Category: Uncategorized

Allen: Michal Pradel to remain in the USHL this upcoming season

According to Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen, Red Wings goaltending prospect and 2025 draft pick Michal Pradel has decided to remain with the USHL’s Tri-City Storm after being drafted by the WHL’s Regina Pats in the CHL import draft:

Detroit Red Wings Slovak goalie draft pick Michal Pradel (75th, 2025) will stay with the Tri-City Storm rather than join the WHL’s Regina Pats. Pradel was the fourth overall pick in the CHL Import Draft.

That’s probably good news for the Red Wings because former Detroit assistant and NHL head coach John Torchetti is the Storm’s new head coach and director of hockey operations. This is a coach who understands the NHL development process.

Pradel was recently runner-up for Slovakia’s junior player of the year. He finished second to St. Louis Blues forward Dalibor Dvorsky who made his NHL debut at the end of the 2024-25 season.

Continued; Pradel eventually wants to play NCAA Division 1 hockey, but right now, he’s going to continue his USHL career. Pradel went 9-and-4 last season for Tri-City, finishing with a 2.41 goals-against average and .899 save percentage.

On retiring the Eurotwins’ numbers

Bleacher Report’s Joe Yerdon offers a list of 11 NHL alumni who should have their numbers retired by their NHL employers, and two of his picks are more or less “slam dunks”:

Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg, Detroit Red Wings

Seeing how long it took the Detroit Red Wings to honor Sergei Fedorov and retire his number made us wonder how long it might take for them to do the same with some of their more recent greats.

We’ve already seen them retire Nicklas Lidström’s No. 5 in 2014 and he wasn’t elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame until the following year. But two other more modern Red Wings are worthy of number retirements as well.

Pavel Datsyuk was elected to the Hall as part of the Class of 2024 and Henrik Zetterberg has been eligible for election since 2021. Both players were vital to helping them win the Stanley Cup in 2008 and returning to the Final the following year as well. Datsyuk was also part of the 2002 Cup championship team and was a human highlight reel throughout his career in Detroit.

Both players were brilliant defensive players and could score like mad. Datsyuk did so with moves that left jaws dropping while Zetterberg was more of a classic offensive player with a healthy mix of style and ability. Those Red Wings teams were a wealth of riches, but Datsyuk and Zetterberg joining the likes of Lidström made them frustrating to game-plan against.

The Red Wings have been mired in playoff darkness the past nine seasons and, sure, retiring Fedorov’s number could be seen as a way to help fill the building by more cynical fans, but if they were to honor Datsyuk and Zetterberg similarly, we doubt there’d be any complaining.

Continued; I don’t think that honoring Datsyuk or Zetterberg would be a cynical celebration, but the fact that the Red Wings are only offering single-game tickets to the Fedorov retirement game as part of a 5-game plan does make me roll my eyes at the team’s…Inflexibility.

I understand that the Wings are a business and that they’re here to make money as much as anything, and part of the team-fan marriage is acknowledging that you pay to watch hockey in some way, shape or form through your tickets, FanDuel Sports Network bill, etc., but I just think that tucking the Fedorov game into a 5-game plan is a little ruthless.

Again, that’s part of the bargain, but it strikes me as the wrong way to do things. When the Eurotwins’ numbers are retired, I don’t know whether things might change ticket-wise, but I can always hope.

Two days, two harsh critiques of the Red Wings organization

Yesterday, the Hockey News’s Adam Proteau suggested that Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman might very well be fired if his team isn’t at least playoff-relevant this upcoming season. Today, Proteau is deeming Yzerman’s team to be a franchise stuck in the “mushy middle“:

Detroit Red Wings

The Red Wings haven’t made the playoffs in nine seasons. Only the Sabres have spent more time out of the post-season.

At the same time, Detroit has picked in the top five of the draft just once in the past 35 years.

It’s difficult to land a generational talent when you’re not picking in the top five. The Red Wings have managed to get lucky and draft Simon Edvinsson (sixth overall in 2021), Lucas Raymond (fourth overall in 2020) and Moritz Seider (sixth overall in 2019) in recent years, but imagine what this team would look like with a few top three picks.

Don’t expect that trend to change anytime soon.

The Red Wings’ additions this summer, which include signing goalie John Gibson, won’t move the needle for them in the highly competitive Atlantic Division. Unless something drastic changes, Detroit is almost assuredly headed for another mediocre season.

Even if they do sneak into the post-season, the Wings will probably be roadkill against superior opponents. And that means more mushy middle developments for a franchise that once was the gold standard for NHL organizations.

Continued; I’m not going to deny that the Red Wings have had a tough road back from the late Ken Holland era, in which the last few years of drafting and developing were quite poor, to building up the Wings’ currently deep pool of prospects who are at least near developing into NHL players to reinforce the roster…

But if we’re gonna call Detroit “lucky” for drafting Edvinsson, Raymond and Seider, and we’re going to call them “roadkill” if they make the playoffs…

Continue reading Two days, two harsh critiques of the Red Wings organization

Tweet of note: NHL Network names Dylan Larkin 15th-best center

Good to see:

Per the NHL Network and NHL.com:

15. Dylan Larkin, Detroit Red Wings

The Red Wings captain is the ninth player in team history with four consecutive 30-goal seasons and the first to do it since Henrik Zetterberg from 2005-09. Last season, Larkin played all 82 games for the second time, finishing with 40 assists and 70 points, and had a goal and an assist in four games at the 4 Nations Face-Off to help the United States reach the championship game, a 3-2 overtime loss to Canada.

Continued; Larkin just turned 29, so he’s going to be a little older when the Red Wings return to playoff contention (hopefully this upcoming season?), but he should have many productive years ahead as he becomes one of the “old guard” holding up the mantle of the winged wheel.

A superb translation of a Sergei Fedorov interview with Match TV via…Uggg_uggg on Twitter

As we all know by now, Red Wings alumnus Sergei Fedorov will have his #91 raised to Little Caesars Arena’s rafters on January 12th, 2026 vs. Carolina.

Fedorov gave an interview to RG.com’s Sergey Demidov that was translated into English, and today, Fedorov gave an interview to Match-TV’s Pavel Lysenkov.

CBS Detroit’s Rachel Hopmayer noted that enigmatic Twitter user “Uggg_Uggg,” a long-time KHL follower, has given us a faithful translation of the article from Russian, and while I’m not a big believer in posting from people I don’t know…

This is a lot better than I could do with Google translate. So all the images which follow are from “Uggg_Uggg,” and are copyrighted as such.

Continue reading A superb translation of a Sergei Fedorov interview with Match TV via…Uggg_uggg on Twitter

Tweet of note via RWP, Ken Campbell: Red Savage to sign 2-year AHL deal with Rochester Americans

Via Red Wings Prospects on Twitter, the Hockey News’s Ken Campbell reports that former Red Wings prospect and outgoing Michigan State University captain Red Savage will be signing a 2-year AHL contract with the Buffalo Sabres’ AHL affiliate, the Rochester Americans:

Prospect preseason: Eddie Genborg scores 2 goals for Timra IK

Hockeysverige.se’s Konrad Gronlund reports that Red Wings prospect and 44th overall 2025 draft pick Eddie Genborg impressed in his first preseason game with Timra IK of the SHL, scoring two goals in an exhibition win over Skelleftea AIK.

IceHockeyGifs and Red Wings Prospects were all over Genborg’s first preseason goal:

Tweet of note: Kienan Draper named alternate captain for U of M hockey team

Red Wings prospect and University of Michigan senior Kienan Draper has been named an alternate captain for U of M this season:

Draper, 23, will face a pivotal season as the 6’2,” 209-pound right wing attempts to earn a bigger role on the Wolverines’ roster as he aims to earn a pro contract.

Khan weighs in on the Red Wings’ next retired numbers

Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff weighed in on the Red Wings’ next potential retired numbers this morning, and this afternoon, MLive’s Ansar Khan discusses the same topic:

It figures to be Pavel Datsyuk’s 13 or Henrik Zetterberg’s 40, perhaps both together, which would seem fitting. Each spent his entire NHL career in Detroit, and their careers overlapped considerably – Datsyuk from 2001-02 to 2015-16 and Zetterberg from 2002-03 to 2017-18, and their statistics are similar.

Datsyuk was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2024, his first year of eligibility. All nine Red Wings who’ve had their numbers retired, including Fedorov, are in the Hall. Zetterberg has not yet been selected to the Hall of Fame but appears to have a good chance.

Zetterberg ranks sixth in games (1,082) and fifth in goals (337), assists (623) and points (960) in franchise history. Datsyuk ranks ninth in games (953), eighth in goals (314), sixth in assists (604) and seventh in points (918) among Red Wings.

Both were top-notch defensive players; Datsyuk won the Selke Trophy as the league’s top defensive forward three times (from 2008 to 2010).

Goaltender Chris Osgood’s No. 30 is another jersey the franchise might consider retiring. Osgood ranks second to Sawchuk in games (565) and wins (317 of his 401) in club history. He won two Stanley Cups as a starter (1998 and 2008) and another as a back-up (1997).

Continued (paywall); I’m still a big believer in a “Ring of Honor” or Red Wings Hall of Fame to give players who were important to the franchise but aren’t quite headed to the rafters.