’s Ansar Khan…


Here come the “FYI’s”:

Continue reading Tweets from Wings practice: Lines appear to be set as Wings prepare for Columbus

Kulfan posts a ‘Meet the Wings’ article; so does Khan

The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan has posted an article-via-photo-gallery in which he breaks down the Red Wings’ roster on a player-by-player basis:

JOE HICKETTS: AGE: 22. HT: 5-8. WT: 175. STATS (Grand Rapids, AHL): 67 games, 3 goals, 9 assists, 12 points. ANALYSIS: Not the biggest player around, but few have as big a heart and play with as much passion as Hicketts. He is likely to stay on the final roster until the veteran defensemen get healthy.
…
ANDREAS ATHANASIOU: AGE: 24. HT: 6-2. WT: 188. STATS: 71 games, 16 goals, 17 assists, 33 points. ANALYSIS: Given increased ice time in the preseason, Athanasiou was among the most impressive players on the roster. It’ll be interesting to watch if that carries over into the regular season
…
CHRISTOFFER EHN: AGE: 22. HT: 6-3. WT: 181. STATS (Sweden): 50 games, 7 goals, 10 assists, 17 points. ANALYSIS: The surprise of training camp, Ehn displayed skating ability, defensive know-how, quickness and enough offensive talent to make the final roster.

Continued

Update: Here’s more from MLive’s Ansar Khan:

Martin Frk

Continued

Update: Kulfan also penned previews of each and every one of the NHL’s 31 teams:

DETROIT RED WINGS

Coach: Jeff Blashill.

2017-18 record: 30-39-13 (73 points, 5th)

2017-18 leaders: G-Anthony Mantha, 24; A-Dylan Larkin, 47; W-Jimmy Howard, 22

Pressure is on: C Larkin — If the Wings are going to surprise in the standings, Larkin must continue to build upon a breakthrough year last season.

Rising star: C Michael Rasmussen — Center, wing, it doesn’t matter. Rasmussen appears to have the mental makeup and physical gifts to be a fine NHL player for a long, long time.

Skinny: The loss of C Henrik Zetterberg (back) will be felt on and off the ice. The key this season is making sure the bushel full of prospects continue growing into bona fide NHL players.

Via KK: CapFriendly posts Red Wings’ cap situation

Via Kukla’s Korner, I’ve been waiting for this Tweet: CapFriendly has posted the Red Wings‘ salary cap situation as adjusted for the team’s LTIR space and opening-night roster:

Update: As John noted on Twitter, the Wings can still utilize Franzen’s LTIR space as necessary. This is just the Wings’ initial cap-compliant, 23-man-roster-compliant set-up.

The Athletic’s Bultman discusses Filip Zadina’s situation in context

The Athletic’s Max Bultman examines Filip Zadina’s status as a Grand Rapids Griffin in context this morning. Bultman compares Zadina’s situation to those of three young players who first skated in the AHL in David Pastrnak, Mikko Rantanen and Alexander (and William) Nylander:

While plenty of prospects fill the AHL every year, it is somewhat unusual for players of Zadina’s lottery-pick pedigree to be there already at age 18 — largely because of rules preventing CHL players from doing so before they’re 20. Since many high draft picks are Canadian, those players either make the NHL or go back to juniors.

But with European players, the rules are different. They can play in the American league immediately. So as we look for recent comparables to Zadina’s current situation — forwards drafted in the top 10 who then played in the AHL that season — the pool is largely composed of European imports.

And as we’ll see, not all of those circumstances are identical to Zadina’s. But among the handful of players who have largely followed this path, there are a few important comparisons, and a couple key contrasts, that can teach us how we should evaluate Detroit’s acclaimed winger during his time in Grand Rapids.

We already more or less know the charge Detroit sent him down with. “Let’s go down and let’s figure out the space, how much space you have,” Detroit coach Jeff Blashill said Sunday. “And let’s gain that confidence, let’s get adjusted to it, and hopefully he fills the net down there and he’s demanding that he gets called back up.”

Continued (paywall)…

AdWeek: Red Wings performing well on social media

AdWeek’s David Cohen reports that the Red Wings are doing quite well on social media, taking the lead in several metrics:

Windsor’s ‘Autumn Kings’ earn a spot on the Wings’ playlist

According to the CTV News Windsor, a band from Windsor, Ontario has found their latest single in heavy rotation at Red Wings games:

The Autumn Kings song “Devil in Disguise” has been in rotation during the Wings pre-season games, and the band hopes it will be the exclusive goal song as the NHL regular season kicks off on Thursday.

“It started with a cold email to one of the people working at the organization,” says lead guitarist Jake Diab. “We simply sent them our track and said ‘What do you think?’ Everyone’s telling us on our high school tour and all of our fans that this is the perfect hockey song.”

Diab says the decision hasn’t been made yet, but for him it is still an honour.

“I’m a life-long Wings fan. It was my dream go to the NHL when I was younger,” says Diab. “That ended up falling though the cracks, but you know what we made up for it in other ways. We’re getting played in the arena now.”

Continued, and here’s their tune:

 

Morning news: Regarding the Wings’ competitiveness, Zadina in the AHL, a Ben Simon interview and a Blue Jackets game preview

Of Red Wings-related note this morning:

1. MLive’s Ansar Khan wrote an article discussing five season-opening questions surrounding this year’s Wings team, including what I’ll call an underrated topic:

Will they be harder to play against? Several players said this was the most grueling training camp they’ve experienced as coach Jeff Blashill emphasized skating and competing.

The theme was “Sixty Minutes of Hell,” which Blashill borrowed from former Arkansas basketball coach Nolan Richardson, who coined the expression “Forty Minutes of Hell” in the early 1990s.

They hope to compensate for a lack of talent by outworking opponents and being harder to play against. They want to play more north-south, forecheck more aggressively, force more turnovers and spend more time in the offensive zone.

Khan continues, and I would suggest that the Wings’ collective “compete level” may very transcend any personnel questions…
2. 97.1 The Ticket’s Pat Caputo expresses discontent with the Red Wings’ decision to send Filip Zadina to Grand Rapids for the start of the 2018-19 season, in both text and video form:

Continue reading Morning news: Regarding the Wings’ competitiveness, Zadina in the AHL, a Ben Simon interview and a Blue Jackets game preview

Filip Zadina, Ben Simon talk to Fox 17 about Zadina’s AHL start

Fox 17’s Jason Hutton spoke with Red Wings prospect and Grand Rapids Griffins forward Filip Zadina, and his coach, Ben Simon, regarding Zadina’s status as a Griffin:

 

Prospect round-up: SHL underway; JvP on the move(?) and Filip Larsson injured

Of prospect-related note:

In the SHL, Jonatan Berggren took 1 shot and finished at +1 in 10:02 of ice time in Skelleftea AIK’s 2-1 win over the Vaxjo Lakers;

In a battle of Wings prospects, Malte Setkov finished at -1 in 10:08 of ice time as his Malmo Redhawks lost 2-1 to the Frolunda Indians, whose Gustav Lindstrom finished even in 21:40 of ice time;

And in the…Dansk Metal League, it turns out that Joren van Pottelberghe has been loaned to the Rungsted Seier Capitals from HC Davos of the Swiss NLA League (and it looks like Davos is going with its current goalies, Gilles Senn and Anders Lindback, so expect a move of some permanence soon)…

And JvP stopped 12 of 14 shots as Rungsted Seier won 7-2 over the Odense Bulldogs. The information regarding JvP’s loaning comes from both EliteProspects and Red Wings Prospects on Twitter, who notes that the Dansk Metal League’s website is…rustic. If not ancient.

If you missed it, there’s bad news regarding Filip Larsson from the University of Denver Pioneers:

Denver Pioneers men’s hockey freshman goalie Filip Larsson is out indefinitely with a lower-body injury, Richard and Kitzia Goodman Head Coach David Carle announced on Monday.

Larsson, a Detroit Red Wings prospect, recorded a league-leading 1.65 goals against average and .941 save percentage for the Tri-City Storm of the United States Hockey League (USHL) during the 2017-2018 season. The Stockholm, Sweden native was named 2018 USHL Goaltender of the Year, named to the 2018 All-USHL First Team and won a silver medal with Sweden at the 2018 World Junior Championship.

Krupa on aggressiveness in rebuilding

The Detroit News’s Gregg Krupa weighs in on the Red Wings’ rebuilding process this evening, suggesting that the Wings should be more aggressive in giving younger players greater roles on the team. Krupa notes that the Wings do have some youth moving up the roster, but he feels that it’s not quite enough:

Five new guys, is a radical departure. But, the Wings did dispatch their promising 2018 first round pick, sixth overall, 18-year-old Filip Zadina, to Grand Rapids.

The roster has been in flux since Mike Babcock described it that way as early as 2012-13. Regardless, the players and coaches say the will strive for the playoffs.

The true purpose of the season, however, is plainly development.

The approach should be: If the development is good enough, the playoffs may come. But given the status of the roster, do not expect them.

If that is how the season trends, the Red Wings should provide more playing time for prospects and consider any diminished performance advantageous for the lottery.

Krupa continues, and I have two points of polite disagreement with his take:

  1. Contractually, it’s really damn hard for Wings GM Ken Holland to dissolve the bonds he’s made with older players…
  2. And it serves no purpose to teach “the kids” that losing-through-learning is an acceptable means of playing a professional sport, so…
  3. I’m expecting the Wings to lose a lot of close games again this year because their talent level is iffy, but I do hope that they are competitive and play with pride and attention to detail, even if finishing in the draft lottery is once again the “better” option.