The Athletic has been posting its 2023-2024 season team previews in order of finish, and the fact that the Red Wings are paired with the Arizona Coyotes does not bode well for Shayna Goldman and Dom Luszczyszyn’s belief in the team’s ability to compete…
Steve Yzerman put in a lot of work this offseason to clean up the Red Wings roster. It just didn’t lead to the big jump that some people might have expected. The Red Wings aren’t out of the woods yet, and it honestly doesn’t even feel like they’re that close either. Not unless a lot of things change this year — especially if the goal is building an actual Cup contender, not just a run-of-the-mill playoff team.
Those are all things that do have potential to change and if you squint hard enough it’s not difficult to see that “14 percent” chance of making the playoffs turn into 100 percent. It’s just that there are a lot of teams above Detroit in the East that don’t need as many things going unexpectedly right for them.
Maybe it all works out with young players taking much bigger steps than expected while all the new faces mesh well into the system. Maybe. From this vantage point, there are just a few too many ifs and buts to suggest this is a clear-cut playoff team. In what feels like a make-or-break year for the “Yzerplan” that’s a worrying sign.
Detroit does not have a bad team. This is the best Red Wings team in years where the playoffs are an actual possibility. But that’s a low bar to clear for a Red Wings team that still needs to prove it’s actually a good team. On paper, they look below average to start.
Continued; and Luszczyszyn wrote a separate article which pans Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman’s patient rebuilding methods, which are arguably in the middle of a longer rebuilding process, as an “Yzerplan” which must break through this season, or it’s a failure:
The best-case scenario is that it works: Larkin and Seider become franchise players this season, other young players progress, and a path to contention becomes immediately apparent.
That’s a successful “Yzerplan,” but it needs to work sooner rather than later because any other alternative is far more harrowing.
If Larkin isn’t “The Guy” after all and doesn’t show as much this season, then the Red Wings spent the last few years betting on a now elder-20s center to lead them to the mushy middle where their Cup chances and their ability to get a player that can actually improve those chances on Seider’s timeline are very both low. It’s a path that could lead to them repeating the same process with Seider in five years’ time.
While there’s potential for the Red Wings to break through, there’s also a chance of being completely stuck for years to come with a team that could be playoff caliber, but not good enough to realistically contend.
It may not feel like a make-or-break year four years after Yzerman took over. If the goal is Cup contention with Larkin though, then Yzerman has certainly positioned the team with what feels like a losing hand.
Continued (paywall);
- Dylan Larkin isn’t “old” at 27;
- The rebuild is not over, regardless of whether the Red Wings make the playoffs this upcoming season;
- Sometimes one has to be patient with a rebuilding team, and it sucks to be patient, but the reality of the situation is that Yzerman spent three years tearing down what Ken Holland left him, and now he’s spent 3 years building the nucleus of a team which will succeed down the road. That’s not a failure–that’s the reality of rebuilding in today’s NHL, especially if you don’t have draft lottery luck.
