The Free Press’s Carlos Monarrez weighs in on the Red Wings’ decision to strip the captaincy from one Dylan Larkin:
It’s one thing for Larkin to ask for a trade – I can’t blame him for that, if it was based on a difficult relationship with Yzerman and a lack of faith in the team’s direction. But it’s quite another thing to now start acting as though there’s still some kind of “band of brothers” vibe.
So the Wings were right to strip Larkin of his “C.” They posted Friday that the season will start without a captain being named: “Any further discussions or decisions regarding this topic will be made once new hockey operations leadership is in place.”
But the Wings didn’t go far enough. They should have jumped right to naming defenseman Moritz Seider as captain – which is pretty much a no-brainer for whoever the new GM is. As I noted, though, the Wings are in leadership limbo, which makes it hard to make big organizational decisions.
Of course, I’m sure the Wings are setting this up as a major celebratory announcement when the time is right so that the new GM can get a public-relations win with some positive news, which the team has been sorely lacking for months.
But stripping a player of his captaincy and immediately naming his replacement isn’t unprecedented among the NHL ranks. After all, that’s what the Los Angeles Kings did in June 2016, naming Anze Kopitar as captain to replace Dustin Brown, whose production had slipped. Mind you, this was just two years removed from Brown captaining the Kings to two Stanley Cups in three years.
Continued (paywall) with this conclusion:
Sometimes it’s not about winning a trade or even being scared of setting the precedent that a player can dictate his terms. Sometimes, it’s just about moving forward.
The Wings took a small step in that direction with the news that Larkin would return but without his captaincy. Now they need to take bigger, bolder steps if they truly want to change the organization’s troubling trajectory.
