Here in Metro Detroit, we’ve mostly been focusing on how the Red Wings’ young players, defense and goaltenders might perform this upcoming season as the keys to Detroit’s success this upcoming season.
Yardbarker’s Alex Wiederspiel suggests that, instead, the Red Wings will need big performances from their veterans–think Andrew Copp, J.T. Compher, James van Riemsdyk, Patrick Kane, Ben Chiarot, Erik Gustafsson, etc.–to succeed:
Detroit Red Wings: Can the depth veterans perform? Detroit hasn’t gotten enough out of veteran forwards Andrew Copp and J.T. Compher. Compher, in particular, got pummeled in the high-danger chance battles. The Wings only had 41.2 percent of the high-danger chances with Compher on ice, according to Natural Stat Trick.
Continued; Larkin, DeBrincat, Raymond, Seider, Edvinsson, they’re all incredibly important parts of the Red Wings’ success, as is a rejuvenated John Gibson and a Cam Talbot facing a more realistic workload for a 38-year-old goaltender…
But if everything has to go right for the Red Wings to make the playoffs, that includes the veterans and “depth guys” and even the in-betweeners (Michael Rasmussen, Elmer Soderblom, Jonatan Berggren, Justin Holl, Travis Hamonic and Jacob Bernard-Docker included) all contributing on a more regular basis.
That’s not how a team works–some players play better than others on a given night–but over the course of the season, all the participants definitely need to row the boat in unison. That’s coach Todd McLellan’s task going into this upcoming season–to get the team going in the right direction, together.Get
