The Free Press’s Carlos Monarrez shares a popular opinion this morning regarding one Stephen Gregory Yzerman’s offseason “save“:
Steve Yzerman never played goalie, but maybe the Detroit Red Wings general manager should have, because he sure made some big saves this week with his trade for Ottawa Senators forward — and Farmington Hills product —Alex DeBrincat.
He saved what was shaping up to be another ho-hum, borderline-meh offseason of free agency.
He saved Wings fans from having to lie to themselves about their faith in “the Yzerplan” as they winced and pushed the “renew season tickets” button on their accounts.
And he just might have saved himself, because if you can park your trade euphoria long enough, just imagine the fallout if Yzerman had whiffed on his attempt to acquire DeBrincat. Imagine what kind of indictment this would have been on Yzerman and his rebuild if DeBrincat had balked at signing an extension with the Wings, nixing the deal.
Instead, Yzerman saved himself and any hope the Wings and their fans have of being more than playoff pipe dreamers this season. He did it by using what got him to the Hockey Hall of Fame as a player: his vision. And so he scored the Wings’ biggest acquisition since he took over in 2019.
Continued; as I said the other day, Steve Yzerman works on his own timeline, and he isn’t afraid of taking slings and arrows from the media or his own team’s fans in order to make his team better.
Sometimes he makes mistakes, to be certain, but he generally tends to make the smarter, subtler, more demonstrative set of decisions as he attempts to slowly rebuild the Red Wings into a team with a stable, playoff-contending roster.
None of us are happy where the “state of the rebuild” is right now, and that includes Yzerman, but he’s doing his best to avail himself of the tools he possesses (the draft, free agency and trades) in order to rectify the Red Wings’ competitive issues.
In all honesty, it’s very trendy to bash Steve Yzerman right now, so I believe that it’s a good thing that he doesn’t give a shit about the state of his reputation among media types.
